Dundee’s V&A to honour John Byrne’s ‘pop-up book’

● Artist says he thought his famous stage creation had been ‘lost forever’

His paintings, album covers, plays and stage designs have made him one of Scotland’s most popular cultural figures.

Now artist and writer John Byrne is to be honoured by Dundee’s new museum of design when it displays a huge “pop-up book” he created for the groundbreaking play The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil 45 years ago.

Byrne admitted he had thought his hand-painted sets, which will be going on display at the £80 million V&A Dundee attraction when it opens in September, had been “lost forever” before discovering they had been secured for the nation several years ago.

Byrne’s backdrops are going on permanent display following years of restoration work carried out on after the book’s acquisition following the death of writer John Mcgrath.

The National Library of Scotland, which has agreed to a 25-year loan, has also carried out an extensive 3D mapping exercise on the biggest book in its 27 million strong collection. The sets have been photographed from thousands of different angles to ensure every detail can be viewed online.

Measuring more than three by four metres when fully open, and standing over two metres tall, the cardboard sets were transported on top of the 7:84 theatre company’s van as it toured village halls in 1973.

The original cast, who included Bill Paterson, Alex

0 John Byrne with his pop-up book which will be on display in Dundee Norton and John Bett, would turn its pages during the show, which tackled issues around the exploitation and economic changes in the Highlands from the 18th century to the North Sea oil boom of the time.

Byrne admitted the construction of the book, which has five scenes include a Highland landscape, a croft, a burnout cottage, a poppy-strewn war memorial and a Native American tipi, had been a process of “trial and error.” Byrne said: “I just thought it was going to be dumped in a scrap-head after the show. It’s not the kind of thing that someone would keep and put in a spare room. I actually thought it had been lost forever. I think it was maybe kept in someone’s garage for years.

“I’m thrilled it’s managed to stand up to the ravages of time, especially after being taken around on the roof of a van.

“I didn’t go on the tour myself. I only ever saw the show once, but it was wonderful. It was like a ceilidh and a play combined, but it was very hardhitting - John didn’t soft-pedal with any of his political views.

“He thought that people who couldn’t go to theatre or didn’t live anywhere near a theatre deserved to see theatre so he decided to take it to them.”