Welcome to Making Routes

Making Routes is a network and online resource for researchers and practitioners who are on the move: using journeys in creative or challenging ways; forging new paths through troubled places; or travelling experimentally with art and ideas.

The network has been convened by Laura Bissell (Royal Conservatoire of Scotland) and David Overend (University of Edinburgh) since 2011. It includes members from around the world, with diverse interests and practices.

This website is a place to share your projects, read our blogs and publications, and connect with others working in this dynamic field.

Blog posts

Salmon Stories

Posted by Laura Bissell on May 15, 2024 at 2:35pm

Waterways was conceived as a group of artists and scientists interested in the interconnected and entangled existence of various species. Our starting point was the Atlantic salmon, described by Dr Colin Bull as ‘in crisis’ due to multiple factors including deterioration of its habitat, warming waters, and risks of predators in both river and marine environments. The salmon as both fish and cultural symbol is key to many Scottish communities and Waterways initial residency sought to try to…

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Waterways: Following salmon

Posted by David Overend on May 14, 2024 at 10:28am

This text was written between 7th and 11th May 2024 as a group of artists and scientists followed salmon down the Rivers Feshie and Spey in Scotland, UK.


1. Nursery

First activity
Moments of vitality
Possible futures

We are at Ballintean Mountain Lodge in the Cairngorms. An interdisciplinary collective, comprised of scientists, artists and artist-scientists, working together for the first time. For the next four days we will…

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Badgers, Burns and Barriers

Posted by David Overend on February 16, 2024 at 9:35am

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A walk with Elaine Rainey (Scottish Badgers), Glen Cousquer (University of Edinburgh) and others at Boghall Burn by the University’s Easter Bush Campus, by the Pentlands. We are working towards a paper on ‘Embracing the 30x30 biodiversity challenge on veterinary campuses’.

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Walking the Feminist City

Posted by Laura Bissell on July 10, 2023 at 9:11am

 12133968470?profile=RESIZE_584x Figure 1: Publicity image for Merchant City Heritage Walk (Glasgow Women’s Library): façade of Glasgow Maternity Hospital at Rottenrow

It is a hot Saturday afternoon in early June when my mother-in-law, daughter and I make our way to the site of the former Royal Maternity Hospital in Rottenrow for a Women of the Merchant City Heritage Walk run…

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Events

Publications