Museum will host a series of artist talks

The Scottish Maritime Museum is to host another artist talk at an afternoon event this Saturday (29 September).

Helen Bellany, artist and partner of the critically acclaimed artist, the late John Bellany, will be the next to headline the Museum’s current series of talks.

During the event, which is led in association with Tidelines Book Festival, Helen, will read from her new memoir, The Restless Wave. The memoir gives a candid insight into their marriage, their loss to one another, their second marriage and life together to the end.

The event at the Museum on the Harbourside in Irvine starts at 2pm and will last about an hour followed by an optional tour until 4pm.

Artist Will Maclean MBE will be the next artist to take part in the popular Meet the Artist: Tea, Talk and Tour series at the Museum at 2pm on Saturday 6 October.

Born in Inverness in 1941, Will was a midshipman before attending Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen. He soon returned to sea as a ring-net fisherman as part of a residency, which resulted in a body of over 400 drawings exhibited at the Third Eye Centre, Glasgow, and at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh.

Currently Emeritus Professor at the University of Dundee, Will’s talk will present a fascinating insight into the ring net herring fishing industry focusing on the MFV Misty Isle, which was built in 1947 for the McRae Brothers of Kyleakin on Skye.

The event begins with the talk at 2pm and concludes with an optional tour until 4pm.

One of Scotland’s most prolific maritime artists, James Watt, will conclude the Meet the Artist series in style with an evening talk at the Museum at 7pm on Thursday 18 October.

Described as a Modern Impressionist, James’ love of colour and fluid brush strokes are the hallmarks of his paintings, which include his well-known scenes of industrial Greenock, a town he called home for most of his life.

James, whose interest in painting was ignited in his fourth year at secondary school with the arrival of charismatic art teacher – an ex-miner – has explored the shipping business all his artistic life, getting to know the personalities of the sailormen and fishermen, sailing with them and fishing everything from sprats to whales.

Doors open at 6pm giving visitors an opportunity to view the Maritime Perspectives Exhibition before the talk which starts at 7pm.

Booking for all talks is highly recommended.

Tickets are available via www.scottishmaritimemuseum.org. The Meet the Artist: Tea, Talk & Tour series is part of an exciting programme of events and activities accompanying the Scottish Maritime Museum’s current exhibition, Maritime Perspectives: Collecting Art of a Seafaring Nation.

The exhibition, which runs until 21 October, is the first full showing for the Museum’s new art collection which features works by nationally and internationally renowned artists such as FCB Cadell, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Muirhead Bone, Kate Downie and John Bellany.

Capturing Scotland’s coastline at work, life and play, Maritime Perspectives: Collecting Art of a Seafaring Nation, features over 80 works gathered for the collection over the last three years through the SMMart project.

An ambitious project to create a nationally significant art collection to enrich the nationally recognised maritime heritage at the Museum, the SMMart project has been made possible by a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund’s Collecting Cultures programme, with further support from Art Fund and the National Fund for Acquisitions.

As part of a new Art Fund RA250 programme celebrating works by Royal Academician artists, the exhibition also features a display of recently acquired works by William Lionel Wyllie RA including ‘The Grand Fleet in the Firth of Forth’ after the Armistice.