Category: Exhibitions Previous

6 October to 4 November 2018

Private View – Friday 5 October, 6-8pm

Our next exhibition features three artists whose work has a common thread; a fascination and understanding of texture, colour and form. The work of Simon Laurie, Jock MacInnes and Astrid Trügg draws inspiration from many sources, but the St Ives artists Ben Nicholson, Alfred Wallis, Wilhelmina Barns Graham and Terry Frost as well as William Scott, Braque and Morandi have all had a lasting influence.

Simon Laurie’s work, whether his stylised still life, abstract landscapes or simplistic heads, has a natural rhythm, skilfully balancing shapes, colour and texture. Multiple layers of paint are drawn and scratched into, producing tactile, textured surfaces punctuated by the simplified shapes of the everyday objects in his still lifes, hedgerows and fields in the landscapes and facial features of his small heads.

Jock MacInnes, like Simon, graduated from Glasgow School of Art and taught there for a number of years before pursuing his own painting career. Still life and landscape are the main focus of Jock’s work with the sights and sounds of the West Coast of Scotland and the harbours and villages around Collioure in the South of France featuring strongly. Texture again is an important part of Jock’s work, painting onto gesso-prepared boards and canvases and then scratching and scraping away the layers to leave a natural, weathered feel.

Astrid Trügg studied at Utrecht School of Art and Leith School of Art, and now lives in North Berwick and works from her studio in Edinburgh. Again texture, form and colour are key building blocks in Astrid’s work. Working into the many layers of gesso and paint produces interesting textures onto which antique newspaper collage adds a feeling of nostalgia. The everyday objects that are carefully arranged in Astrid’s still life pieces appear simplified, the perspective altered but the resulting forms balance perfectly with her vibrant and harmonious choices of colour.

Although all three artists employ similar techniques and share similar artistic influences each has evolved their own instantly recognisable, idiosyncratic style.

 

 

1-30 September

Private View – 31 August 6-8pm

Dominique Cameron spent nine months in a wood in Fife, not every day, but at least once a week walking, drawing, writing and painting this most complicated of spaces. Here the landscape snares, entangles, along paths where the light flickers and pools of shadows sharpen the senses. From Winter to Spring and early summer she charted the changes through ice and snow, rain, wind and sun, painting, amongst other things large scale works on paper on the woodland floor, attempting to articulate the nature of trees in all their constant movement of bursting, greening, flowering, falling. During this time she too became part of this landscape, not so much a visitor but more tenant of this small patch of Scottish woodland.

‘I have mapped my path through this wood….. It has become another kind of home, where I have got to know a little more of the lives that are lived here. I have loved every moment.’

We are delighted to welcome back George Birrell to the new gallery in his home town of Gullane for our Summer Show. George is a regular and popular exhibitor at the gallery so it’s great to be able to show a new series of his instantly recognisable paintings throughout August.

George has been working on a new landscape format which is a bit of a departure from the (mostly) square compositions we are used to seeing. I think it works incredibly well allowing George to add a bit more narrative to the scenes.

See what you think!

The show starts with an opening on Friday 3rd August from 6-8pm and will continue until Sunday 26th August. Hope you can make it along.

Our second exhibition in our new gallery space in Gullane is a small group show with six artist with very different styles who are constantly inspired by the changing landscape around them.

Matthew Draper SSA VAS PS, Michael Durning RSW PPAI PAI, Neil Macdonald RSW RGI PAI, Sandy Murphy RSW RGI PAI, Jacqueline Orr RSW RGI PAI and Robert D Murray RSW RGI PAI.

We will also have some new driftwood and found items from Shaun McLaren.

Images will be added to the website as they become available.

The exhibition opens on Saturday 30th June and runs until Sunday 29th July.

Our first exhibition in our new premises in Gullane will be a Mixed Exhibition featuring new work by a variety of gallery artists including Matthew Draper, Ann Oram, Simon Laurie, Graeme Wilcox, Alan Connell, George Birrell, Neil Macdonald, Alice McMurrough, Astrid Trügg, Dominique Cameron, Andy Heald, Jayne Stokes and many more. We will also be showing for the first time work by Gail Murray RSW PAI, Robert Murray RGI RSW PAI and Kirsty Cohen. A really great line up for our first show.

