The National Galleries of Scotland is delighted to announce that the Trustees of Miss Agnes H Hunter’s Trust have decided to continue their support of the NGS Education Visual Impairment Programme for the next two years.  Provided for visitors with all levels of visual impairment, this programme provides specifically designed guided tours and workshops, led by trained educators.  Thanks to the Miss Agnes H Hunter’s Trust, which has funded this programme for the last two years, we can continue to provide these sessions free of charge until March 2010. 

If you would like to find out more about our Community Education Programme, please call Mary Kilpatrick, Community Education Officer, on 0131 624 6428.

Miss Agnes H Hunter's Trust is an Edinburgh-based charity funding activities in support of the blind in Scotland, those suffering physical or mental illness or disability, the education and training of disadvantaged people and those charities enquiring into the cause, relief or cure of arthritis, cancer or tuberculosis.

The results for this very successful art competition have been announced. In it's fourth year, the competition received 4,010 artwork entries for 2008.

You can see the 53 winning pieces displayed at the National Gallery Complex, The Mound, Edinburgh from 13 June - 28 October 2008. The competition is sponsored by Scottish Widows.

The National Galleries of Scotland has won three of the prestigious Roses Advertising Awards. The awards were given in recognition of the Campbells Soup Can Columns installation at the Royal Scottish Academy Building during the enormously successful exhibition Andy Warhol: A Celebration of Life and Death.

The Warhol cans campaign won two Gold awards in the Best Unusual Size or Special Build and Best Ambient Media/Stunt categories. The cans also collected the coveted Grand Prix prize. It is the first time in the history of the awards that the Grand Prix has been won by an in-house team.

The idea to turn the gallery building columns into towers of giant Campbell’s Soup cans created an extraordinary illusion and captured the imagination of the public. The idea proved to be a successful venture with nearly 100,000 members of the public viewing the exhibition.

Portrait of Scotland, launched on 25 April, is a nationwide competition sponsored by Lloyds TSB Scotland which encourages readers of The Scottish Sun to show off their photography skills and enter an image of what best represents their Scotland.

Taking inspiration from this summer's Vanity Fair: Portraits exhibition at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, all participants should take their portraits on Saturday 3 May, resulting in what should be a fascinating range of images of Scotland on that bank holiday weekend. The portraits are not restricted in subject-matter – photographs might be of a family member, a friend, a pet, a favourite footballer or even a favourite landscape or scene.

There are two categories in the competition - over-16s and under-16s – and the competition will run until May 19. Winners will be announced in June and the best entries will be hung in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. Category winners will also receive £500 of photography vouchers each. Details of how to enter can be found in The Scottish Sun until 19 May 2008.

Susan Rice, Chief Executive of Lloyds TSB Scotland, who are sponsoring both the Vanity Fair Portraits exhibition and Portrait of Scotland competition, said: “The competition not only celebrates photography, but will provide a huge variety of personal takes on Scotland.”

The results for this very successful creative writing competition have been announced. In it's third year, the competition received 848 entries for 2008.

The competition is a three way partnership between the National Galleries of Scotland, the English-Speaking Union Scotland and the Scottish Poetry Library. It is sponsored by SQA and EIS, and supported by the Scotsman.

With the evenings getting lighter, Spring is just around the corner. There are plenty of exciting art activities planned for the coming season - choose from talks and lectures, activities for families and children and exciting art courses.

Use the What's On Calendar to find out what is scheduled and how you can take part.

The National Galleries of Scotland is delighted to announce that Baillie Gifford & Co is to sponsor this year’s major summer exhibition at the National Gallery Complex in Edinburgh.

This exhibition of over 100 paintings, pastels and watercolours runs from 19 July to 12 October and will explore the Scottish taste for Impressionism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, assessing the impact of modern European art on Scottish art and artists.

Highlights will include Renoir’s The Bay of Naples (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), Degas’s L’Absinthe (Musée d’Orsay, Paris) and Sir John Lavery’s The Tennis Party (Aberdeen Art Gallery).

In support of the major redevelopment of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, The Heritage Lottery Fund has earmarked £4.8m and Scottish Government has awarded a £5.1m grant towards the project Portrait of the Nation.

The proposed redevelopment of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery in Queen Street will see a doubling of its gallery space and a 50 per cent increase in the number of works on display. There will also be a larger shop and café and a new education suite, including a community gallery, art studios and a seminar room.

