2012 – Scotland’s Year of Creativity? Where’s the engagement with the creatives?
With apologies to any of you who have already read my post over on our facebook page about his video. I think it deserves a wider audience.
So, 2012 is the designated year for us to celebrate Scotland’s creativity according to Visit Scotland. An idea I’m ecstatic to get behind, make no mistake about it but I can’t help thinking that in celebrating the embarrassment of riches that our land is blessed with in terms of creative talent there would have been THOUSANDS of better examples that Visit Scotland could have used.
Our country has produced one of the top names in fashion design. We have internationally-renowned acting talent (I’m claiming Emma Thompson as a Glaswegian, okay?) galore. The most famous (and best) 007 of all delivered milk to the whole of Scotland – if you believe your granny. For such a cold & wet country, we have some outstanding comedy talent and musicians who can break your heart. We have an enormous, thriving independant business scene driven by creatives who we aspire to emulate.
At this point I haven’t even touched on the artists, the indie designers, the authors – but I hope that I have clearly demonstrated the depth of creative talent immediately on hand in our beautiful country.
Which is why this advert has broken my heart.
Now don’t get me wrong, I am a massive fan of the Aurora Borealis and I don’t know anyone who gets as excited as I do at fireworks. But when showcasing the creativity of a nation don’t these things seem rather out of place?
I hope that my tone is not bitter, because my emotions are not. I’m extremely sad that this ostentatious opportunity to advertise the cream of the crop – the very best that Scotland has to offer creatively – has been bodged and I hope that anyone reading this blog post will take a moment to explore the talents of some of the people I have linked to, and many of the people I have missed because we are truly blessed in this country to have the talent that we have.
I am passionate about the arts in Scotland, and do agree with you, but a creative piece of video to stimulate a mindset of Scotland + Arts and ‘be surprised by it’ in 40 seconds is always going to be limited.
I actually prefer this clip from Scottish Government which says more about Scotland than Visitscotland does, and is one I use on my own website: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-pAXrP4J38