Author: Alan Rae

9 October to 21 November

Colin Brown, John Brown RSW, Alfons Bytautas RSA, Ann Cowan, Phill Jupitus, Simon Laurie RSW RGI and Alastair Strachan with ceramics from Karen Thompson.

An exhibition to demonstrate how artists can use collage in different ways – to assist and inform composition, adding texture as well as in its more recognised form of creating an artwork from a variety of objects such as magazine clippings, coloured paper, newspaper texts, found objects…anything really.

It is a fun, imaginative and thought provoking medium with a great history. The 8 artists we have pulled together have provided an exciting and interesting selection of very collectible pieces. I am sure you will enjoy contemplating the work but perhaps most of all I hope it inspires you to have a go yourself.

Bass Rock

4 September to 3 October

Featuring:

Julia Albert-Recht, Claire Beattie, George Birrell, John Boak, Georgina Bown, Davy Brown, Dominique Cameron, Alan Connell, Ann Cowan, Fee Dickson, Matthew Draper, Michael Durning, Ronnie Fulton, Andy Heald, David E Johnston, John Johnstone, Suzanne Kirk, Simon Laurie, Neil Macdonald, Julia McNairn White, Rachel Marshall, Ann Oram, Clive Ramage, Gregory Rankine, Pen Reid, Pascale Rentsch, Arran Ross, Jayne Stokes, Astrid Trügg and Darren Woodhead.

It has cast its spell over artists and writers such as Turner and Robert Louis Stevenson. In the 17th century, it was dubbed Scotland’s Alcatraz following Cromwell’s invasion of Scotland. Now the Bass Rock, which sits a few miles off the coast of North Berwick in East Lothian, is to be the subject of our latest exhibition.

Around 30 artists have been invited to present their unique view of the famous volcanic plug, which is home to 350,000 seabirds, including over 150,000 gannets – the largest ‘single rock’ colony of northern gannets on earth.

It is an irresistible, imposing, brooding and beautiful muse for artists and it has inspired a fascinating and varied collection of work for this show.

The exhibition continues until Sunday 3 October, I hope you will be able to come and view the work “in the flesh”.

We are delighted to be able to reopen and continue our Mixed Spring Exhibition from Monday 26th April.

Our new opening hours are 11-4pm from Tues-Sat, 12-4pm Sundays closed on Mondays.

No appointment necessary but for everyones comfort and safety, we will restrict the numbers in the gallery to 4, alongside the now familiar social distancing, wearing of masks and use of hand sanitiser in operation.

Mixed Spring Exhibition

6 March to 23 May

Featuring ten new paintings by George Birrell as well as work by Victoria Broxton, Colin Brown, Ann Cowan, Matthew Draper SSA VAS PS, Whyn Lewis, Leonie MacMillan, Julia McNairn White, Ann Oram RSW, Paul Reid, Pascale Rentsch, Allan J Robertson, Arran Ross, Michel Rulliere, David Schofield, Astrid Trügg, Christopher Wood RSW and many more.

Due to Government regulations the gallery doors will remain closed until further notice. Please check the website and social media for updates. In the meantime if you are interested in any of the pieces on our website please feel free to contact us for further information. 

Mixed Winter Exhibition

5 December to 28 February 2021

Featuring work from Claire Beattie, George Birrell, Georgina Bown, Chris Brook, Davy Brown, Alison Burt, Dominique Cameron, Alan Connell, Jimmy Cosgrove, Matthew Draper, Michael Durning, Ronnie Fulton, George Gilbert, Andy Heald, John Kingsley, Simon Laurie, Sarah Lawson, Steven Lindsay, Alan Macdonald, Carolynda Macdonald, Neil Macdonald, Ailsa Magnus, Rachel Marshall, Alice McMurrough, Alison McWhirter, Sandy Murphy, Jim Rae, Naoko Shibuya and Christopher Wood.

