Hands Up for Trad’s Women in Music and Culture 2025 list has been announced to celebrate just some of the women working in Scotland.
Launched as part of International Women’s Day 2025, we shine the spotlight on 12 women who all contribute towards Scotland’s cultural landscape through their work. Read the 2025 list here.
We asked Jackie Wylie to tell us more about her work, influences and ambitions for the future.
How did you first get involved in the arts and who were your early influences?
My very first experience of the arts was when all my wee cousins and I would stay the weekend at my Gran and Papa’s and we all had to participate in the fabulous Scottish tradition of “doing a turn”!
Growing up in Edinburgh I had the joy and the privilege of having the Edinburgh Festivals on my doorstep. Having this exposure throughout my life to the theatre, both Scottish and international, has shaped what I love in culture. We are so lucky in Scotland to have this window on the world that is so outward-facing and on our own doorsteps.
I became involved in student theatre whilst at Glasgow University which then led onto my becoming Artistic Director of the Arches until it very sadly closed in 2015. The Arches was a brilliant venue where all art forms joyfully collided and all artists and audiences were welcomed with open arms.
In a time when many artists and creative professionals are facing significant challenges, how have you developed and evolved your creative practice over the past few years?
We are acutely aware as an organisation, and as individuals working within the sector, of the many challenges that artists and freelancers are facing. The paradox is that in the midst of these crises, we need artists, more than ever, to articulate hopeful futures.
At NTS, we are so lucky to have our “without walls” model, enabling us to define theatre in any way we want. This has meant we have been able to focus on telling the stories that need to be told, in places and spaces across the country. I am artistically driven by the special meeting point of offering audiences a joyous night out combined with an experience that has something relevant to say about the times we live in.
During lockdown we pivoted and became a digital production company to ensure we continued to create work for artists and audiences whilst theatres were closed. This evolution, of making work to reach the broadest audience possible, has continued and we now have an ongoing digital and broadcast programme that complements our touring work.
Who or what interests you creatively?
It is thrilling to be sitting in a Scottish theatre, and to witness the audience seeing themselves portrayed on stage. Cultural representation is so important. For example, I was so proud for NTS to adapt Peter Mullan’s cult film Orphans and for audiences to observe and be part of that legendary Scottish raucous night out. I am writing this, having just come out of the rehearsal room for our new work, Through the Shortbread Tin, created by Martin O’Connor and Lu Kemp, which fuses Scots and Gaelic languages and examines the Ossian hoax and the myths we tell ourselves about Scottish culture and identity. I am so excited for the final show opening in April 2025.
One of the defining aspects of Scottish theatre is its relationship to music, which is woven through so much of contemporary Scottish theatre, from The Cheviot, The Stag and the Black Black Oil, to Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour (an NTS musical adaptation of Alan Warner’s celebrated novel) and coming up this year for NTS, Keli which pays homage to the joy of music and brass-banding culture, led artistically by folk music legend Martin Green.
I was at the opening concert of Celtic Connections earlier this year which celebrated Glasgow 850, and it felt incredibly powerful, in the way it brought international and local artists together in honour of one of the world’s most culturally vibrant cities.
I also had the pleasure of meeting novelist Kirsty Logan recently and am now reading her short story collection, No and Other Love Stories.
What are your plans for the next year or so and/or what are your longer term creative ambitions?
It is so important to celebrate Scottish culture, out with Scotland as well as within it. I am thrilled that our production of The Fifth Step transfers to London’s West End later this year with Jack Lowden reprising his role, alongside Martin Freeman.
We have an exciting programme on offer throughout this year, with tours across Scotland, including our year-round programme, Theatre in Schools Scotland that reaches our youngest audiences in Primary Schools. In the summer, we are honoured to welcome Brian Cox back to Scotland’s stages in James Graham’s new play, Make It Happen about the collapse of the Royal Bank of Scotland.
We are also excitedly pulling together our bumper programme for our 20th anniversary next year which we are hoping will be a celebration of all the elements that make National Theatre of Scotland such a unique institution!
Find out more about Jackie Wylie and National Theatre of Scotland here.
Read the Hands Up for Trad’s Women in Music and Culture 2024 List
Hands Up for Trad are an organisation who work with Scottish traditional music, language and culture. If you would like to support our work you can donate here.
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