Following the announcement of the grants from the Heritage Lottery Fund and the Scottish Government, the National Galleries will launch an initiative to raise £7.7 million from private sources. The full cost of the project is £17.6m and a fundraising campaign will be launched shortly. It is envisaged that the building will close in spring 2009 and will reopen to the public in Autumn 2011.

See Portrait of the Nation project section for more details.

The annual National Galleries of Scotland Art Competition for Schools 2008 is now open for entries. Please send your entries to Linda McClelland, National Gallery of Scotland, The Mound, Edinburgh, EH2 2EL.

This year there are six categories for entry, each with a different theme:

Category A Nursery Schools (Theme – Birds)
Category B Primary 1-3 (Theme – Can you see the music?)
Category C Primary 4-7 (Theme – Sit in Splendour)
Category D S1 and S2 (Theme – Art to Wear)
Category E Special Education Schools (Theme – Come Closer)
Category F Group Work (Theme – selected from any of the above)

Pupils are asked to view selected works from the Online Collection of the National Galleries of Scotland and to make their own personal response on paper. The closing date is Friday 9th May 2008.

An awards ceremony will be held at the National Gallery of Scotland in June 2008. Prizes include digital cameras for schools, art materials, art workshops and gallery visits.

Linda Fabiani, the Minister for Europe, External Affairs and Culture, has announced the extension of Chair appointment of Sir Brian Ivory CBE to the National Galleries of Scotland until March 2009.

Sir Brian has been Chair of the National Galleries of Scotland since June 2000. Over the last seven years he has successfully overseen a number of major projects and purchases, the most notable of which was the re-development of the National Gallery complex at the Mound, the Playfair project, which was completed in 2004.

Sir Brian's continuing leadership will ensure continuity in the development of two major capital projects: the negotiations to purchase the Anthony d'Offay collection of contemporary art, and the planned re-development of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery.

More information can be found on the Scottish Government website.

Fifty winning pieces of work from The National Galleries of Scotland Art Competition for Schools 2007 will be on show at the Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, in the main corridor to the adjacent to the art gallery, from 16 November 2007 to 29 February 2008.

The work on display takes its inspiration from artworks in the national collection and it has been created by children from nursery, primary, secondary and special education schools from all over Scotland.

If you are interested in finding out details of this year’s competition, have a look at the Art Competition for Schools 2008.  If you are successful your work could be on display next year!

Robin Baillie, Senior Outreach Officer in the Education Department, has recently represented the National Galleries of Scotland as part of a cultural exchange organised by Perth and Kinross Council to the Qi Baishi International Art Festival in Xiangtan, China, September 2007.

Robin exhibited the Parallel Lives NGS Outreach Project (2003-4) and the video installation Travelling Lives (2007) by artist Gavin Lockhart, which featured as part of a recent collaboration with Perth and Kinross Council. The video was a portrait of Sheila Stewart MBE, the storyteller and singer from the travelling community in Perthshire. The images of Sheila and her family were projected onto the empty packing crates used for the exchange.

Both exhibits were very well received and stimulated great interest in the audience particularly in relation to the use of new media and using a contemporary viewpoint to address historical works of art.

The trip featured Robin delivering seminars and lectures in two universities in Xiangtan, and also included a visit to the National Art Museum of China in Beijing who are interested in future collaborations with NGS. Hopefully the links made through this exchange will develop future possibilities of this kind.

The Art Fund has created an online image repository for artworks which have been bought with its help. Their generosity to the National Galleries of Scotland is reflected on their website, which features over 500 artworks from our collection that have been purchase with assistance from the fund.

To view these works on the Art Fund website follow the links below.

• National Gallery of Scotland
• Scottish National Portrait Gallery
  
• Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art
  

The Art Fund is an independent charity committed to saving art for everyone to enjoy (Registered charity 209174).

The National Galleries of Scotland was an award winner at the 2007 Arts & Business Scottish Awards. The Galleries in partnership with TOTAL E&P UK Ltd were winners in the Arts, Business & Employees category for the Fionna Carlisle exhibition Energy: North Sea Portraits.

The exhibition was held at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery from October 2006 to January 2007, and celebrated the energy, diversity and achievement of the people involved in the North Sea oil and gas industry.

The Arts, Business & Employees award is in recognition of a successful partnership that integrates the arts into employee development, while stimulating a more creative environment. The winning business demonstrates forward thinking and an understanding of the role the arts play in the workplace.

