Stills Centre for Photography, in Edinburgh, is thrilled to announce that their exhibition for EAF25 (Edinburgh Art Festival) will be a presentation of Siân Davey’s, The Garden. This will be the first showing of the work in Scotland, and Stills will be the first gallery in the UK to exhibit many of the images featured in The Garden photo book published by Trolley Books.
Beginning in 2020, Siân Davey and her son Luke spent three years transforming her abandoned garden into a haven of wildflowers grown from locally sourced seeds and bulbs. Davey fostered biodiversity; encouraging wildlife to flourish amongst the plant life.
As the transformation took place, the garden wall became a space shared by Siân and the local community to exchange stories and experiences. When the garden blossomed, Siân and Luke called on those beyond the garden wall to enter. Capturing moments of reflection and closeness shared between families, friends and couples. The Garden was born, a space for heartbreak, healing, joy and connection.
Siân Davey says,
“Why don’t we fill our back garden with wildflowers and bees, and the people we meet over the garden wall – we’ll invite them in to be photographed by you.” This is what my son Luke announced in the kitchen, midwinter, our back garden abandoned for at least ten years. The Garden is a pilgrimage, an intentional act to cultivate a garden that is grounded in love: a reverential offering to humanity. When the flowers opened, they called in the community. The mothers and daughters, the lonely, the marginalised, new lovers, the traumatised and heartbroken and those that had concealed a lifetime of shame. As the garden evolved it became an expression of sexuality, yearning, joy and interconnectedness. Those who entered reflected back to me my history and who I had become. I saw myself in everyone.
The garden became a metaphor for the human heart. Everyone has a place in our garden. I am the garden. Those who enter are the garden. Without distinction, without separation”
Vivienne Gamble, Director, Stills Centre for Photography, said,
Bringing this work to Scotland for the first time marks an exciting step in our 2025 programme. The work has so many ways to experience it; and a human angle we can all relate to and will have experienced in some way”
Kim McAleese, Director, EAF says,
“We are delighted that this captivating body of work will be on show during EAF25. The themes of care, community and resilience are core themes for the festival, and this show exemplifies that”
About Siân Davey
Siân DaveySiân Davey is a photographer and founder of The Creative Body Process. She has a background in fine art and social policy and worked for fifteen years as a Humanist Psychotherapist. In 2007, following a visit to the Louise Bourgeois retrospective at Tate Modern, London, she was inspired to translate her personal history into a creative practice. In 2011, she moved into photography, drawing upon her history to inform her practice. In 2014 Davey completed an MA in Photography at the University of Plymouth, followed by an MFA in 2016.
Her awards include the Arnold Newman Award for New Directions in Photographic Portraiture, New York (2016), the Prix Virginia, Paris (2016) and the Royal Photographic Society Hood Medal (2017) and Honorary Fellowship (2023). Her work was selected in three consecutive years (2015 - 2017) for the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, London. She has been a recipient of a W. Eugene Smith Fellowship (2019), commissioned by the Wellcome Photography Prize (2019) and been a nominee for the Prix Elysée (2023 and more recently the Prix Pictet.
Her work has been exhibited internationally in both solo and group shows, including at Aperture, New York (2018); Deichtorhallen, Hamburg (2021); Richard Saltoun Gallery, London (2021); and Images Vevey, Switzerland (2022). She is represented by Michael Hoppen Gallery, London, and has been included in numerous exhibitions and art fairs with the gallery.
Davey's work is held by various collections including the Science Museum, London; the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Bristol and the National Portrait Gallery London, the Centre national des arts Plastiques, Paris; and the Martin Parr Foundation.
The Garden is Sian's third book with Trolley Books following Looking for Alice (2015) and Martha (2018). Looking For Alice was shortlisted for the Paris Photo/Aperture Foundation First PhotoBook Awards (2016) and for the Kraszna-Krausz Foundation Book Awards (2017).
She lives and works in Totnes, Devon.
About Stills
Stills is a centre for photography based in the heart of Edinburgh. We offer exhibitions and production facilities as well as a range of engagement opportunities for anyone to discover, enjoy and understand photography. Stills was established in 1977. Since that time it has become a champion for the important and powerful role that the medium of photography plays in the world today. This exhibition has been organised in line with Stills’ commitment to annual presentations of internationally-renowned work that has not previously been exhibited in Scotland.
EAF (Edinburgh Art Festival) is the UK’s largest annual festival of visual art, and will return 7 - 24 August 2025. Founded in 2004, we work with local and international partners to present an ambitious and meaningful programme of exhibitions, events and projects across the city.
Since its beginnings, EAF has featured exhibitions including international and UK artists at a pivotal point in their career alongside the best emerging talent, major survey exhibitions of historic figures, and a programme of newly commissioned artworks that respond to historic sites in the city.
We support Scottish and international artists to make new and ambitious projects which engage with the extraordinary context of Edinburgh in August. Presented principally in public spaces, our projects allow access to overlooked or neglected stories or spaces in our city’s heritage.
EAF’s year-round community engagement programme has long-term relationships and partnerships across the city, creating relevant and memorable experiences with artists. We invite local people to explore culture, community, the city and self-expression, and value, with many festival projects reflecting this unique creative relationship.
Partners for EAF: the Community Wellbeing Collective; National Galleries Scotland; Jupiter Artland; Edinburgh Printmakers; Sett Studios; Collective; Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop; The Scottish Gallery; Travelling Gallery; Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh; Ingleby; Dovecot Studios; The King’s Gallery; National Museum of Scotland; Talbot Rice Gallery; Edinburgh College of Art; Edinburgh Futures Institute; Stills Centre for Photography; Fruitmarket; City Art Centre.