“Only Human”

Jackie Anderson, Jennifer Anderson, Henry Jabbour, Angela Repping & Graeme Wilcox

With Sculpture from Alejandro Lopez

31 October to 29 November

Instead of our normal (Pre-Covid) opening event, we will also open, by appointment only, on Friday 30 October between 12 and 5pm. Please contact the gallery to book a 30 minute slot if you would like a preview of the exhibition.

For those who cannot get in on the Friday afternoon, we are happy to reserve any of the pieces over the opening weekend so you can see the work in the flesh. All work is available to view on our website, please contact the gallery to reserve or purchase.

Going beyond a physical likeness of a sitter, good figurative and portrait artists strive to capture the essence of the person, the character, with it’s insight and morality, it’s strengths and frailties. The work in our next exhibition urges the viewer to reflect not only on the life of the person in the painting but also on our own.

At a time of intense pressure on everyone in our society, this exhibition is a timely reminder, to take time to reflect and remember that we are, “only human”.

Glasgow based sisters Jennifer and Jackie Anderson both studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee and both have exhibited in the BP Portrait Awards at the National Portrait Gallery. Both artists produce gentle, though-provoking studies. Jackie’s work relies on thinly applied, translucent washes to capture fleeting glimpses of passers-by, moments captured in time. Jennifer’s portraits, in this show, painted on brass, aluminium and ceramic tile are similarly tender and sensitive creating an intimate connection between the viewer and the subject.

Angela Repping met Jennifer & Jackie whilst also studying at Duncan at Jordanstone and like them, she too recently exhibited in the BP Portrait Awards. Angela’s exquisite pencil and acrylic drawings are well known to regular visitors to the gallery and the work in this exhibition will not disappoint.

Henry Jabbour trained at Leith School of Art and later at New York Academy of Art. His work provides quite a contrast in style to the rest of the work in the group. Although still fundamentally emotional and sensitive figurative portraits, the brushwork (in his oils) and palette is vital and expressive.

Another BP Portrait Award exhibitor, Graeme Wilcox, completes the painters in the show. Graeme works from sketches and photographs of his observations of figures in everyday urban life. Although each composition is a snap shot in time there is a suggestion of narrative that hooks and engages the viewer.

Alejandro Lopez has provided a variety of beautiful figurative sculptures with ethnic and classical influences using a variety of materials including limestone, alabaster and driftwood. Alejandro was born in Chile, studied at the School of Fine Art, Neuquen in Argentina and has been working and teaching wood and stone sculpture at the Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop since 2006.

The exhibition opens on Saturday 31 October at 11am and will follow government guidelines at the time. All work in the exhibition will be available to view, reserve and purchase on the website nearer the start of the exhibition. If you are interested in any pieces please contact the gallery.

The exhibition runs from Saturday 31 October at 11am, open 11-3pm Tuesday to Saturday, Sunday 12-3pm and closed Mondays, until 29 November. We are open for walk-ins but restricted to one person or family group at any one time. Face masks must be worn and hand sanitizer is available throughout the gallery…masks are also available should you forget.

Carol Dewart PAI RSW, Jennifer Irvine RGI RSW, Hazel Nagl RGI RSW PAI & Jacqueline Orr RGI RSW PAI

Saturday 26 September to 25 October 2020

Unfortunately, due to Covid restrictions we are unable to put on an opening event with the artists in attendance. However, the gallery will be open from 11-5pm on Saturday 26th for walk-ins but to ensure social distancing we will limit visits to one person or family group at any one time. Face masks should be worn and disposable masks are available from the gallery. 

Opening hours after the opening Saturday will revert to 11-3pm Tues to Saturday, 12-3pm Sunday and closed on Mondays. We are happy to arrange appointments between 3-5pm each day if preferred.

Four colourful artists from the West head to East Lothian in our next exhibition. Colour Palettes, West to East will showcase the work of four good friends; Carol Dewart, Jennifer Irvine, Hazel Nagl and Jacqueline Orr. All four artists studied drawing and painting at the world-famous art school in the 1970s and 1980s.

