Letter: Merger trial

Regarding the proposed merger between the Edinburgh College of Art and the University of Edinburgh, Professor Ian Howard (Letters, 8 January) puzzles me.

Research is concerned with that which exists (including that which is not yet known to exist).

Art, on the other hand, has no existence; only a work of art exists.

In striving to create a work of art the artist engages in the beginning the mind with the brain, feelings with thought, intuition with intellect.

The artist is driven by a great desire to express, from which is formulated a realisation; it is the making manifest of that realisation that forms the latter stages of the creative process leading to a work of art.

That demanding effort of making manifest is informed by investigation, which in itself is very often innovative in nature, but that is secondary to that within the mind of the artist. In any real sense of the word it is not research.

A thoughtful artist colleague of mine once expressed this with great simplicity: "artists are not ornithologists, they are birds".

Given the importance of the existence of the art college to the cultural life of Scotland, perhaps The Scotsman might like to promote an event to debate this matter, so as to assist in informing the impending decision as to whether or not to proceed with the proposed merger.

Gavin Ross

Mill of Breda

Alford, Aberdeenshire