Art exhibition is not to be missed 500 works will be on show at prestigious showcase
More than 500 works will be on show at the prestigious Paisley Art Institute (PAI) Annual Exhibition, which opens on Saturday.
Pieces in all mediums will be featured, including a large number of three-dimensional works, which is rare in an show of this size, according to the organisers.
And this year the guest painter will be Adrian Wiszniewski, who is a member of the famous group known as the New Glasgow Boys. A PAI spokesman said Wizniewski is an acclaimed contemporary Scottish painter and printmaker.
His interest in architecture and design has led him to a range of projects and collaborations, including speculative outdoor architecture, poetry, writing, plays and even fashion design.
His work is held in the collections of major galleries worldwide.
And the guest sculptor this year is Lys Hansen, who PAI says is one of Scotland’s most important figurative expressionist painters.
Her work aims to explore the human condition.
She said: “It has to examine some kind of truth and really mean something as the most extraordinary thing is ourselves and our lives and how we feel about those around us.”
Lys Hansen prefers to paint on a large scale as this, she says, opens up the work to the viewer, allowing us to look at it, get into it and feel it.
Since 1985, she has worked regularly in Berlin, with the city, its people, their lives and struggles a continuing source of inspiration.
For the PAI show, the artist presents a series of painted wooden sculptures, cut naturally from fallen trees local to her village.
PAI’s President David Sutton, said: “This is an important year for Paisley and the Paisley Art Institute is proud to be a supporter of its bid to become City of Culture 2021.
“The opening of the 129th annual open exhibition will celebrate one of the main objects in the constitution of the PAI, ‘to encourage and promote art’, largely intended for the people in Paisley originally, but the exhibition brings in visitors from all over Scotland and beyond.
“It’s for the people, not just the artistic cognoscenti.”
The PAI show runs at Paisley Museum until Saturday, June 26, and admission is free.
Visit www.paisleyartinstitute. com for more information.