The exhibition, which reflects the fact that all the artists are based in the west of Scotland but exhibiting their work in East Lothian, opens at Fidra Fine Art in Gullane on Saturday 26 September. It runs until Sunday 25 October.

The idea to exhibit together came from Jacqueline Orr but according to Jennifer Irvine, “we all recognised immediately that it would work.”

She continues: “Our styles are very different but there is definitely a thread that runs through our work, connecting our images in our colour palettes hence the title of the show.”

Carol Dewart, whose distinctive landscape paintings of Scotland reflects a strong influence of Aboriginal art and its use of distinctive mark making, studied at GSA in the 1970s under well-known Scottish artists such as David Donaldson, James Robertson and Geoff Squire.

She says: “All four of us were at GSA and although not in the same year group, we have been firm friends for a long time. We are the product of a particularly strong period in the history of GSA. Over time, each of us has developed our own language and style of painting but the ethos of 1970-1980’s in GSA’s Drawing and Painting Department is a common factor in how we interpret our genre.”

Jacqueline Orr adds: “I was there a year or so after Carol and my tutors included James Robertson, Barbara Rae and John Cunningham. Our response to our chosen subject matter makes this exhibition interesting. The longstanding emphasis on observation and practice at the GSA allowed each of us to develop a distinct and evolving visual vocabulary, encouraging a unique response to the subject matter that excites us.   

“We are all ‘colourists’ except that our use of colour is very different and may confuse those who associate the term with bright, vivid colours.”

The threads that bind the four friends began with Hazel Nagl, who graduated from GSA in 1973 before going on to become resident tutor for several years at GSA’s workshop at Culzean Castle in Ayrshire. It was there she met Jennifer Irvine, then a young student.

The two women became friends and went on to meet Carol and Jacqueline through being involved in artist-run bodies such as Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts (RGI), Glasgow Art Club and the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolours (RSW.

Hazel Nagl now lives in the historic village of Kilbarchan in Renfrewshire, famous for its links to the weaving industry and her latest paintings are informed by its history.

“Much has changed, of course,” she explains, “but there are still traces of it left not least the National Trust for Scotland Weaver’s Cottage which reflects so much of the old ways. The workshop has all the paraphernalia, colour and complications of the trade and an original loo A real drawing challenge!”

Dominique Cameron – “Moor”

Ann Cowan – “Dunbar Sketchbooks”

22 August to 20 September 2020

Exhibition Opening Arrangements

For everyone’s safety and convenience we have decided to open the Dominique Cameron & Ann Cowan exhibitions by “Appointment Only” on Saturday 22 August from 11-5pm. Following the Saturday Opening, the gallery will revert to being open for walk-ins as usual, with access limited to one person or family group at any one time, from 11-3pm Tuesday to Saturday, 12-3pm Sunday and closed on Mondays.

20 minute slots will be allocated to one person or family group at any one time, on a first come first served basis. This will allow visitors to meet both Ann and Dominique who will both be at the gallery on the Saturday. Hand sanitiser dispensers are dotted around the gallery for your convenience. Face masks should be worn at all times during your visit – disposable face masks are freely available at the door.

Please contact the gallery on 01620 249389 during opening hours or email alan@fidrafineart.co.uk to arrange a slot on the Saturday.

All images are available to view and purchase on the website upon receipt of this invite. We are happy to reserve pieces over the opening weekend to allow you the opportunity to see the work on the wall.

Jan Patience, art journalist and author, has written a short piece covering the artists and their work in this exhibition…

“Isolation is a default position for most artists. As the great Scottish painter, Joan Eardley, once observed: “I think you have to be a bit one-track to be a painter.”

In the early days of 2020, thanks to Covid-19, the world caught up with this one-track focus, a place into which artists routinely drill in order to make work.

As lockdown started to bite, social media filled up with scenes which people had not previously noticed; plants, trees, wildlife, skies, buildings, eerily empty streets and wide-open vistas. With traffic calmed and aeroplanes silenced, our collective antennae started to twitch.

