Scotland’s festival city
Edinburgh is home to the world’s largest arts festival, a three-week summer jamboree of music, theatre, dance, visual art and comedy which plays out in hundreds of permanent and temporary venues throughout the city.
It is said that Edinburgh has more art museums and independent galleries per head of the population than London, and museum curators and gallery owners strive to strike a balance between presenting established artists and nurturing emerging talent.
The City Art Centre (left), the Fruitmarket Gallery (foreground) and Edinburgh Castle (right, background)
The Scottish capital’s top four art galleries are all operated by National Galleries Scotland in its role as the caretaker of the national collection. All four galleries occupy beautiful buildings either purpose-built or repurposed from their former uses as a hospital or orphanage.
Occupying two substantial early 1800s buildings which face each other across a busy road to the west of the city centre, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art houses a collection of modern and contemporary art dating from about 1900 to the present. Both are set in extensive parkland dotted with sculpture by artists such as Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore.
The lawn in front of Modern One features Charles Jencks’ Landform, a dramatic work comprising a stepped, serpentine grass mound reflected in crescent-shaped pools, while mounted on the facade of the neo-classical building in large neon letters is Martin Creed’s Work No. 975, EVERYTHING IS GOING TO BE ALRIGHT.
Charles Jencks’ ‘Landform’ in front of Modern One
The displays in Modern One change on a regular basis and are accompanied by a series of special exhibitions. The collection ranges from early 20th century European art (Derain, Matisse, Picasso, Bonnard, Cubism, the Scottish Colourists, Expressionism, modern British) to post-WWII work (Bacon, Hockney, Warhol, Eardley) to more recent artists such as Gormley, Emin, Bourgeois, Mapplethorpe and Hirst.
Modern Two is home to a changing programme of exhibitions and displays drawn from the collection. On permanent display is a recreation of Sir Eduardo’s Paolozzi’s studio as well as his towering, robot-like sculpture, Vulcan. Modern Two is also home to a Surrealism collection, including works by Dali, Magritte and Giacometti.
Marc Chagall’s ‘L’Ecuyere’ (‘The Horse Rider’) in the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art
Near the city centre in the New Town, a UNESCO World Heritage Site completed around 1850 to expand the city beyond its cramped, medieval Old Town, the Scottish National Portrait Gallery is one of Edinburgh’s most remarkable buildings – a neo-Gothic, red sandstone palace opened in 1889 as the world’s first purpose-built portrait gallery.
Both inside and out, an elaborate decorative scheme with glittering friezes, extensive murals and sculptural embellishments make it a special experience. Statues of poets, monarchs and statesmen watch over Queen Street, while William (“Braveheart”) Wallace and warrior king Robert the Bruce guard the entrance.
Scottish National Portrait Gallery
A kind of shrine to Scotland’s heroes and heroines, the gallery explores different aspects of the country’s story and people through images of famous historical figures such as Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott and Prince Charles Edward (“Bonnie Prince Charlie”) Stuart to more recent pioneers in science, sport and the arts, including singer/songwriter Emeli Sandé, comedian Billy Connolly and actor Tilda Swinton. The gallery also houses the National Photography Collection.
In the very centre of the city in beautiful Princes Street Gardens, the Scottish National Gallery houses the national collection of fine art from the early Renaissance to the late 19th century. Displayed in a peaceful setting are masterpieces by Raphael, Velazquez, Vermeer, Monet, Cezanne, Van Gogh and many more. For a nation of Scotland’s size, the collection is regarded as one of the best in the world.
A beautiful new annex specialises in the history of Scottish painting. All the major names are represented, including Allan Ramsay, David Wilkie, William McTaggart and Henry Raeburn, whose much loved The Reverend Robert Walker Skating on Duddingston Loch, better known as the “Skating Minister”, is rivalled for iconic status only by its gallery mate, Sir Edwin Landseer’s rgal stag, Monarch of the Glen.
Scottish National Gallery
Sir Edwin Landseer’s ‘Monarch of the Glen’, 1851 (Scottish National Gallery)
Virtually back to back with the Scottish National Gallery (and also designed by William Henry Playfair in the form of an ancient Greek temple) is the Royal Scottish Academy. The RSA was founded in 1826 by a group of eminent artists with a range of aims, including presenting an annual exhibition open to all artists of merit, offering fine art instruction at no charge and supporting less fortunate artists through charitable funds.
Royal Scottish Academy
The first Annual Exhibition was held in 1827, making it one of the longest running shows in the world, and the organisation moved into its purpose-built galleries in 1855. Honorary Academicians have included Rodin, Degas and, more recently, Anselm Keifer. The RSA runs a year-round programme of exhibitions and many of its members teach in Scotland’s leading cultural institutions.
