Gray’s School of Art alumna shares her real-time heartbeat at Spectra 2025
An alumna from Gray’s School of Art has taken part in a brand new artwork featuring live heartbeats of Aberdonians at this year’s SPECTRA. Emmajane Kingaby who graduated from Gray’s in 2022,after winning the Principal’s Award for Fine Art, took part in the idontloveyouanymore showcase in Union Terrace Gardens by sharing her real-time heartbeat, along with fellow Aberdonians.
I feel touched to have been invited to participate in The Matter of the Heart, a participatory artwork that brings together 65 different heartbeats, connecting our community through a shared pulse.
This project is about people—the heart of the North East that makes Aberdeen what it is.
It feels special to come together in this way, especially considering the deep symbolism of the heart. I imagine the work will affect each person differently, and already, I find myself reflecting on the significance of this collective experience.
As a Creative Development Co-ordinator at Gray’s, I lead Engage, a collaborative initiative between Gray’s School of Art, Robert Gordon University and Look Again Aberdeen. In my role, I work with local, creative practitioners to design and deliver a variety of art and design workshops. Currently, the programme includes Art Weekenders, Evening Workshops and A Week in the Life of Art School. We continually develop the programme in response to public feedback, ensuring it remains both relevant and impactful. Engage offers a platform for creative exploration and has already begun to foster a strong community engagement, inviting participation from a diverse range of individuals, including local practitioners, students, and the wider public. Through collaboration, I witness first-hand the benefits of working together—encouraging personal growth, fostering a sense of unity, and supporting skills development. These shared experiences strengthen our creative community and create lasting connections across all levels of engagement.
On Saturday night, it was a unique experience to witness the collective heartbeats of Aberdonians resonating throughout the benches and gardens of Union Terrace Gardens, somewhat hugging and embracing the space as it enveloped the activity. My own heartbeat, pulsing in real time from a distance over the course of four days, became part of this collective rhythm. Friends and colleagues sent me photos of a 3D cube featuring my name, alongside two sentences describing what Aberdeen means to me, with the lighting reflecting my live heartbeat—each flicker a direct representation of my heart’s rhythm.
I would often respond to each photo of my heartbeat with a recording of my own, showing my heartbeat pulsing remotely—an experience that felt both surreal and deeply connective. Artists Anna West and Davi Callanan, the duo behind idontloveyouanymore, created a powerful and distinctive way of bringing people together. Being part of this experience will undoubtedly influence and inspire my creative practice in the future.
Creatives are a vital part of our community—they help us appreciate what we have, see the world around us in new ways and inspire us to imagine what life could be like. The work created for Northern Lights and Spectra highlights this, not only by bringing our local community together but also creating a chance for people from all over the world to connect.
