Ellie Harrison

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The Glasgow Effect

  • 2017 Lecture

    The Glasgow Effect

    22 Feb 2017
    CECHR Annual Symposium, University of Dundee

  • 2017 Newsletter

    The Glasgow Effect

    10 Feb 2017

  • 2017 Media

    Ellie Harrison – ‘The Glasgow Effect was a boycott of the oil industry, of privatised public transport’

    9 Feb 2017
    The List

  • 2017 Media

    The Glasgow Effect

    7 Feb 2017
    Kiltr

  • 2017 Media

    The timely return of activism

    28 Jan 2017
    The Herald (The Arts p.6)

  • 2017 Media

    Artist Ellie Harrison says she has been painted as an “ogre”

    9 Jan 2017
    The Courier (p.8)

  • 2017 Lectures

    The Glasgow Effect

    On 8 January 2017, just one week after completing her year-long ‘durational performance’ The Glasgow Effect, for which she refused to travel beyond Glasgow’s city limits, or use any vehicles except her bike, for the whole of 2016, Harrison gave a talk about the work at the Glasgow Film Theatre. On 4 November 2019, she published a book providing the complete context for her thinking and action.

  • 2017 Media

    Glasgow Effect artist ‘used anger’ to fuel work

    6 Jan 2017
    BBC News, Glasgow & West Scotland

  • 2017 Media

    The Glasgow Effect interview

    6 Jan 2017
    Stephen Jardine, BBC Radio Scotland

  • 2017 Media

    Heads Up

    1 Jan 2017
    The Skinny (p.8)

  • 2016 Media

    Dundee lecturer Ellie finding Glasgow Effect taking its toll

    15 Oct 2016
    The Courier (p.19)

  • 2016 Lecture

    Scottish Artists Union AGM

    Harrison was invited to be guest speaker at the 2016 AGM of the Scottish Artists Union, the union she has been a member of since 2010. She offered some insights into her research and work during The Glasgow Effect, in relation to some timeless trade union themes: solidarity and exploitation.

  • 2016 Newsletter

    The Sustainability of a Sustainable Lifestyle

    22 Sep 2016

  • 2016 Media

    Loving the Inbox: the Artist as Bureaucrat

    1 Jul 2016
    ArtReview Asia (p.68-71)

  • 2016 Lecture

    White Wood Forum

    Harrison answered questions from Deirdre Heddon about The Glasgow Effect project as part of the White Wood Forum event at Deveron Projects in Huntly exploring Art and Sustainability.

  • 2016 Media

    Glasgow effect artist releases first work

    26 May 2016
    The Scotsman (p.14)

  • 2016 Media

    ‘Glasgow Effect’ artist Ellie Harrison reveals first work of project

    24 May 2016
    The Herald (p.10)

  • 2016 Writing

    Practising what we Preach

    Written by Harrison during the first few months of The Glasgow Effect in 2016, this essay explores the many problems within the higher education system, which were the project’s initial impetus, and the destructive values these promote. It outlines key actions to resolve the contradictions that are preventing us from practising what we preach. (Word count: 4,496)

  • 2016 Lecture

    Data Dystopia

    19 Mar 2016
    Somerset House, London

  • 2016 Media

    Dundee University withdraws support from art project

    18 Mar 2016
    The Courier (p.1)

  • 2016 Media

    Unpaid leave for art project

    18 Mar 2016
    Evening Telegraph (p.12)

  • 2016 Media

    Glasgow Effect artist Ellie Harrison has university funding pulled

    11 Mar 2016
    The Sun

  • 2016 Newsletter

    The Glasgow Effect

    11 Mar 2016

  • 2016 Lecture

    The Glasgow Effect

    Harrison was invited by the Scottish Artists Union to speak via Skype to the Cross-Party Group on Culture at the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh on 1 March 2016. She screened The Glasgow Effect by Wee D before discussing his arguments in relation to wider debates about arts funding, economic policy and social change.