Both Dominique Cameron and Ann Cowan know all about being totally immersed in making their art. Both have strong track records of losing themselves in specific places at a particular moment in time and creating cracking bodies of work.

For their forthcoming joint exhibition with Fidra Fine Art in Gullane, Ann chose to explore the narrow closes, bustling harbour and oddly beautiful industrial spaces she found in the coastal town of Dunbar in East Lothian.

In a bid to pin down the transient emptiness of a vast landscape, Dominique found herself sucked into the drama of the rare bog that is Rannoch Moor in the west Highlands of Scotland.

People are noticeably absent in the two separate bodies of work created by Ann and Dominique as they dug their way into these places.

Both work quickly and often in situ. If the work isn’t completed on the spot, it’s finished not long afterwards in their respective studios. Their mark-making is deft and gestural, capturing, in a mix of different media, the feel of being in the here and now. Atmosphere seeps through paper or canvas.

Ann, who grew up in the Borders, the daughter of an architect and an artist, is always drawn to the structure of a scene. Dunbar’s red sandstone buildings are depicted in fast-drying acrylic paint, while down at Cromwell Harbour, boats float in a sea of turquoise washed ink, scored over by oil pastels. Having known it all her life, she immersed herself in the town prior to lockdown. Now, she knows it now like the back of her hand.

Dominique began with a quest to paint and pin down the emptiness of Rannoch Moor. This dramatic wilderness represents fifty square miles worth of marshy bogland, mountains, big skies and ever-changing weather. Until last year, she’d never visited the moor, but through repeated visits, she has let it seep into her soul.

As she drew and painted, Dominique posted her work on social media for a poet she’d never met to respond to in words. Mark Goodwin’s haiku-like verse now peppers a small book called Moor, which is crammed with images of Dominique’s Rannoch Moor drawings and paintings. Slowly, a portrait of this most mercurial of wildernesses emerges.

Artists like Ann and Dominique recreate more than the geography of a place; be that in a busy town with its weathered buildings or on an eerily deserted moorland with a squall descending from on high. They connect us across time to the stories we tell each other and the feelings which envelop us when we are in the moment. When time stands still. “

Until 16 August

We are delighted to welcome you back to the gallery and view art again “in the flesh”.  For everyone’s comfort and safety we are restricting access to one person or family group at any one time. We have several dispensers with hand sanitiser dotted around the gallery for your use and I have moved my desk into the back room so visitors have the full gallery to enjoy. In line with government guidance face coverings should be worn at all times when visiting the gallery.

We will be easing back in with revised opening times:

Tuesday to Saturday 11am-3pm

Sunday 12-3pm

Closed Mondays

For those who are making a special trip or would prefer a set time we are happy to arrange appointments between 3-5pm each day. 

As we were unable to access the gallery space we decided to postpone, until next year, our “Idiosyncratic” exhibition, featuring the work of Mark Bannerman, Joseph Davie, Alan Macdonald, Alice McMurrough RGI RSW PAI & Gordon Mitchell RSA RSW RGI. Instead we brought forward our Mixed Summer Exhibition and ran it for a few weeks online but now we can at last view the work, “in the flesh”, in the gallery.

I am delighted that the artists from the “Idiosyncratic” exhibition have still been able to submit a number of pieces and will be exhibiting alongside a whole host of cracking artists… so far confirmed are; George Birrell, Dominique Cameron, Matthew Draper SSA VAS PS, Michael Durning PPAI PAI RSW, Neal Greig, Andy Heald, Whyn Lewis, Neil Macdonald RGI RSW PAI, Rachel Marshall, Heather Nevay RGI, Ann Oram RSW, Paul Reid, David Schofield, Astrid Trügg, Graeme Wilcox & Christopher Wood RSW with ceramics and sculpture from Andrew Adair and Arran Ross.

It really is a great line up of some of the most popular and interesting artists working in Scotland today. The exhibition covers a wide range of styles and genres and is sure to appeal to art lovers who have been starved of creative visual art during lockdown.

