Tomorrow will be the last full day of my show at the Edinburgh Ski Club.
It has been fantastic to have quite a large body of my work on show in one place again 2 years since my last solo. I’m glad to say the comments and feedback have been very positive from people who already know my work and the many who have come in out of the cold from the street to have a first look.
Harvest, Blue and Super Moons
So if you are able to come along tomorrow or before 2pm on Wednesday 29th November when I’ll begin to take it down then please do come in.
Here are a couple more pictures and a video to give an idea of how it looks …
Wall of East Neuk hand-painted etchings
(Please ignore the heavy breathing in the video!!)
Clive Ramage will be exhibiting more that 50 works of art in a solo ‘pop-up’ exhibition at Edinburgh Ski Club this November.
Works From The Studio is the latest solo show of works by Dunfermline-based painter and printmaker, Clive Ramage. The show will include some of Clive’s atmospheric paintings of lighthouses, along with his popular Edinburgh and East Neuk scenes and a variety of hand-coloured etchings. This will be the biggest collection of Clive’s works to be shown in one place to date.
The self-taught artist originally from Arbroath said:
“I am very excited about the show having put the whole thing together myself. It has been quite a challenge! Not only painting and framing 50 pictures but planning and publicising the event to ensure it’s looks right and is a success. There’s still a lot of work to do with only a week to go, but I’ll get a helping hand with hanging it from my friend and fellow painter Celie. It will be great to see all the work I have created over the past year or so all together in the one space.”
Clive mainly works from his home-based studio in Dunfermline and is also a member of the Fife Dunfermline Printmakers Workshop. He frequently travels around Scotland in his camper van (or mobile studio) seeking inspiration in the country’s wild and remote corners and it’s often dramatic weather. Many of the paintings in this exhibition have been inspired by these trips along with Edinburgh and the villages of Fife’s coast.
Describing his work, Clive says:
“I usually start drawing from a reference sketch done on site, but as soon as I am happy with the general composition I paint purely from imagination. As I work my way through a painting, the colours and atmosphere become the focus for me. The final result is my own emotional response to a place and my attempt to capture it’s unique atmosphere.”
Clive exhibits regularly at the RSA, SSA, RGI and the RSW annual shows. He frequently sells his work with many galleries around Scotland with his prints and paintings hanging in private collections around the world.
Works From The Studio will be open to the public from 11am-5pm daily between Thursday 23rd November – Tuesday 28th at Edinburgh Ski Club, 2 Howe Street EH3 6TD
There will be a variety of recent watercolours, oil paintings and etchings on show. Proceeds from sales will go towards the costs of a 2 month residency at Castlemaine Press Print Workshop, Australia next year.
Please join me at the private view. I look forward to seeing you there!
It’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything, but it’s not because I haven’t been busy painting and printmaking. In fact, it’s probably because I have been so busy doing that that time has flown by. But as I’ll be taking part in a mixed show at Dancing Light Gallery in Whitmuir over the next few weeks, I thought I’d better get my act together on the marketing front!
The gallery will be having a preview over this coming weekend and I have 10 pieces in the exhibition, including those above and below. If you’re in the area (it’s halfway between Edinburgh and Peebles) then the gallery is well worth a visit. As is the lovely restaurant and organic farm shop which are all together under the one roof. Here’s a link to the gallery for details of the exhibition and how to find it.
I’m also putting together the finishing touches to various pictures for a solo exhibition which is taking place in Edinburgh in 3 weeks time. I’ll post the details for that over the weekend, so watch this space …
I’m delighted that my latest Dean Village hand-painted etching (Sunset) has been accepted to be exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy Annual Open 2017. It’s the 4th in a series of 10, each of which depicts the scene at a different time of day or season.
I’m especially pleased that this painting was accepted as I think it it’s the best piece of work I have done to date. It’s certainly the one I’m most satisfied with, insofar as it’s the closest I’ve gotten to achieving what I had in mind when I began the series last year. I’m also really pleased to have work in this particular RSA Open as it’s on during the Edinburgh Festival, so it’s going to be very busy.
