Successful VACMA 2024/25 Autumn Applicants Announced

The Visual Artist and Craft Maker Awards (VACMA) are a programme of small grant schemes delivered in partnership with a range of local authorities and art organisations across Scotland. The schemes are managed locally by these partners. VACMA offers fixed bursaries of £500 and £1,000. The purpose of these bursaries is to support visual artists and craft makers in their creative and professional development.

During this round, we had 6 successful applicants:

• Jenny Sturgeon
• Yolanda Bruce
• Alannah Spence
• Linda Newington
• Sarah Hornby
• Aimee Labourne

You can find out more about these artists and their projects below.

Applications for VACMA's Winter deadline (4 February 2025) are now open. Find out more here.

Jenny Sturgeon

"In recent years, I have been drawn to the intersection of nature and the human experience, seeking to explore deeper emotional and symbolic narratives in my work. This has led me to want to develop a more experimental approach—I want to push the boundaries of my practice and invite new perspectives on the connection between the self and the surrounding world. My work is driven by a desire to experiment and immerse myself in fresh creative directions.

This bursary will provide essential support for me to develop my mixed-media and printmaking skills through a project exploring the menstrual cycle; a theme rich with personal and universal significance. The funding will allow me to connect my body with my practice, dedicate time and resources to experiment with new techniques, materials, and approaches that can be used to reflect the cyclical nature of menstruation. I plan to explore organic forms, patterns, themes, and rhythms inspired by both the physical and emotional aspects of the cycle."

Yolanda Bruce

"As a recent graduate, I am busy establishing my own art practice beyond the confines of university. While working part time, I am looking at what my artistic practice is. I am currently exploring sculpture and photography but I am also keen to continue my printmaking.

At present, I am unable to pursue this part of my art practice due to lack of equipment. This bursary will enable me to purchase the necessary equipment and give me a start to establishing this part of my practice. It will also give me the opportunity to explore and create collagraphs including the current series I wish to work on. It will also allow me to explore other printing options including lino and wood cuts."

Sarah Hornby

Sarah is an interdisciplinary queer artist and hereditary practicing witch from the Shetland islands. Her work mainly undertakes practice-based research and is a fusion of ancient mysticism and contemporary expression, exploring the liminal spaces where art and magic intersect. Recently, her artistic practice has been investigating the ecological wellbeing of the planet. Exploring the importance of the natural world as portrayed through the powers of nature within witchcraft.

"I plan on investigating illustration thoroughly as a whole subject, exploring its rich potential as a storytelling medium. My focus will be on working with various traditional materials on paper, such as ink, watercolour, coloured pencils and marker pens, alongside digital techniques to create a multifaceted body of work. I am particularly interested in illustrating themes drawn from local folklore and witchcraft, reflecting on humanity’s intricate relationship with the natural world."

Alannah Spence

"I’ve forever felt drawn to capture the beautiful complexities of what it is to question being human. Through both a harmonious contrast of realism and expressionist layers I focus primarily on painting both portraits and figurative works in acrylic paint. I’ve always found the process of the developing stage to be my most authentic means of being an artist, relishing the unpredictable nature of expression and play in paint, as often experienced in the unpredictability of embracing authentic life.

I hope to explore new developments from the painted surface upwards. I seek to explore painting not on traditional canvas and wood but to paint onto the transparent surface of plastic perspex. I believe this will allow for a natural progression from painting in an expressive layered style to a more physically layered development."

Aimee Labourne

"Through drawing, a process which unfolds over time, I explore our interconnection with nature and its constant flux. By creating images with moving focus and boundless space, allowing the eye and imagination to wander through, I wish to evoke how we experience landscape by moving through it. Working both in the landscape, and from collected visual material about nature, I explore an interplay between 'realism' and uncertainty, expressive of humankind's complex ideas around nature.

This bursary would enable a new body of work about landscape and the body. Through testing and researching monoprint processes, I would expand on recent preoccupations with chance and imagination in my drawings, exploring anthropomorphism in this media which has an inherent sense of endless possibility."

Linda Newington

"I have become a painter AND printmaker having developed my skills in collagraph and monotype printmaking over recent years, previous VACMA awards have contributed towards that development.

I would like to investigate and research the wood cutting print process to add to my range of skills in producing prints alongside collagraph and monotype printmaking, my paintings in mixed media and watercolour, drawing too. I realise I enjoy the challenge of learning new processes by first finding out about the technique and artists who have worked using it, and then developing my own approach."

Thumbnail Image: Yolanda Bruce. Banner Image: Linda Newington.