From the Society of Scottish Artists annual exhibition at the Royal Scottish Academy
Across from the southern entrance to Waverley Station, the City Art Centre is home to the city’s collection of Scottish art dating from the 17th century to the present day. Including historic and modern painting and photography and contemporary art and craft, the works are displayed on a rotating basis along with a series of special exhibitions.
City Art Centre
Most of Scotland’s leading artists are represented, including the group known as the Scottish Colourists (Peploe, Fergusson, Cadell, Hunter) and an equally important group, the Glasgow Boys (Hornel, Henry, Lavery). The collection records many important moments in Edinburgh’s history, as in John Wilson Ewbank’s monumental Entry of George IV into Edinburgh from the Calton Hill, 1822. The crowded scene is depicted in extraordinary detail, while the painting also documents the changing face of the city.
Across the street from the City Art Centre, the Fruitmarket received a multi-million pound redevelopment which expanded its existing galleries and embraced a large adjacent warehouse and former nightclub). The first project and renovation of its kind to open in the UK after the Coronavirus pandemic, it retained original industrial features such as steel frames, brick-lined walls and rough wood.
A former fruit, floer and vegetable market converted into a gallery in the 1970s, the Fruitmarket is dedicated to Scottish and international contemporary art. It was the first Scottish cultural institution to be included on the Bloomberg Connects cultural app, joining over 20 others around the world.
Dovecot Studios is a world renowned tapestry studio producing exceptional hand-woven tapestries and rugs. The cavernous main hall stems from its previous incarnation as municipal swimming baths where generations of locals learned to swim.
The studios collaborate with leading artists to create tapestry interpretations of their work. Over the years they have included Eduardo Paolozzi, Peter Blake, David Hockney, Graham Sutherland, Henry Moore, Elizabeth Blackadder, John Bellany, Barbara Rae and others.
Dovecot Studios
Completed tapestries can be seen in places such as the British Library in London (R.B. Kitaj’s If Not, Not, at seven metres square the studio’s biggest tapestry to date), Coventry Cathedral and Kings College Chapel, Cambridge. There is an ongoing exhibition programme, while visitors can watch weavers at work from a viewing balcony.
Housed in the beautifully restored Castle Mills heritage building, a former rubber factory and brewery complex which won architecture awards for reuse, Edinburgh Printmakers offers facilities for artists using both traditional and digital processes. Both in-studio and visiting artists’ work can be seen in a series of themed exhibitions.
Edinburgh Printmakers occupies the former Castle Mills rubber factory. Photo: Jules Lister
Adjacent to the Palace of Holyroodhouse, the official royal residence in Scotland, The King’s Gallery hosts themed exhibitions of works from the Royal Collection, the largest private art collection in the world. Spread over 13 historic royal residences, including Buckingham Palace, Hampton Court Place and Windsor Castle, it comprises over a million objects, including paintings, works on paper, photographs, tapestries, furniture, ceramics, sculptures and textiles.
The Queen’s Gallery
Since the reign of Charles I (1625-1649), successive monarchs have accumulated a vast treasure trove of works, including Old Masters (Da Vinci, Holbein, Michelangelo, Raphael), Dutch Golden Age paintings (Hals, Rembrandt, Steen, Vermeer), Sevres porcelain and modern art (Anish Kapoor, Lucian Freud, Andy Warhol) as well as priceless gifts from nation states acquired on royal visits. Themed exhibitions have included Victoria and Albert: Our Lives in Watercolour, Eastern Encounters: Four Centuries of Paintings and Manuscripts from the Indian Subcontinent and The Art of Tudor and Stuart Fashion.
Waller Hugh Paton, ‘Edinburgh with a distant view of the Palace of Holyroodhouse’, 1862 (detail) from Victoria and Albert: Our Lives in Watercolour at The Queen’s Gallery
Dundas Street
For an overview of Edinburgh’s independent galleries, not to mention an opportunity to explore the gorgeous Georgian New Town, take a stroll down Dundas Street, which has been the city’s ‘gallery row’ for five decades. You’ll find yourself criss-crossing the street as window displays entice you over.
Both & Gallery and Arusha Gallery present solo shows by contemporary artists and curated group exhibitions. Birch Tree Gallery focuses on artworks which have their roots in nature, whether in materials, inspiration or thematic elements. The Fine Art Society is a specialist in Scottish art from the 1700s onwards. Harvey and Woodd has an extensive range of both traditional and cntemporary art. Established in 1842, the Scottish Gallery is both Scotland’s longest running commercial gallery and Edinburgh’s foremost independent exhibitor, with an unmatched pedigree for showcasing emerging, established and historical artists. Founded in 1970, the Torrance Gallery was the first art space on Dundas Street and today presents one- and two-person exhibitions as well as large mixed exhibitions.
S. J. Peploe, ‘Royan’, 1910 (The Scottish Gallery)