I hope you enjoy the work online but look forward to welcoming you back to the gallery very soon. If you need any further information or would like to book an appointment, please feel free to get in touch.

In the meantime, please stay safe. Hope to see you soon.

Land and Sea 2020

Jim Dunbar PRSW RWS RGI, Neal Greig ARUA, Andy Heald, David E Johnston RSW & Jayne Stokes SSA

4 April to 3 May

Due to the developing situation with the Covid-19 virus we have decided to temporarily close the gallery until further notice. 

All images for the previous exhibition, “Take Five” and the current “Land & Sea”, are available to view online.

If you would like to purchase, view or require any further information please get in touch at any time and we will do our very best to help.

Our next exhibition focuses on land and seascapes and the very different interpretations by five outstanding artists.

Jim Dunbar studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee and then taught for a number of years at schools in his home county of Angus. He retired from teaching in 1999 and has painted full time ever since. Jim is an elected member of the Royal Watercolour Society (RWS), Royal Glasgow Institute (RGI) and the Royal Scottish Society of painters in Watercolour (RSW) where he is currently President. Representational in style, Jim tends to concentrate on places, objects and people that have a strong connection to him – friends, collected objects or familiar places. His paintings in this exhibition feature the landscapes around his home in Angus. Rarely using photographs, Jim creates numerous studies of his subjects to refer to when creating the final piece.

Neal Greig, born in Belfast, studied at Edinburgh College of Art and now lives in Glaslough, County Monaghan. He has received numerous awards including the prestigious Pollock-Krasner Award from the Jackson Pollock Foundation, New York. More recently, in 2018, Neal was Elected to Royal Ulster Academy. Neal’s land and seascapes of the wild and rugged Atlantic coast of Ireland and the Highlands of Scotland are brimming with the organic colours of nature from the splashes of greens, pinks and oranges of the lichens and grasses on the clifftops to the deep blues of the ocean and sky. Painting en plein air, his spontaneous brushstrokes are applied expressively with the confidence of an assured artist.

Andy Heald has been exploring landscapes across Scotland for over two decades.  Andy often paints en plein air and begins by using acrylic, sand, clay, plants and emulsion. He then creates the finished work by excavating the canvas, the earlier media scratched and scrubbed off with pencils to create the final, abstract pieces. When painting he is drawn to the ever-changing appearances of our shared environment and attempts to capture these fleeting moments and elements.  His primary influence is the spontaneity of nature – the inseparable response to sea, cloud, sun, season and weather. Andy attempts to reflect these fresh interactions by painting rapidly; the paint and media driven, splashed, scrubbed or dripped over the canvas in an attempt to capture the raw experiences of nature.

We are delighted to welcome David E Johnston to exhibit here for the first time. David, based in the Mearns in the North East of Scotland, is a self taught landscape artist. Working almost exclusively in watercolours he is inspired by the Mearns land and seascapes close to his home. Working from a combination of sketches, images and visual memory, he tries to get as close as possible to the original experience of being in the landscape in order to create a sense of place. David has had several one man exhibitions and has participated in numerous group shows. He was elected member of the RSW in 2017.

As with all these small group exhibitions I want to include a variety of styles to try and explore how different artists approach a similar subject. Jayne Stokes work is quite unique. Jayne graduated from Edinburgh College of Art in 1996 and has worked as a full time artist ever since. “My work aims to show the passage of time across the landscape and to explore our relationship with it.” In doing this Jayne incorporates “found objects” finding that this not only helps to create a sense of place and connect the viewer with the original landscape but also helps the viewer to contemplate environmental and sustainability issues.

“The environment and sustainablity are important issues to me personally and increasingly something that none of us can ignore.  This also feeds into my use of mixed media. My works is rarely made from only from virgin materials. It comes from things that are remade or recyled, or changed and repurposed. That is as important to the work as the messages and stories about the places I visit and document.  I hope to remind people of the importance of stopping and appreciating what is around us.”

I hope you enjoy browsing the art work on line. Please do not hestitate contact us if you would like any further information or would like to reserve one of the pieces.