IN THE FRAME

Museum staff recreate famous city paintings

IT IS not easy trying to recreate 16th century art with a saw and some loo roll but the creative minds at Glasgow Museums have hilariously pulled it off.

Lockdown has brought out the inner artist in many of us – but the city curators have taken it to another level.

Laura Bauld, who is working on the refurbishment of The Burrell Collection, said: “We noticed the Getty Museum in the US had challenged people to recreate a favourite artwork using only the things they had at home.

“It was a great opportunity to highlight some of the outstanding paintings gifted to the city by William Burrell.”

She added: “We’ve worked with these pieces for nearly four years now so we have come to know and love them.

“We thought it would be a wonderful way to pay them homage, a wacky way to place them in the spotlight and to share them with our audience and others via social media.”

Laura and her colleagues Allison Whitehill, Jo Meacock, Morven Rodger and Iona Shepherd had a fun few weeks working out how to recreate some of the city’s finest paintings by Klimt, Degas, Millet and more.

Getting angles and lighting correct were among the challenges and the team enlisted the help of partners – and even pets – to get the poses just right.

Laura explained: “It was tricky finding objects that can be used to represent some of the things in paintings that are 400 years old.

“What are you going to find in your flat that could be a sixteenth-century sword?

“We used toilet rolls, towels – even a sonic screwdriver toy at one point. It’s been a real challenge but a lot of fun and the feedback’s been brilliant.”

Laura added: “Everyone I work with at Glasgow Museums takes great pride in using the amazing array of objects in the city’s collection to engage and inspire the people of Glasgow and beyond.

“So while we are living in different times and working in different circumstances, this was a chance to bring our paintings to people in a different way.”

She laughed: “How could you not smile at our efforts to recreate these masterpieces?”