Aspects of Gypsy Traveller Life / Shamus McPhee

An Exhibition by Shamus McPhee as part of Gypsy Maker 1

Shamus McPhee’s exhibition explores the ways in which art and activism are employed in his work to disseminate ideas, and how the resulting art artworks operate as integral to his pursuit of cultural visibility and recognition. The exhibition, ‘Aspects of Gypsy Traveller Life’, consists of new works which examine attitudes witnessed in the social response to Gypsy Traveller culture in Scotland. McPhee’s paintings interpret the discrete outcomes borne of policies of banishment and rejection. Here he shows us different modes of living and the cumulative effects of continuous oppressive practice. Quintessential cultural characters from Gypsy Traveller life are celebrated throughout these powerful and thought provoking artworks. McPhee laments the exponential loss of common ground and traditional stopping-places but, moreover, he arraigns the unethical hierarchical marshalling of land ownership by virtue of inherited birth right, through the eyes and experiences linked to family connections.