The Glass Mountain: Barry McGlashan

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Barry McGlashan

WE ARE DELIGHTED to host Barry McGlashan’s third solo exhibition at The Scottish Gallery, The Glass Mountain.

The world Barry McGlashan creates in his paintings ranges from the intimate to the monumental, not only in the variety of his subject but in his ability to capture in the largest or smallest canvas an interest with humans, with landscape and with story. His knowledge of literature and art history informs his practice and he revels in producing scenes which beguile and intrigue in equal measure. Each painting is visualised as a stage set, perfectly orchestrated by a master auteur. McGlashan is insistent on the viewer playing their part and rather than giving away the whole plot we enter the narrative at a moment of the director’s choosing, invited to draw our own conclusions on an evolving story. We must thank the artist for his catalogue notes written to accompany the paintings which give insight into the mind of an artist with a vivid imagination, and with his extraordinary paintings set McGlashan out as our very own Aberdonian Master.

The Glass Mountain WORKS BY

Barry McGlashan September 6th — September 30th 2017

16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh EH3 6HZ | +44 (0) 131 558 1200 mail@scottish-gallery.co.uk | www.scottish-gallery.co.uk

Weltlandschaft

A

Massachusetts looked across a misty landscape towards Mount Greylock, its form reminiscent of a huge, breaching leviathan. Or even in Japanese culture, that idea of The Floating World so beautifully imagined by Hokusai – and there at the centre of his Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji, the mountain sits like some calm, omnipresent giant, keeping watch over nature’s little dramas, its constancy perhaps giving comfort to those who find themselves engaged in some pursuit within its shadow.

It’s easy to see why all this should interest a painter. I spend my days in another sort of pursuit, with each new painting suggesting the next in a continuing dialogue with that which I discover on my own journey through the landscape. And perhaps the summit of that everdistant mountain says something very true about the act of painting; you want to keep moving forward, finding new solutions, better ways to communicate your purpose… but the real answers can hopefully stay always just beyond reach. They are the impetus to keep returning, to continue the climb. I’m reminded of a quote by one of my favourite painters;

s a painter whose subjects often exist in imagined landscapes, the idea of the Weltlandschaft or ‘world landscape’ has become very important to me.

A German word, it describes the compositional device of showing a huge expanse of imaginary landscape, too much to take in all at once, which affords an elevated view over mountains, oceans, fields and treetops: a creator’s eye view which allows all the human triumphs and tragedies to play out like some great theatre of the world. It gives us an experience, we don’t just look at the picture: we need to read it, to take our time, exploring the landscape of the painted surface and discovering what is there to be found.

The 15th century Flemish painter Joachim Patinir lived right at the beginning of this. His new way of perceiving the world allowed a pictorial understanding of landscape to develop which would later be visited by giants of art history; artists such as Pieter Bruegel and Caspar David Friedrich who, in their own ways, would build upon this sense of our small place in the heart of all that unknowable immensity.

I find all of this fascinating; it’s there in the books I like to read, the music I listen to and of course the art I love. The notion of the sublime, the strived-for but unreachable, like the pursuit of an everdistant mountain perhaps? This is something that has become deeply rooted in our culture. The poet Dante Alighieri chose to make his Purgatorio in the form of a mountain, Herman Melville’s great white whale makes more sense when you find his writing room in

» Frustration is one of the great things in art, satisfaction is nothing.« Philip Guston

Barry McGlashan, 2017.

Image right: Weltlandschaft • cat 21 • oil on canvas • 30 × 40 ins • 76.2 × 101.6 cm

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[1]

Purgatorio Oil on canvas • 37 v 37 ins • 94 v 94 cm

I like repetition of thinking and form, it has a kind of beauty about it. There is also something in that which suggests obsession and of course that can be a very familiar thing to artists. Obsession is how we work things out, how we find solutions. Here an artist sits, trying to find the true form of that familiar yet distant mountain outside his window. It reminds me of a Japanese artist by the name of Chiura Obata who, for the first two rigorous years of his childhood training, was made to draw perfect circles and lines without resting his elbows. I can never think of that without associating it with haiku I once read which goes ‘Little snail, inch by inch, climb Mount Fuji.’

