Making Headlines

Here’s a link to a piece in this week’s Dunfermline Press about my show Northern Lights -An Artistic Odyssey of Scotland’s Coast.

With my painting The Bass Rock Light
With my painting The Bass Rock Light

 

Text from article below:

BE captivated by the beauty of Scotland’s breathtaking seascapes and lighthouses at the Fire Station Creative’s latest exhibition.

‘Northern Lights: An Artistic Odyssey of Scotland’, the first solo exhibition by self-taught Dunfermline artist Clive Ramage, 45, launched at the weekend and will run until November 22.

The artworks on display are based on Clive’s year-long travels in his camper van around Scotland documenting the landscape and scenery from Stromness to the Mull of Galloway, after being awarded a grant by Fife Contemporary Arts and Crafts.

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The inspiration for the project came from Clive’s childhood experiences growing up in Arbroath.

He said, “I’ve always been drawn to the sea. Each night, like clockwork, the Bell Rock, Isle of May and Fife Ness lights would intermittently flash their beams out across the cold, dark sea and I would watch – mesmerised at my bedroom window.

“Those magical, exotic lights across the sea have continued to tantalise and inspire me and I have always wanted to capture something of that magic and atmosphere in pictorial form.”

The effects of the weather also provided their own inspiration for Clive’s paintings.

“The colours and atmosphere of each location probably became the more important feature of the work,” he explained.

“It wasn’t so much the lights themselves that were intriguing me pictorially, but the wild spaces between them, the surrounding landscapes.”

Clive has previously exhibited in the Royal Scottish Academy, the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts and the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour.

He is also a member of the Fife Dunfermline Printmakers Workshops and rents a studio in the former fire station.

He added, “Fire Station Creative is such a beautifully renovated space for exhibiting artworks.

“The wonderful Fife coast and the East Neuk in particular have also proved to be a huge inspiration to me, so it will be great to be show some of that work here too.”

Gallery curator Ian Moir said, “We’re really proud to be showing off the talent that comes from our own studios.

“I think this exhibition will be well-received by the public. The subject matter is very accessible and the artworks have been extremely well-executed. It’s going to be a great show.”

Entry is free. The gallery is open from 10am to 5pm Wednesday to Saturday and 11am to 4pm on Sunday.

Northern Lights – Now showing at Fire Station Creative, Dunfermline

Here are a selection of some of the paintings currently on show at Fire Station Creative. All are for sale.

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Edinburgh Art Fair

The Old Town, Edinburgh
The Old Town, Edinburgh

As well as having the solo paintings show on at Fire Station Creative, Dunfermline, right now, I will also have some of my Edinburgh etchings on show and available for sale at Edinburgh Art Fair this weekend.

Please click the links for more info! I’ll be demonstrating printmaking techniques there tomorrow, so stop by and say hello and have a go yourself if you can make it!

Hope to see you there!

Clive

The Lights That Never Go Out

Here are the first photos from my journey around Scotland’s amazing coastline (Ardnamurchan, Mull and part of the East Coast). I will be using some of these as the inspiration for new paintings and prints. Plenty more to come, so keep watching this space!

photocrati gallery

Fife Council grant acknowledgement pic

The Lights That Never Go Out – A Map of Scotland’s Lighthouses

Here’s a map of all the Scottish lighthouses that I found at Ardnamurchan Point. There’s a lot of them! Almost 100 and pretty much all built by the Stevenson family within 100 years from the first (the Bell Rock) which was finished in 1810. I hope to get to as many as possible over the next few months as part of my project, The Lights That Never Go Out, An Artistic Odyssey From Muckle Flugga To The Mull of Galloway.

So after a day spent washing clothes and repacking the campervan after the Easter trip to the west coast, I’m off again to spend the next few days and nights sketching and photographing the lighthouses between Montrose and Fraserburgh. Tonight I’m hoping for a clear and starry sky (ie. no fog horn!) spent at the foot of Rattray Head.

Scottish Lighthouses
Scottish Lighthouses