The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
Amazing underwater pictures to be shown
Award winner will use prize to develop new body of work
A fascination with the sea – and what lies below the waves – has won a Scottish photographer a major arts award.
The JD Fergusson Arts Award gives promising Scottish artists support each year to help them develop their work and boost their career.
This year’s award, funded by the Perth Common Good Fund and the JD Fergusson Arts Award Trust, has been given to Janeanne Gilchrist, 45, a photographer and image-maker from Edinburgh, for her underwater photographic works, taken while freediving.
The photos reveal a hidden and beautiful world around Scotland’s coasts.
“It is like a natural landscape, it is always changing depending on the weather and currents,” said Janeanne.
“I am delighted to have won this award, it is a great opportunity to develop my work.”
The award, worth £3,500, will be used by Janeanne to develop a new body of work which will then be exhibited in a solo exhibition at the Fergusson Gallery in Perth.
This will run from November this year until March 2018 and the artist hopes to free-dive around the remote Outer Hebrides to capture new images.
Perth Museum’s collections officer Amy Waugh said judges had agreed Janeanne was the “stand-out” entrant.
As well as exhibiting their works at the Fergusson Gallery, previous award winners have journeyed as far afield as Australia, New Zealand and America.
Notable past winners include Debbie Lawson, whose work is held in the collections of, among others, Charles Saatchi and Mario Testino. Debbie also created the Oor Wullie Snowglobe installed at Ninewells Hospital in Dundee.
The award is open to artists whose last professional training was over three years ago working in any visual arts discipline. Applicants must born in Scotland or lived for half their life in Scotland.