We will open the doors on Saturday 26 May from 12-5pm and would be delighted if you could join us to celebrate our opening.

Going forward our new opening hours will be: 11am-5pm Tuesday to Saturday, 12-5pm Sunday and Closed Mondays except Bank Holidays.

Hope to see you soon.

Our second exhibition of 2018 is a Mixed Show featuring the work of some of the most well known Scottish artists from the past 100 years.

We have recently acquired a few interesting pieces by the highly respected Scottish artist, Patrick William Adam RSA (1854-1929) who lived next door to the gallery at Ardilea from 1908 until his death in 1929. He is most well known for his Interior paintings many of which were painted in houses in and around North Berwick, including Ardilea, Hyndford, Clerkington House and Smeaton Hepburn House. He was one of the founding members of “The Society of Eight”, a group of like-minded artists who got together to exhibit their work in Edinburgh. It seems that their common purpose was to bridge political and artistic differences that existed at the time between Glasgow and Edinburgh. Other members include Cadell, Lavery, David Alison, James Cadenhead, Harrington Mann, James Paterson & another artist whose work we will have on show, Alexander Garden Sinclair. Later members to this group were Peploe, Guthrie, MacTaggart & William Gillies.

Three pieces will be on show, a beautiful oil, “Sweet William, Geraniums” dated 1929, an atmospheric pastel drawing “Flash on the Bass, North Berwick” dated 1925 (or possibly 1929) and for those interested in North Berwick in days gone by, a watercolour featuring beached boats by the first tee at North Berwick Golf Course dated 1899.

Alongside these three pieces with local interest we will also have beautiful landscape by John Campbell Mitchell RSA (1862-1922) of North Berwick looking back from Daisy Island (or “The Leithies”) as well as work by Ian Fleming RSA RSW (1906-1994), Henry Wright Kerr RSA RSW (1857-1936), James McBey (1833-1959), John Bulloch Souter (1890-1972), William James Laidlaw Baillie CBE PRSA PPRSW RGI HRA (1923-2011) and John Bellany CBE RA HRSA (1942-2013) amongst others.

Of our contemporary artists we will have new work by the popular gallery artists Matthew Draper, Andy Heald, Allan J Robertson and Thomas Cameron.

We will also be introducing a new artist to the gallery, Leonie MacMillan. A graduate of Glasgow University and Duncan of Jordanstone as well as spending two summers apprenticeship under the tutelage of the well known ceramist, Lotte Glob, Leonie’s work combines abstract design with messages about the world in which we live.

The show will kick off with refreshments on Saturday 2nd March from 2-5pm and will continue until the end of April. We hope you can join us.

Our first exhibition in 2018 is a solo show with one of Scotland’s leading figurative artists, John Johnstone. Born in Forfar in 1941, John studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art from 1959 to 1964 under David McClure and Alberto Morrocco. He later returned to
teach life drawing classes to a generation of artists such as Joseph Urie, Ian Hughes and Michael McVeigh who have gone on to forge their own successful careers.

His early work was influenced heavily by the work of artists such as Soutine and Kokoschka. When John combined these influences with his fascination for the human figure, a distinctive and powerful style emerged. This work was concerned with death, social injustice and inhumanity in complete contrast to the fashionable styles encouraged at the time. Two of these early pieces are in the current show and mark a strong contrast to the more light-hearted caricature paintings that he is well known for today.

Following art college, John had a number of critically acclaimed exhibitions in Dundee and London. His first show at the Alwin Gallery in Mayfair in 1966 contained work from his Post-Dip show, “full of anguish, suffering and a desperate acceptance of the absurd”, wrote Conroy Maddox the English surrealist artist in the Art Review. His second show, again at the Alwin Gallery, a year later, drew the attention of the London based writer for the The Scotsman, Robert Macdonald, wrote “The paintings in his first show had a nightmarish violence about them that was disturbing, but the expressionism is now becoming more coherent and controlled and his work is gaining painterly qualities which make it evident that he is an artist to be watched.”

