Painting in Defence of Migrants, 1993 (oil on canvas)

Steven Campbell worked in Glasgow steelworks before going to Glasgow School of Art and was later awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to New York City. He was at the beginning of Glasgow’s world wide success as a centre for contemporary art. Campbell said of this work: This is a comment on how people are vulnerable. All the birds are migrants. Although we are cruel to nature and there are hunters in the sky and clouds, I wanted to convey the idea that when people are in terrible circumstances, nature still has a sensitivity. Because we are part of nature, it will come to our defence when things are so bad. The people are migrants and they are exhausted, but the migrant birds help them. I think it is a defence of sensitivity.