Anne Bevan’s sculpture and installations explore invisible or hidden structures that are part of everyday life; the flow of water through pipe systems, objects uncovered from the history of obstetrics, the movement of the tide, the geology, ecology and energy of shore and sea.
She develops projects through a range of media including sculpture, photography and video. Her interest in interdisciplinary and collaborative practices has seen her working with many people from different specialisms, including archaeology, anthropology, geology, marine science, creative writing, film and music. This dialogue brings new connections and conversations, along with new ways of understanding our relationship to place and the environment.
“Movement, change, transformation. Paused for a moment through casting, making, forming, a shift of materials, images, sounds and words. I’m interested in the fluidity of things, the world, and how we move in it, how we might pause and imagine beyond this moment in time…”
(Anne Bevan)
BIOGRAPHY
Anne Bevan was born in 1965 in Orkney where she now lives and works. She studied Fine Art and Sculpture at Edinburgh University and Edinburgh College of Art (1983-88) and has undertaken numerous national and international exhibitions, residencies and commissions. This includes solo exhibitions at the Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh (2000), Hunterian Museum, Glasgow (2004) and the Pier Arts Centre, Orkney (1997, 2017); group exhibitions include Ocean Imaginaries at RMIT Melbourne, Australia (2017); Here and Now, Scottish Art 1990 – 2001, Aberdeen Art Gallery and Dundee Contemporary Arts (2001).
Residencies include the IAAB International Artists Residency Programme in Basel (2000), Hoherweg Studios Dusseldorf (2004) and RSA residencies for Scotland in Shetland (2010) and Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop (2025). Public art commissions include Source, Pier Art Centre (2001), Moon Pool, Tyrebagger Forrest, Aberdeen (2002), and Tang, Stromness Primary School (2015). She is Academician (Elect) of the Royal Scottish Academy.
She has developed several collaborative works with the writer Janice Galloway, composers Pete Stollery and Gemma McGregor, marine scientist Kate Darling from University of Edinburgh and archaeologist Mark Edmonds.
Since returning to live in Orkney in 2013 Anne has focused her work on themes relating to her home community, including as Artist in Residence for Orkney Beside the Ocean of Time (2016-17), and TRANSECTs a major UKRI research project looking at energy transitions in relation to coastal communities (2024 – 2028).
Throughout her career Anne has taught and been involved in research, including working as Lecturer at Edinburgh College of Art (1991 – 2013) and Curriculum Leader for Art & Design with UHI Orkney (2013-2024). She currently works part time as a lecturer and researcher with the UHI Archaeology Institute.
The Stone Wave
On this great beach a wild
Atlantic storm
Sculptures in stone its huge
and wavelike form.
(Robert Rendall, 1957)
at the heart of it is motion
and water always water in which
motion is perpetual
if there were such things as
apples of the moon, they would float in air,
as silver, sure, as this
(Janice Galloway, 2013)