At this promising part of his career John seemed to lose his way. In a letter he wrote “My seven years as an angry young man are over.” – he found it increasingly difficult to paint in this disturbing, expressionistic style.

However, a retrospective exhibition at the Tate of work by Edward Burra proved revelatory and provided John with the inspiration to forge forward with his painting once again. Now more controlled and less expressionistic, John’s work became more illustrative allowing him to add more detail to his work.

Around this time the printmakers workshop started up in Dundee. Being an insatiable drawer, John found etching to be the perfect medium to accommodate his imaginative narrative and fantastical caricatures. These etchings remain an important and popular part of his work today. We have a number of new and older etchings in this show.

John’s work has continued to be more illustrative, indeed he admitted that he probably should have followed a career as an illustrator as his real love has always been drawing. His drawing skills are evident in all the work on show in this exhibition from the beautiful line in the unusual “Conjoined Twins” from 1965 and the busy fantastical etching “Dream City” to the keenly observed visit to a modern art exhibition in “Shark Tank”.

Expert draughtsmanship, wonderful observation, a good dose of humour and an unremitting desire to create; John Johnstone is an artist to be admired.

The exhibition kicks off with an opening on Saturday 3rd February from 2-5pm where you can meet the artist and runs until the 25th February.

Most of the information on John’s career I found in the book, “John Johnstone” written by his brother Bob Johnstone with an introduction from the art critic Edward Lucie Smith, is also available during the exhibition.

Next up at Fidra Fine Art is our mixed Winter Exhibition; “12 x 2”, 12 Artists x 2 Paintings. It features a great variety of work by some of the best contemporary Scottish artists working today. We are delighted to have received a really strong selection of work covering an interesting variety of styles and subjects… Im sure there will be something here to suit most tastes.
Lesley Banks, George Birrell, Dominique Cameron, Alan Connell, Matthew Draper, George Gilbert RSW, John Johnstone, Simon Laurie RSW RGI, Neil Macdonald RSW RGI PAI, Alice McMurrough RSW RGI PAI, Ann Oram RSW & Angela Repping.

We have also lined up a visit from the very popular jeweller, Kathryn Williamson. Kathryn will be here with her lovely jewels on Saturday 16th December from 12 noon.

Our Winter Exhibition starts on Saturday 2nd December and will continue through to 28 January 2018.

Our next exhibition at Fidra Fine Art features the smartphone photographic work of German artist, Holger Mohaupt. Set in our everyday landscape, Holger’s cleverly observed narratives elevate commonplace experiences into engaging stories. His work invigorates a sometimes austere world thoughtfully and aesthetically.

The title of the exhibition “I See What You Like” is a playful hint at the curation of the show. All the images on display are “likes” from the artist’s Facebook page, which he has been regularly feeding with his distinct imagery of his every day experiences for the past five years – social media acting as a new form of participatory curation.

To contrast with Holger’s handprinted digital photographs is a small series of portrait etchings by the Aberdeen artist John Bulloch Souter (1890-1972). These pieces, created around one hundred years ago using a process more laborious than the relatively instantaneous digital techniques of today, invites the viewer to consider the changes in aesthetics, processes and how art is consumed and enjoyed today.

A third strand to this exhibition is a video installation titled, ‘Private View’ which is hosted in the St Andrew Blackadder Parish Church on the High Street in North Berwick. Here Holger again is engaging in a dialogue, this time with memory and landscape. The video projection in the main hall of the church was inspired by the memorial benches in and around the seaside town in East Lothian. The peace and tranquility of the church invites the visitor to contemplate and reflect beyond the every day.

Holger describes this work as, “…a call for dialogue. A dialogue between personal landscapes and the psychogeography of the everyday, with his smartphone as a walking stick.”

“I See What You Like” at Fidra Fine Art, will open with a Preview on Friday 27th October from 6-8pm and will continue Saturdays and Sundays open 12-5pm until 16 November. Midweek appointments are very welcome.

“Private View” video installation at St Andrew Blackadder Parish Church will run from 28 October to 26 November open Monday to Friday 9am-2pm and Saturdays 10am-2pm.