I won’t make it to the opening of the exhibition unfortunately, but I’ll look forward to seeing the exhibition when I return from my summer holiday. I’m off to Belgium and Holland to get up close and personal with all my favourite paintings by artists like Bosch, Brueghel, Avercamp, Rembrandt and Vermeer. I’m especially looking forward to going back to the Rijksmuseum which was mostly closed for refurbishment the last time I visited, so I only saw a fraction of the artworks they normally have on show.
I’m currently reading the weighty Van Gogh, The Life tome and so this is also going to be a bit of an artistic pilgrimage to the places where he lived, worked and painted in those 2 countries. I’m hoping to come back brimming with ideas and inspiration and, despite the huge amount of anticipation I have for going on this trip, I’m already looking forward to getting back to work when I return.
I’ll try and post a few pictures from my trip here and on my Instagram page, so watch this space.
On another note, I just delivered a batch of etchings and paintings to The Coach House Gallery in Pittenweem, which will be on show there during the Pittenweem Art Festival. So drop in for a look if you’re planning a visit (which runs between 5-12th August). And if you haven’t been to Pittenweem or the festival before then it’s well worth the trip. The village is stunning and the interiors of some of the houses perched on the hill above the harbour are well worth a visit in their own right. There’s over 100 artists showing, as well as music and other events so there’s plenty to see and do.
So I’ve produced these 3 different coloured versions of my Super Moon etching (image size 48x58cm). They’re off to the framers now, but do go along to the event if you’re in the Perth area and have a closer look at the moon than you’d normally get. There’s a lot more detail thank you might expect in that bright orb hanging in the sky at night. Hopefully, I’ve managed to capture a suggestion of that with these.
There’s also going to be hundreds of works on show by around 60 other artists, so plenty to see.
Here’s the Blue version showing the full-sized print below.
I have a few pieces in this show at the lovely Strathearn Gallery including these 2 above and below. It’s on until 21st May, so do drop in tomorrow for the opening or before the show closes in a month.
Tobermory, 65x25cm, mixed media over line etching
Quay Gallery
I also have new work on show at The Quay Gallery, Aberdour, including this large oil of The Bass Rock (a favourite subject!).
The Bass Rock (Sunset) 80x80cm, oil on canvas
Studio Move
The other news is that I have left Fire Station Creative and will no longer be taking part in exhibitions or open studios at there. I will, however, be opening my new studio doors (in Edinburgh) to the public at some point in the future, so keep an eye out for news on that front.
And Finally …
Many thanks to those who visited the recent show at Gallery at Fifty Five in Stonehaven. The feedback was fantastic and I look forward to exhibiting there again in 2018.
Until then, I’ll be working on new pieces including more versions of the 2 hand-painted etchings above and those I’ve done of Edinburgh and the East Neuk, along with more oils based on my recent travels to Yorkshire, Cornwall and Northumberland. There will no doubt be a few more lighthouse paintings and new etchings in the pipeline too.
There’s more to report as far as exhibitions coming up are concerned and an exciting piece of news (for me at east!) about my work featuring in a new glossy magazine … but I’ll leave that for next time.
You can always find more updates and pictures of my latest works in progress etc by following me on:
20 Hand-painted etchings of Edinburgh & the East Neuk of Fife
Here’s some news about some upcoming exhibitions.
I’m happy to say I have a number of exhibitions in the pipeline for this year and this lot of newly framed work will be heading off to a gallery near you in the coming week. I’ll have some of this work in the Gallery at Fifty Five Spring show opening in Stonehaven on 4th March.
There’s also arTay during Perth Festival of the Arts which takes place in May, and either side of that I’ll have work in the Pittenweem Arts & Galleries Weekend along with fellow Fire Station resident artists in April, and at the Fire Station Creative gallery which will be happening around Open Studios time in June. I’ll post the specifics for all of these nearer the times.
In the meantime, I’ll be working mainly on new oil paintings and etchings, including lots based on my recent Cornwall, Devon and East Lothian trips in the campervan.
I’ve been meaning to update my blog for weeks, but it’s only now (while bed-ridden with flu for a 3rd day on the trot) that I’ve had the time to stop and think about what to write.
