"There is a theatrical otherworldly quality in Nasmyth’s work which has always appealed to me. I know Tantallon too having been there many times. Its dramatic splendour is the very stuff of Romanticism. There’s a theatrical quality where compositional elements have been moved around somewhat and carefully choreographed to create a stage like scene. A place to ignite the imagination and let it roam. So I have taken the basic elements of the original’s composition as my starting point and then in my own way roamed from there. It’s a more Impressionistic effect paint wise and also in terms of atmosphere with the stormy clouds and the choppy Forth giving way to those ethereal Monet like skies we have had during these summer months." Arran Ross
Price: POA
Arran Ross is a Scottish artist whose output encompasses Sculpture, Painting and Photography. A previous winner of the Pollock Krasner and JD Fergusson Awards, he also taught at Edinburgh College of Art.
I am best known for the “Astronaut”, the central nomadic character in an epic narrative, which began life in the Mid to Late 1990’s. This alter ego creation leads us on a pilgrimage, a journey through inner space as much as any Outer One. It’s a contemporary parable or rather series of, on the theme of escape, told in sculptural, photographic and painted form which brings to mind classics such as Dante’s Inferno, Gulliver’s Travels, fused with more recent influences, Kubrick, Bowie and like modern day Manga shares a similar kind of cartoon like, Apocalyptic edge.
This is best encapsulated by the 2359 series originating in 2018, an Apocalyptic safari, with the Astronaut appearing, simultaneously, in various settings throughout the Earth, at a point in time, ominously close to midnight which, metaphorically speaking, parallels where we seem to be ourselves, as a species. And while we ponder our escape beyond the stars, it’s worth considering that our Spaceman friend has quite possibly escaped or returned back here himself, to Planet Earth, the only oasis we know of yet in the Universe.
