New Social Art School People - Eva Merz

EVA MERZ born 1966 in Esbjerg, Denmark.

I grew up in a fishing town on the West coast of Jutland, Denmark. I trained as an advertising designer in my hometown before going to Norway to attend an art course and later work in a drug-rehab collective. In 1992 I moved to Copenhagen and did an extended course at a photography school. Two years later I went and joined the Walk for Justice, a 3,800-mile spiritual walk across the US, led by American Indian Movement. People from 21 tribal nations, walked through 13 states, crossed 25 mountain ranges, survived three blizzards and raised public attention to Native people's issues. Later that year I ran a marathon in the state of Iowa.

Returning to Copenhagen in 1996, I worked at a fish market for a couple of years and later started teaching photography, while keeping up a part-time arts practice, doing various smaller arts and book projects and exhibited photographs in Denmark and abroad.

Coming to Scotland in 2003 for a short artist residency in Huntly, I started a new practice of interviewing and working with people, publishing interviews, making public events and gaining media attention. I didn't want to leave Scotland so I moved to Aberdeen where I got involved in communities of different people, amongst them skateboarders, street beggars and homeless people. First I founded Aberdeen Street Skaters, an organization of skaters and young artists. New Social Art School grew out of this initial collaboration and is now a small movement of people who make work together, publish books and other media forms, trying to raise public awareness to social and political issues.

In the summer of 2007 I finally moved to Glasgow where I plan to live for a long time. Currently I work from the Studio Warehouse SWG3 where I share a space with the vacuum cleaner and a whole heap of other good folk.