Well December was a very good month for a start. With 4 separate exhibitions on the go and several paintings and etchings off to new homes for Christmas it was all a bit hectic, in a good way! I was delighted to get pieces accepted for both the SSA and the RSW annual shows, both of which were held at the RSA building on The Mound in Edinburgh during Dec/Jan. My watercolour of Limekilns, Winter Afternoon (above) sold on the preview day of the RSW show, which was a nice little confidence booster to start off the new year!
Dancing Light Gallery
Dancing Light Gallery
January has been kind to me once again this year. I was approached by Dee at Dancing Light Gallery near Whitmuir and asked if I would like to show with them. We arranged for me to visit the gallery (which is stunning if you haven’t already been … it’s well worth a special trip!) and I took some examples of my work. I was very pleasantly surprised by the beautifully lit space and by the quality of the work on show. It’s definitely one of the better galleries I’ve visited recently and when you add the fact that there’s a fantastic organic farm shop and restaurant in the same complex then it’s a great place to spend an afternoon.
So I am delighted to say that I’ll be exhibiting with Dancing Light Gallery in two separate exhibitions later this year. Firstly, in a printmaking exhibition during October/November where I’ll be showing my etchings; and secondly in the mixed Christmas exhibition, where I’ll show several paintings. I’m really looking forward to working with the owner Dee and her colleagues at this beautiful gallery and hope it’s just the beginning of a long and fruitful relationship.
Gallery at Fifty Five
I’ll also be exhibiting for the first time with another new gallery this coming March. I stumbled upon Gallery at Fifty Five in Stonehaven while visiting friends there last year. I was immediately struck by this small but very ambitious gallery. The work on show by Martin Nelson was truly outstanding and I chatted with the owner Eion for a good while about it and about art in general. It was great to meet a gallery owner who not only knew his artists well, but also loved their work and wanted to talk about it. Follow the link above to see the high caliber of artists showing here.
So with only a month to go now before that exhibition opens, I’m determined to get out of this bed and back into the studio. I’ll be finishing off the paintings I have for the Stonehaven show as well as working on new etchings for the exhibitions later in the year at Dancing Light. I’ll post opening details for all of the above exhibitions asap …
I was thrilled to have a very successful open studio event at the end of last month, where I was asked lots of questions about my work and especially about my recent hand-painted etchings. So I thought it might be a good idea to provide an example of what they are and explain a bit about how & why I produced them. It’s been making these (and clearing out my plan chest of etching proofs!) which has preoccupied much of my time this year, but it’s also been something I’ve really enjoyed doing too.
Below is an example of a state proof etching I was loath to throw away, but didn’t want to sell as it was. I had a drawer full of them from 4 years of working on this and about 30 other different plates at the Dunfermline Printmakers Workshop.
Cellardyke Shoreline (etching & aquatint)
It can be an expensive business putting a plate through its various stages before finalising it, as I like to use decent paper for the proofs that come near the end of the process. Anyway, I decided back in January to do something productive with all those failed etchings that were taking up precious studio space. It was time for a bit of colouring in! Below is a finished hand-painted etching from the same plate as the one above. This one was done using a mixture of watercolours and pastels.
Cellardyke Shoreline (Evening Song)
As I had several of each I decided to experiment with colours and mix up the media a bit too. Here’s another from the same plate using gouache and watercolour.
Cellardyke Shoreline (Sunset)
You can see how different the same composition can become with a little imagination and a willingness to take a risk or too. They were going in the bin otherwise, so it’s no risk at all really. I must have painted somewhere in the region of 30 of these over the year using a variety methods, including the larger Edinburgh ones of Dean Village and The Old Town (see below), the plates for which were produced specifically with hand-painting the prints in mind. I’ve found it great fun and quite liberating to just take risks and throw colour at them to see what happens. It’s also been good to experiment with different ‘feelings’ or atmospheres in each. So they’ve all ended up as distinctly separate and individual pieces. I might take inspiration from some of the more successful ones for future oil paintings, but that’s for later next year.
The Old Town, Edinburgh (2/10)
I’m planning on getting back into the etching properly again in 2017 and I’ll no doubt be making a lot more duff proofs in the process … so watch this space for more hand-painted etchings!
