Glasgow's 1999 Design Medal shortlist announced
The Lighthouse, Scotland’s national Architecture and Design Centre, has unveiled the shortlist for the fifth Glasgow 1999 Design Medal.
Created as a lasting legacy of Glasgow 1999, UK City of Architecture and Design, the Medal and a £1,000 travel bursary are presented annually to a graduate from one of the city’s Further or Higher Education institutions. This year’s winner will be announced on Thursday 29 January.
The Medal will be presented at a special ceremony by leading British furniture and product designer, Michael Marriott.
An exhibition of work by the shortlisted designers will be on show in The Lighthouse until early May 2009.
“Glasgow is celebrated as a centre of design innovation,” says Nick Barley, executive director of The Lighthouse, “and the city’s further and higher education institutions make a massive contribution to the strength of its creative community. The Glasgow 1999 Design Medal recognises the key role that these institutions play in nurturing young talent and celebrates a new generation of designers whose vision, skill and creativity will be vital to the future strength of the UK economy.”
The twelve designers making the short list for the prestigious award this year cover the full range of design disciplines with product design engineering showcased alongside textiles, ceramics and jewellery, as well as graphic design.
Two visual communication partnerships make it on to this year’s short list.
Pamela Cuthill and Claudine Cockburn have produced a limited edition book illustrated with a series of powerful and poignant documentary images, artefacts and memorabilia presenting the moving story of a young soldier’s fight to re-build his life after suffering horrific injuries in Iraq.
Meanwhile, Silje Eirin Aure and Victoria Kastenbauer’s Argyle Socks and Sandals explores the social history of Glasgow’s Argyle Street – a thoroughfare with a diverse range of residential, retail and industrial spaces – through a series of observational drawings.
All four designers are graduates of the Visual Communications course at the Glasgow School of Art.
The judging panel this year was chaired Don McIntyre, head of the Urban Learning Space at The Lighthouse, and comprised of textile and furniture designer, Donna Wilson; Fraser Bruce, a Lecturer in Product Design Engineering at Duncan of Jordonstone, University of Dundee; Former Scottish Young Designer of the Year Oskar Kron of Skratch Design; and Christina Jansen, director of The Scottish Gallery.