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[2]

Tone Poem oil on panel • 24 v 31.5 ins • 61 v 80 cm

I have these torn off pieces of paper floating around my studio all the time – when an idea comes to me I’ll often scribble down a quote, sentence, phrase, sometimes just a word, as a kind of shorthand or place-holder for that visual idea. These words or phrases represent a finished painting in my mind. Normally I’ll gather them together into a sketchbook but I thought it would be interesting to show them together in this painting which happened right at the beginning of working for this exhibition.

Many of the ideas remain but titles and meanings have changed through the creative evolution of process.

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[3]

To the Wall oil on panel • 13 v 11.75 ins • 33 v 29.8 cm

Often in the studio it’s helpful to turn the painting to the wall so you can see it again freshly another time. It seems a lot went wrong with the world last year. I think if 2016 was a painting, I would just turn it to the wall for now.

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[4]

A Wall in Montmartre oil on panel • 24 v 16 ins • 61 v 40.6 cm

This painting shows the studio wall of the painter Suzanne Valadon and her son, Maurice Utrillo who worked in the Montmartre area of Paris. Valadon began as a model for the likes of Renoir and Toulouse-Lautrec before gaining her own reputation as a painter and becoming their contemporary. The place has a feeling of beautiful decay that I wanted to capture, but a sense of absence too – with the impression of the two missing pictures on that old studio wall in Paris.

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[5]

Northern Bacchanal oil on canvas • 75 v 82 ins • 190.5 v 208.3 cm

I’ve always been a huge admirer of the great Flemish artist, Pieter Bruegel. The fact that humour, tenderness, vulgarity, pathos, the grotesque and beauty can all sit together in one work has great appeal because it seems so truthful. His technique of often tilting the picture plane up towards us so that we can almost read the painting is very interesting to me as someone who just can’t seem to avoid telling stories in their work. That ‘theatre of the world’ where all these elements play out at once relates so well to what Joachim Patinir was doing with his landscapes, the ‘Weltlandschaft’; a feeling of there almost being too much going on to tell the whole story, that there is always something else tantalisingly just out of reach. I wanted to make a painting that was a homage to all of this. I thought this Northern ‘Festival of Fools’ seemed the perfect setting for all that human drama. Bruegel himself can be seen in the window to the right, witnessing the comedies and tragedies playing out in the streets below.

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[6]

Gluttons conte on paper • 16 v 23 ins • 40.7 v 58.4 cm

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[7]

Fisher Widow conte on paper • 15 v 12 ins •38.1 v 30.5 cm

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[8]

Birdcatcher conte on paper • 15 v 12 ins • 38.1 v 30.5 cm

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[9]

The Philosophers oil on canvas over panel • 12 v 16 ins • 30.5 v 40.6 cm

I was thinking of those paintings of solitary figures standing at sunset by Caspar David Friedrich. They often seem to be contemplating their little place in the world, just as these two old philosophers talk endlessly into the night, trying to make some sense of it all.

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These paintings show that most basic necessity: the toil to create warmth. Work is very important to me, as a painting subject, but also in my own life. I used this simple idea as a way to experiment with the paint a little – balancing that with the need to maintain the figurative nature of the image.

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[10]

Wood Gatherer (i) p. 18 • oil on canvas • 12 v 10 ins • 30.5 v 25.4 cm

[11]

Wood Gatherer (ii) p. 19 • oil on canvas • 12 v 10 ins • 30.5 v 25.4 cm

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[12]

Enlightenment Society (Study) oil on paper • 22.5 v 30.25 ins • 57.2 v 76.8 cm

Edinburgh had its fair share of these coffee houses which originated in London during the Age of Enlightenment.

I find the idea of these places quite fascinating. Different social spheres would meet to discuss the topics of the time, the society of them seems quite unique; very socially democratic, with their own rules. Weighty issues could be debated fairly by all – accompanied of course by ‘the virtue of the coffee drink.’

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[13]

Portrait of the Unknown Author oil on paper • 12.5 v 11 ins • 31.7 v 27.9 cm

I often thought those portraits of authors you used to get on the back of paperbacks quite strange. Seemingly often taken years earlier, they didn’t really tell us anything about that person. It could even be said that there was a feeling of the writer hiding behind the portrait. Recently, I was reading Daniel Defoe’s novel A Journal of The Plague Year.