The National Gallery of Scotland is delighted to be displaying two exquisite Italian bronzes that have recently been taken on loan.

The first is a gilt bronze statuette of St John the Baptist after a model by Michelozzo di Bartolomeo (1396-1472), probably cast in Florence in the later fifteenth or sixteenth century.  St John is wearing his traditional goat-skin vest under a loose cloak and holding the scallop shell with which he scooped water to baptise the multitudes. This is one of five known casts of a figure by Michelozzo commissioned by Piero de Medici for the font at the entrance to the church of Santissima Annunziata in Florence. 

The second, the Blessed Lodovica Albertoni after Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598 – 1680), is a unique, small-scale version in bronze of Bernini’s celebrated marble statue in the altar recess of the Altieri Chapel in San Francesco a Ripa, Rome.  It is an extremely high quality casting which makes it highly likely it was produced under Bernini’s direct supervision. 

Each of the National Galleries of Scotland's three complexes is a great venue for a family visit. To help plan, there is now a dedicated section for parents on our web site (see Parents' Survival Guide pages in the Visit section). You will find essential information on everything from car parking, access, cloakroom provision and facilities for babies, to children's activities and workshops. Don't forget to check our Floor Plans and Must Sees section, too.

We are delighted to announce the appointment of Mr Herbert Coutts and the reappointment of Mr Charles James Dawnay to the Board of Trustees for the National Galleries of Scotland. Both appointments will be for a four-year term and will run from 1 August 2007 until 31 July 2011.

Herbert Coutts has served in senior local government cultural posts for more than forty years. For the final period of his career, Coutts directed the Capital’s Culture and Leisure Department.

James Dawnay is a member of the National Trust and The National Trust for Scotland. He has been a Director of London’s oldest established fine art consultancy, Gurr Johns, and holds Chairmanships and Directorships with various Trusts in the fields of arts and architecture, museums and finance. He is also a Director of a number of Investment Trust companies.

The exciting interactive feature eTours is now live as part of Online Collections. eTours provides our website visitors with the opportunity to view a selection of works on specific themes or topics. You can scroll through works, zoom in to look at detail and find out interesting facts about the works. Watch this space for new eTours to be added over the coming months...

Dr Simon Groom has been appointed the new Director of Modern and Contemporary for the National Galleries of Scotland from August 2007. Simon Groom has been Head of Exhibitions and Collections at Tate Liverpool and he was previously Exhibitions Organiser for Kettle's Yard in Cambridge.

For more information see our Press Office section. 

The National Galleries of Scotland Disability Equality Scheme and Action Plan is now available to view online.

The document aims to show how, through changing attitudes, the development of partnerships and increased expertise, the Galleries can continue to be proactive in recognising and removing the barriers which disabled people face in accessing the National Galleries of Scotland and its collections.

Four new members have joined the Board of Trustees for the National Galleries of Scotland this Spring. Richard Burns and James Knox joined the Board in February, replacing Giles Weaver and Valerie Atkinson. Additionally, Ray Macfarlane and Alasdair Morton joined the Board in March, replacing Gavin Gemmell and Ian McKenzie Smith. Details of all the Trustees can be found in the About Us section of the National Galleries website.

Suvi Kervinen from Finland started an internship in the Conservation Department at the beginning of March. She is assisting the Painting Conservation studio with condition reports of loans and the ongoing work of conserving the Galleries’ collection of paintings. She is shown here removing a yellowed layer of varnish from William Mosman’s portrait of Lt. Col. Alexander Murray of Cringlety.

The National Gallery of Scotland has recently acquired Giovanni Battista Lusieri's oil painting, The Monument to Philopappos, Athens. Lusieri is best known for his meticulously detailed, large-scale landscape watercolours. The same exacting technique was applied to this, his only known work in oil. The purchase was made possible with assistance from The Art Fund, the UK's leading independent art charity.

Bank of Scotland and the National Galleries of Scotland have announced the biggest ever sponsorship of modern art in Scotland. Over the next two years, Bank of Scotland will invest over £400,000 in Bank of Scotland Total Art, a series of two major modern art exhibitions at the Royal Scottish Academy Building, featuring Andy Warhol and Joseph Beuys.

By working in partnership, Bank of Scotland and the National Galleries aim to ensure that modern art reaches the widest possible audience, creating educational and inspirational experiences for all. The Bank’s support will create an innovative education programme with a special focus on young people, targeting, for example, nursery-school children as well as their parents and carers.

See Press Release for more details.