Campaigners, politicians, and arts figures are calling on the Scottish government to intervene over the possible sale of the archive of Glasgow’s Centre for Contemporary Arts, according to The Art Newspaper. The collection was listed among the assets of the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA), which was recently deemed insolvent.
The collapse came despite a significant injection of public money. The BBC reported in January that the CCA had secured more than $4.5 million in three-year funding from Creative Scotland only a year before its closure. The organization had been struggling for years, however. It was forced to close for six months after the 2018 Glasgow School of Art fire, temporarily shut again in late 2024 over financial concerns and became embroiled in disputes with pro-Palestinian artists over calls for the center to boycott Israel.
By January, Creative Scotland said the CCA could no longer show that it was financially viable, and its board acknowledged it had couldn’t to find a sustainable financial footing.
The archive, which also includes material from the CCA’s predecessor, the Third Eye Centre, holds more than 50 years of cultural activity in Glasgow through exhibition records, photographs, posters, films, flyers and other ephemera. Its inclusion among the CCA’s assets has sparked bnot just protests but also a petition calling for the collection to remain intact.
Creative Scotland, which owns the CCA building, said it is working with Glasgow Life and the Ballast Trust, an archives charity, to find ways to preserve the collection and keep it publicly accessible in Glasgow.
Amanda Catto, a former portfolio manager at Creative Scotland, described the archive as “part of Scotland’s cultural memory” and warned that breaking it up or selling it would represent “an irreversible loss to Scotland’s cultural record.” She also raised concerns about what the episode could mean for archives held by other cultural organizations that might run into financial trouble.
MB Valuations, which was instructed to dispose of its assets, is seeking advice about the archive and inviting expressions of interest rather than including it in the broader auction of the center’s furniture and equipment. The firm reportedly hopes the collection can remain together under institutional ownership.
The dispute follows the collapse of the CCA earlier this year after a prolonged period of financial problem. The organization entered liquidation in January, resulting in the loss of all its staff, and Creative Scotland subsequently announced plans to sell the building, which had served as a major center for contemporary art in Scotland for more than two decades.
The Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator opened an inquiry into the CCA’s financial governance following its collapse but concluded the investigation last week without taking further action.