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News

Ellie Harrison is an artist & activist based in Glasgow (UK). In 2023 she won the Stephen Fry Public Engagement Award for her ‘Bus Regulation: The Musical’ Trilogy in Greater Manchester, Strathclyde & Merseyside (2019 – 2023).
In 2021 the Second Edition of Harrison’s book The Glasgow Effect: A Tale of Class, Capitalism & Carbon Footprint was launched at the UN Habitat’s Innovate4Cities conference to mark the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, and chosen by the Ecologist for the Resurgence Book Club. Her Early Warning Signs were also exhibited at Glasgow’s Mitchell Library during COP26 to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the project.
Harrison’s Vending Machine continues to feature in the 😹 LMAO exhibition exploring humour in data visualisation at the Open Data Institute in London.

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Ellie Harrison

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Artist, activist & author of 'The Glasgow Effect: A Tale of Class, Capitalism & Carbon Footprint' 📚

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This is Massive! 📢 Did you hear First Minster John Swinney announce that all buses in Scotland will be brought back into public control by 2031? 🚍🥳 After 10 years' campaigning with Get Glasgow Moving and Better Buses for Strathclyde, it's just amazing to see The Scottish Government finally starting to listen! Hear my reaction in this special podcast for The National Newspaper 👇 @followers ...

3 days ago
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This weekend Wasps Artists' Studios - Hanson Street, Glasgow is celebrating its 25th anniversary! 🥳 I’ve been based here for sixteen of those years, since 2010. On 𝗦𝗮𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝟯 𝗢𝗰𝘁𝗼𝗯𝗲𝗿, 𝟭𝟭𝗮𝗺-𝟰𝗽𝗺 I’m opening my studio to visitors as part of the building’s special anniversary open studios event: waspsstudios.org.uk/news/hanson-street-studios-celebrates-25th-anniversary-this-october/ Please come down and say hello! @followers ...

3 weeks ago
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On Thursday night we launched the Get Glasgow Moving public transport campaign’s 10th Anniversary Exhibition at The New Glasgow Society 🙌 It’s only on until Weds 23rd Sept, so please make sure you visit! 👇

🗓️ Open every day until Weds 23rd September, 12noon-5pm
📍 1307 Argyle Street, G3 8TL

It’s been a total labour of love to bring this exhibition together – four days’ solid to install and a whole summer spent sorting through the archives and organising more than 240 photographs, sixty press cuttings, fifty films, alongside many old placards, banners and leaflets to the tell the story of our campaign over the last decade 🚍 🚇 🚆

If you don’t know much about Get Glasgow Moving or just want to find out how I’ve been spending a massive chunk of my time over the last 10 years as the campaign’s co-founder and chairperson – then please make sure you come along!

I’ll be invigilating from Monday – Weds, so come and say hi 😊

We are also selling our popular campaign t-shirts, designed by yours truly, for just £10 – so don't miss your chance to get one 👕

And thanks, as always, to Neil Scott for the wonderful photos!

Presented as part of Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival 2026

#GlasgowDoorsOpenDaysFestival #GlasgowGoesOut #CulturalHeritage #GlasgowEvents #GDODF26 @followers
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1 month ago
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Opening this Thursday! 📢 Please don't miss this special exhibition I've curated to celebrate the Get Glasgow Moving campaign's 10th Anniversary 🥳 I've been working on it all summer and it's 𝗼𝗻𝗹𝘆 𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗻 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝘀𝗶𝘅 𝗱𝗮𝘆𝘀 at The New Glasgow Society as part of Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival #GDODF26 @followers 🙏 ...

1 month ago
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I was delighted to be back in Liverpool City Region this week for the launch of Merseytravel's new publicly-controlled bus network 🚌🥳 I staged 'Bus Regulation: The Musical' here in 2022 and 2023 as part of the campaign which led to Steve Rotheram's decision to become the 2nd UK city region to roll-out bus franchising, after Greater Manchester. Find out more here: ellieharrison.com/merseyside @followers ...

