The Herald - The Herald Magazine
Centenary of artist’s birth is a cause for celebration
JAN PATIENCE
shipyards, the beach, the dump…you name it.
In 1967, Wyllie met a young Glasgow School of Art-trained architect, Ron McKinven. A former professional footballer, McKinven specialised in the design of commercial premises such as pubs, nightclubs and restaurants.
Wyllie went on to instal a huge peacock and a Scottish pipe-band in Motherwell Services Club, and created the interiors of the Birds and Bees pub in Stirling, La Bonne Auberge in Glasgow and many other restaurants, bars and clubs throughout Scotland.
A scrap metal merchant he knew gave him old chrome car bumpers and a series of bumper creatures and palm trees started appearing in local cafes, nightclubs and pubs. One of them – a dragon originally made for Bumper’s disco in Prestwick – was eventually moved to the Dean Park in Kilmarnock, where it remains to this day.
Today, there are Wyllie art works all over the country, from Caithness to Campbeltown and from Lewis to Motherwell. In non-lockdown days, thousands of people a day file past his Running Clock outside Buchanan
Street Bus Station in Glasgow.
Wyllie, a wordsmith as well as an artist, called himself a “scul?tor” because he said he wasn’t sure if he was an actual sculptor. The Question Mark became his calling card and was at the heart of all his work. His Paper Boat, a commentary on the demise of heavy industry, even had the letters QM emblazoned on the side. When it opened up, a question mark rose up.
A curious childlike zest for life permeated the life of Wyllie. In a short film by the artist’s friend and collaborator, Kenny Munro – now posted on Mapping Memories, it’s clear that even in old age, he was always questioning things.
Munro’s 15-minute film contains snippets from the early 1990s on, of Wyllie out and about; in Ireland making a film of his 32 Spires installation with filmmaker Murray Grigor, on Lewis creating his bright red Post Box Palm (and posting a letter in it) and his
Stones of Scotland permanent installation at Regent Road Park in Edinburgh. Touchingly, we see Wyllie in his Aladdin’s Cave of a home in
Gourock, by then in his late 80s, reading from a letter of encouragement sent to him by his friend, the influential kinetic US sculptor, George Rickey, who spent his childhood in Scotland.
Towards the end, his old friend and sparring partner, Richard Demarco, is seen at the opening of an exhibition of Wyllie work. “There is only George Wyllie,” says Demarco, and we were not ready for him…”
Mapping Memories – The George Wyllie Art Trail, to contribute your photographs, films, audio and memories, go to georgewyllie.com Jan Patience is the co-author, with Louise Wyllie, of Arrivals and Sailings: The Making of George Wyllie (Birlinn).
THE Stafford Gallery in Wimbledon has been flying the Saltire for Scottish artists for the last decade and this tenth anniversary proves this with flying colours. One of the highlights is a painting called White Cloud VII, above, by the late James Morrison, who died last September at the age of 88. The oil painting, painted in 2000, has been donated to the gallery by a couple called Richard and Susan Halls, with the stipulation that proceeds from the sale will be divided between Doddie Weir’s My Name’5 Doddie Foundation. The painting is priced at £3,950.
It’s a timely intervention as the Montrose-based painter is the subject of a forthcoming documentary called Eye of the Storm by You’ve Been Trumped filmmaker, Anthony Baxter, who also lives in the north-east town. The film, featuring interviews with Morrison carried out in the last years of his life, also features animations by Catriona Black. It will be premiered at the Glasgow Film Festival in February followed by a showing on the BBC Scotland channel.
Morrison, who attended the Glasgow School of Art in the 1950s, was an acclaimed artist and influential teacher who has been credited with helping to reinvigorate landscape painting in Scotland. In a career spanning seven decades, he became known for painting the vast horizons, huge skies, hedgerows and rivers of Angus.
Other Scottish artists whose work features in this 10th anniversary show include; Charles Jamieson, Muriel Barclay, Robert Kelsey, James Tweedie and Helen Tabor. If your are pining for art, this exhibition, which can be viewed online, is pulsing with vigour and joie de vivre.
Exhibition of Scottish Artists 2021: Stafford Gallery in association with Wimbledon Fine Art, 41 Church Road Wimbledon Village London SW19 5DQ, 07939 048 436 or 07836 296 737, http://www. staffordgallery.co.uk, January 17 to February 7. Gallery is closed in line with Covid-19 restrictions but open for online enquiries.