As the G8 demonstrators descend onto a temporary campsite in Edinburgh, lying in The Jack Kane Centre Park in Niddrie, Craigmillar, lies the largest concrete sculpture in Europe, that is a collective vision of how one of the UK's poorest communities wanted to deal with its problems.

As Bob Geldof predicts a million people will descend into Edinburgh for the G8 summit, how adapt, that lying in wait is this sculpture that deals with the very issues that the leaders of the world will be discussing.

Here lying in The Jack Kane Centre Park is a vision and a solution to poverty defined by The people of Craigmillar, designed by Jimmy Boyle and opened by Billy Connelly in 1976.

The Gentle Giant (that cares and shares). Designed by Jimmy Boyle while still in Barlinnie prison in 1975 should interest all those who are about to descend into Edinburgh, for here is a vision that has been studied and copied worldwide.


Included here is a weblink to the community arts website and more info on this famous sculpture.

 http://www.communityarts.net/readingroom/archivefiles/2005/06/the_gentle_gian.php


The Gentle Giant
By Jimmy Boyle

This is an essay by an established artist who learned to make art in prison. It tells the story of his interaction with a great Scottish community arts venture, the Craigmillar Festival Society. Jimmy Boyle's essay appeared in the catalogue for a 2004 retrospective exhibition in Edinburgh about Craigmillar and its accomplishments. For context, we include a portion of the catalogue's introduction by the renowned Scottish public artist David Harding.

—The Editors (Special thanks to Andrew Crummy)

Craigmillar [is] a housing estate, often described as one of the worst areas of multiple deprivation in Scotland.… Here in the '60s and '70s evolved a model for using the arts as a catalyst for social inclusion and progress which gained international fame. It was to here that planners, sociologists, community workers, artists and politicians, along with the great and the good, beat a path from all over the world to witness this "miracle," to learn from it and to apply it back home. …

With the help of the local MP and the local city councillors, Craigmillar Festival Society became a strong political force exerting some control over planning, building, social and cultural development decisions. In 1976 it bypassed the then Scottish Office and went straight to the EC and won poverty action funding of £750,000. At its high point it was responsible for initiating and running 57 neighbourhood projects and employed 200 full-time and 500 part-time workers in works ranging from landscaping, play area development, theatre and art works, play groups, social work and community development.…

In 1978 the Festival Society produced a major report with 400 recommendations on how to improve life on the estate. The title of the report, "The Gentle Giant," was named after a 100-feet-long land sculpture of Gulliver conceived and designed by Jimmy Boyle while still a prisoner in the Special Unit in Barlinnie Prison in Glasgow. It was formally dedicated and unveiled by Billy Connolly in 1976.

—David Harding, excerpted from the catalogue of the exhibition "Arts: The Catalyst, Craigmillar," October 30–December 31, 2004, at City Arts Centre, Market Street, Edinburgh, Scotland. Read the essay on Indymedia.com.

  
The Gentle Giant by Jimmy Boyle.

It was 1973 when I arrived in the Barlinnie prison special unit from the Cages in Inverness prison. I was, to put it mildly, animalised after seven year of solitary confinement. The special unit was a special place where people like me were given the opportunity to become humanised in a community setting, albeit in a maximum security, prison setting. Three of the five prisoners in the unit were considered "the worst." Besides me, there was Larry Winters, and a Craigmillar guy, Ben Conroy. The three of us were difficult people to handle and that was an accepted fact. In this new situation we were given an opportunity to change. Easier said than done, change to what and for what?

It was a time when I was bursting with rage and energy and incapable of doing anything positive. Art was something for the toffs, not people from my working-class background, or so I thought. One day I picked up seven pounds of clay that was lying around and did a sculpted portrait of Ben. It was the first real positive thing I'd done in my life and it was like a creative damn bursting inside me. In that one moment I had crossed over a threshold. As a result of this the arts began to play a big part in the unit. At the same time the community side of the place was coming together as prisoners and prison screws began to work together. It was a revolutionary period.

As part of the safeguards to stabilise the place, we prisoners demanded that outside groups be invited in. One of the first groups to come in was the Easterhouse Community group. They were led by an energetic group of young people who wanted to improve things in their community. We all had something in common in that we were all developing communities, recognising the arts as an effective tool in enhancing that change. It was a magical time. It was an important period when local members of the community were coming together to empower themselves. The Easterhouse community had strong ties with Craigmillar and it was through them that Helen Crummy, Neil Cameron and others came up to visit us in the Barlinnie special unit. It was as a result of this that they asked me to design a sculpture for young people.

The original idea for Gulliver was more sophisticated that what is currently in situ. Making a public sculpture, especially when children are involved, is severely restricted by Health & Safety regulations. In the original design I had lots of little "hiding places and slides," but these had to be taken out for safety reasons. The compromise is what is currently on site. I can tell you that the sculpture is a symbol of that particular period when disadvantaged communities were for the first time, demanding to be heard. That collective voice was and remains powerful.
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Jimmy Boyle. Photo courtesy of the Gateway Exchange.

Jimmy Boyle, born in 1944, is described in the Gazetteer of Scotland as: "Gangster, murderer, artist and author. Born in the Glasgow Gorbals, the son of a well-known robber. Boyle began his career in petty crime before becoming a member of a dangerous Glasgow gang. He gained a reputation as 'Scotland's Most Violent Man,' was involved in various serious assaults and was eventually found guilty of murder and imprisoned for life. Arrested spectacularly in a London pub in 1967, he was sent to the new 'Special Unit' in Barlinnie Prison (1973), which specialised in rehabilitation." It was in the special unit that Boyle was exposed to the arts and began to make sculpture. He carried on a well-known correspondence with artist Joseph Beuys. Boyle went on to write his autobiography, "A Sense of Freedom," and was later released. He is now a widely shown artist and a prison-reform campaigner who works with young offenders.