1 month ago
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After 10 years campaigning, it's just brilliant to see The Scottish Government finally taking action to regulate bus fares in Glasgow 👏 But their £2 fare cap will do nothing to improve services, create new routes or integrate timetables and tickets with other transport modes 🚍🚇🚆 For that we must bring our bus network back into public control. Please support Better Buses for Strathclyde to make it happen ✊ @followers ...

2 months ago
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Thanks so much to The National Newspaper for inviting me to discuss how to fix Glasgow's public transport on their podcast! 😄🚍🚇🚆 Listen to find out more about my campaigning with Get Glasgow Moving, Better Buses for Strathclyde, Bring Back British Rail & GoBike 👇 @followers ...

3 months ago
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It was great to meet Paul from PalFox Photography last month when he visited me at Wasps Studios Hanson Street to take these fab pictures 📷

My studio has always been more like an office than anything else, going back to my very first one in Glasgow in the Barnes Building at The Glasgow School of Art from 2008-2010. I bought ‘The Boss’ mug back then as I was interested in the aesthetics of the corporate world and exploring what it meant to be self-employed worker, making pieces like ‘The History of Financial Crises’ (2009), ‘Desk Chair Parade’ (2009) and ‘Desk Chair Disco’ (2011), and the ‘Work-a-thon for the Self-Employed’ (2011).

I’m not making much art these days as nearly all my time goes into local community activism, particularly with the Glasgow Community Energy co-operative which I helped get up-and-running during the pandemic, and with the Get Glasgow Moving public transport campaign which I co-founded in 2016.

Over the summer I’m preparing for Get Glasgow Moving’s 10th Anniversary Exhibition at the New Glasgow Society, which opens on Thurs 17 September as part of Glasgow Doors Open Days Festival 2026.

I love using my creative skills to further causes that I’m passionate about. Over the years I've designed many campaign materials – including this ‘Trans-Clyde Links You Clyde-Wide’ T-Shirt, which is based on the original marketing for the Trans-Clyde integrated public transport network launched by the Greater Glasgow Passenger Transport Executive in 1979, the year that I was born.

The integrated public transport networks which most big city-regions had were wilfully destroyed in 1986 with the deregulation (and later privatisation) of buses. This was one of the most destructive of all Margaret Thatcher’s policies, and it is shameful that The Scottish Government has continued to maintain it for more than quarter of a century of devolution. With the Better Buses for Strathclyde campaign, we are doing all we can to get our region’s buses back in public control.

If you like the T-Shirt, come down to the exhibition in September and you’ll be able to get one there! And, if you'd like to have a nosey round my studio, I'm also planning to take part in the Open Studios at Wasps Artists' Studios - Hanson Street, Glasgow on Sat 3 October 😊 See you there! @followers
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3 months ago
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Commodities

  • Hen Weekend Badge Hen Weekend Badge £2.00
  • Radical Renewable Art + Activism Fund Sticker Radical Renewable Art + Activism Fund Sticker £3.00
  • National Museum of Roller Derby T-Shirt National Museum of Roller Derby T-Shirt £25.00
  • Bring Back British Rail Sticker Bring Back British Rail Sticker £3.00
  • The Glasgow Effect (First Edition) The Glasgow Effect: A Tale of Class, Capitalism & Carbon Footprint £10.00 – £12.00Price range: £10.00 through £12.00
  • Bus Regulation: The Musical T-Shirt Bus Regulation: The Musical T-Shirt £15.00
  • The Quotidian Factor Badge The Quotidian Factor Badge £2.00
  • 4 Live Broadcasts DVD 4 LIVE Broadcasts DVD £20.00
  • Part-time Book Part-time Book £10.00

Contact

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  • Publications Archive
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  • ellie@ellieharrison.com

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