Glenkiln Sculptures

My dog Beano with Rodin's sculpture of John The Baptist

I had a lovely Sunday yesterday with a trip to Thornhill via the Sculptures at Glenkiln. As you can see from the photo, Galloway was looking at its very best in the sunshine.

There's a great article by journalist Mary Smith about a walk you can do at Glenkiln to take in all the sculpture here.

The Last Day

Andy Priestman ceramics with our current exhibition in the background.

It's the last day of our current exhibition and the paintings have started to leave for their new homes. The interest in this show has been fantastic and we have really enjoyed having such a significant collection of Galloway and Scottish art in our gallery.

The paintings become like good friends and we miss them when they are gone.

Wigtown Book Festival

I just booked three days at Wigtown Book Festival. The web site has excellent online booking.

I'm going to see artists Alastair Gray and John Byrne talk about their life and work. Can't wait!

A New Roof

The gallery is very noisy today - the fine weather means the roofers have started to replace both the flat roofs at the back of the gallery. They're putting proper insulation in too so hopefully we'll feel a bit warmer this winter and cashmere jumpers will just be a cosy thing to wear, rather than the only way of surviving a cold winter's day in the gallery!

Pot Fest in The Park

Pot Fest international ceramics market at the magnificent Hutton in the Forest was the weekend before our exhibition Opening. In spite of the hectic time we were having in the gallery we managed to take Sunday off and have a really enjoyable day out.

Both Jill and I love pots, as visitors to the gallery will know, and it was great to see quite a few of our regular exhibitors at this fantastic event.

Adam Booth's Lily of the Valley gate had been newly installed in the garden and it looked perfectly at home already.

Every year at Pot Fest there is a themed competition where exhibitors can submit one piece each. The visitors and the potters all vote for their favourites. This year the theme was 'Altars, Shrines and Makers'. Our good friend Christine Smith won with her fantastic piece 'Homage to The Shrine of Flight'.

Homage to The Shrine of Flight by Christine Smith

I also loved this piece by Richard Godfrey, I do enjoy a tea ceremony...

A Shrine To The English Tea Ceremony by Richard Godfrey 

We took a tour round the house and gardens. Every year Lord and Lady Inglewood buy some contemporary pottery for the house and it looked so at home beside the Arts and Crafts pottery and the many other treasures.

In the gardens we spotted this cheeky monkey looking out from an upstairs window:

Of course we couldn't go home without a little collection of new pots.

I bought a couple of pieces from Paul Young including this luscious bowl:

When we got home we all ate a delicious salad from Margaret Brampton's 'Alice in Wonderland' bowl:

Yum!

What's happened to time...?

I've been a bit neglectful of my Blog, it's something I really enjoy doing but sometimes life just takes over and there aren't enough hours in the day.

Our current exhibition has been hugely successful and we have had a never ending stream of visitors to the gallery since it opened.

The Private View, a week ago, was very busy and also lots of fun. We were lucky enough to get a visit from the previous owner of our gallery, Niall McGill Duncan, and his little dog Missy, later in the day when the crowds had disappeared!

I love the appreciation that the older Galloway and Scottish paintings get, and over the weeks that we have them in the gallery I always learn lots more about the artists and about local history in general.

As it's summer time we served Pimms during the Private View and as you can see it went down very well indeed...

Thanks to Joss for spotting a photo opportunity - the Pimms glasses looked like an art installation.