Alec Finlay
Alec Finlay was born in Scotland in 1966. He is an artist and poet whose work crosses over a range of media and forms, encompassing permanent and temporary interventions and work embedded in the landscape or found online.
The son of concrete poet, Ian Hamilton Finlay, he set up the Morning Star small press in the 1990s, which published the wide-ranging Folios and the pocketbooks series.
Much of his work is focused on integration between poetry and the environment; his 2018 installation at Southwark Park Galleries features 20 short poems emblazoned on bird boxes throughout the park while his collaboration with The Walking Library and poet Ken Cockburn resulted in Wild City, Fiadh-Bhaile, Orasul Salbatic (2018)- a documentation of public readings and participative walks.
He has held a number of residencies; in 2002 he was the first BALTIC artist in residence, more recently, the John Muir Trust Residency in Dunbar in 2017. He has exhibited at the Sydney Biennale, and in 2016 had an artwork permanently installed at Jupiter Artland. He has produced many public artworks, including a 2014 Memorial for Organ and Tissue Donors at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh. Also in 2014 he worked with The National Trust and other artists to carry out a project commemorating the centenary of the start of the First World War.
In collaboration with Ken Cockburn, Lucy Richards, Kate McAllan, Alistar Letch and with contributions from hundreds of others, Finley created the Covid Memorial I Remember, for Pollok Country Park, Glasgow, 2022, and published the accompanying book.
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Further Information
From the Library Catalogue
Learning Resources
National Poetry Day 2022 Teaching Resource: Circle Poems
An easy to use and fun circle poem teaching resource created specially for National Poetry Day 2022. For primary or secondary classes.
