Please Keep - Edinburgh Art Festival
The People’s Story Museum, Edinburgh, August 2025
For EAF25, Hamish Halley presented please keep, a poignant video piece that intertwines two narratives: the intimate act of cleaning his grandparents’ home after their passing and the monumental transition of the Perth Museum’s collection to a new space. Hosted in the People’s Story Museum, the installation reflected on custodianship, preservation, loss, and renewal.
please keep, video, 2025, (00:20:00)
![]()
![]()
![]()
The People’s Story Museum, Edinburgh, August 2025
For EAF25, Hamish Halley presented please keep, a poignant video piece that intertwines two narratives: the intimate act of cleaning his grandparents’ home after their passing and the monumental transition of the Perth Museum’s collection to a new space. Hosted in the People’s Story Museum, the installation reflected on custodianship, preservation, loss, and renewal.
please keep, video, 2025, (00:20:00)
Install photography by Murray Orr
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Solar Solar - Shoot the Lobster
5 Florence Street, Glasgow, June 2025.
Group show featuring Trinity Bavaria, Aitor González, Xingzi Gu, Hamish Halley, Cherry Handforth, Violet Handforth, Brody Mace-Hopkins, Sophie Howe, Eunjo Lee, Rowan Mace, Hayley Tompkins, Sue Tompkins, Honey Webster, Sgàire Wood, and Yuki Xu
“When we face the Sun, what we desire and is warm and red behind the eyelids, we stand opposite our shadow. We can only see the past, it is our material to work with, we cannot see the future. So we live in the in-between space and have to create and love from a place of in-betweenness: enlightened and dense, near and far, light and dark, presence and absence, material and immaterial, Love and the hollowed out space that it is able to fill. A body made of light. Solar Solar is meant as an incantation, shedding light on the grouping of international artists based in the UK and NYC.” – Violet Handforth.
How to Make Your Own Gravity Well, 2025, synthetic fabrics, Shetland wool, beeswax, duck feathers, pins (100x100cm)
He was conceived at the bottom of the field there, 2022, plant dyed cotton, linen, silk, viscose and wool, stuffed with Scots Timothy hay (100x100cm)
5 Florence Street, Glasgow, June 2025.
Group show featuring Trinity Bavaria, Aitor González, Xingzi Gu, Hamish Halley, Cherry Handforth, Violet Handforth, Brody Mace-Hopkins, Sophie Howe, Eunjo Lee, Rowan Mace, Hayley Tompkins, Sue Tompkins, Honey Webster, Sgàire Wood, and Yuki Xu
“When we face the Sun, what we desire and is warm and red behind the eyelids, we stand opposite our shadow. We can only see the past, it is our material to work with, we cannot see the future. So we live in the in-between space and have to create and love from a place of in-betweenness: enlightened and dense, near and far, light and dark, presence and absence, material and immaterial, Love and the hollowed out space that it is able to fill. A body made of light. Solar Solar is meant as an incantation, shedding light on the grouping of international artists based in the UK and NYC.” – Violet Handforth.
How to Make Your Own Gravity Well, 2025, synthetic fabrics, Shetland wool, beeswax, duck feathers, pins (100x100cm)
He was conceived at the bottom of the field there, 2022, plant dyed cotton, linen, silk, viscose and wool, stuffed with Scots Timothy hay (100x100cm)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dancing figures, time it begs, Moving works with fleeting legs, Marytwo Gallery, Luzern, Switzerland, March 2025.
Group show featuring Samantha Aquilino, Cheryl Donegan, Martine Gutierrez, Hamish Halley, K8 Hardy, NIC Kay, Mark Leckey, Joe Moss
In Nicky Tams, we hear Hamish Halley learning the verses of the Scottish folk song ‘Nicky Tams’ from his grandfather on the family farm in Perthshire. Framed by this sonic memory, Halley dyes fabrics with vegetable dyes, creating a direct link to his textile practice. This multi-layered exploration of family, memory, and tradition weaves together personal moments and cultural heritage. Featuring Halley’s family and everyday rural life, the work reconstructs a ballad through generational conversations and lived experience.
Through these interwoven elements, Nicky Tams becomes more than a document of a place – it offers a way of seeing shaped by Halley’s upbringing. It reflects on the transmission of knowledge within the family while inviting viewers to step into another’s experience and share multiple perspectives through the work.
Nicky Tams, 2021, digital video (00:10:09)
Group show featuring Samantha Aquilino, Cheryl Donegan, Martine Gutierrez, Hamish Halley, K8 Hardy, NIC Kay, Mark Leckey, Joe Moss
In Nicky Tams, we hear Hamish Halley learning the verses of the Scottish folk song ‘Nicky Tams’ from his grandfather on the family farm in Perthshire. Framed by this sonic memory, Halley dyes fabrics with vegetable dyes, creating a direct link to his textile practice. This multi-layered exploration of family, memory, and tradition weaves together personal moments and cultural heritage. Featuring Halley’s family and everyday rural life, the work reconstructs a ballad through generational conversations and lived experience.
Through these interwoven elements, Nicky Tams becomes more than a document of a place – it offers a way of seeing shaped by Halley’s upbringing. It reflects on the transmission of knowledge within the family while inviting viewers to step into another’s experience and share multiple perspectives through the work.
Nicky Tams, 2021, digital video (00:10:09)
poster design by Fabien Fretz
Install photos by ©marytwo