The narrator of the story is an unnamed resident of London during the Great Plague or Visitation of 1665. All we have to go on is his signing off with the initials ‘H.F.’ It’s thought that Defoe placed his uncle, Henry Foe, who would have experienced the plague first hand, in the position of narrator (Daniel Defoe’s true name was simply ‘Foe’ – he merely added the ‘De’ to seem more interesting). I started to think about the notion of fiction and fact and how blurring those lines is often a useful thing in making art. I also wanted to say something about that appealing material sense of old books, the print medium itself, the foxing of the paper, the distressed, yellowing, beauty of age.

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[14]

The Hermit in Winter oil on canvas • 36 v 36 ins • 91.4 v 91.4 cm

After looking at a lot of early renaissance painting, I became interested in the subject of the hermit. It looks as though he feels some relation to that lone robin, of course you never see robins together. Similarly, it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to understand why a painter, working in solitude for months at a time, may begin to feel some kinship with the hermit.

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[15]

Hermit conte on paper • 11.5 v 7.75 ins • 29.2 v 19.8 cm

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[16]

The Custodian oil on canvas • 45 v 60 ins • 114.3 v 152.4 cm

I wanted to make a painting that could be a kind of monument to those who appreciate and preserve that in our culture which can so easily be forgotten – or worse still, destroyed. It has a sense of ending about it – is that a sunrise or a sunset? I used some ancient architectural forms, all overrun by weeds (Doric and Ionic columns, the central archway we see is that from the recently sacked site of Palmyra in Syria) to create some sense of a ‘cradle of civilization.’ Great works by Friedrich, Titian, Poussin, Caravaggio, El Greco and Van Eyck seem to be either coming or going. Apollo, the God of many things cultural, sits guard atop the bookshelf. I’m a huge admirer of the allegory paintings made collaboratively by Jan Bruegel and Rubens – they’re a sort of visual collection or list on a number of themes, and I reference them here with the tabletop of valuable items and artefacts from throughout history. Beside them sits a large pot of salt, again symbolic of preservation. Musical instruments are scattered around and the whole scene is watched over by the busts of Plato, Socrates and Aristotle. And there amongst it all, sits the young Custodian, surrounded by piles of upturned books, beginning to learn again for the new day.

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[17]

The Wave oil on panel • 24 v 28 ins • 61 v 71 cm

The mathematician sits alone in his room (much like the artist) trying to find some underlying meaning and structure in the form of the wave. Secrets to be decoded in chalkboard formulae. Perhaps that is Hokusai’s famous wave on the wall that he is lost in? I find it interesting how scientists (again like artists) often resort to figurative description to communicate their ideas. The constant in my work is very much present here; the search for an answer.

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[18]

No Change Up Here Forever oil on canvas • 38 v 38 ins • 96.5 v 96.5 cm

The image of the distant mountain returns again and again in this exhibition, a symbol of an unreachable yet constant presence. Being a painter feels something like that; always searching for answers but each new discovery only throws up more questions to be resolved.

There is a sense of continuing dialogue, an evolution of purpose in painting which I find endlessly fascinating.

It’s like knowing you’ll never reach the summit but your little bit of effort, inch by inch, somehow contributes to the climb.

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[19]

Flemish Artist (And His Landscape) oil on canvas • 24 v 28 ins • 61 v 71 cm

A newfound understanding of the ‘world landscape’ has set our hero up above the scene he sets out to paint, with a view soaring across a wider world. But he still appreciates those humble details, even the dandelions.

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[20]

Flemish Artist conte on paper • 11.5 v 7.75 ins • 29.2 v 19.8 cm

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[21]

Weltlandschaft oil on canvas • 30 v 40 ins • 76.2 v 101.6 cm

This painting was inspired by Joachim Patinir, a pioneering Flemish artist born in the 15th century, perhaps one of the first to think of himself in terms of being a landscape artist.

His paintings often have an unusually high horizon line which allows the scene to play out through the landscape before us. Something which struck me about Patinir (as he is thought of as having invented that landscape format) is that pictorially he stopped thinking in terms of up and down and started to think in terms of left to right – a much more ‘human’ way to experience things spatially.

The events in his paintings often seem a secondary concern, even those huge religious subjects of the day can appear incidental in his work. This painting is trying to get that idea across – the world seems to vanish off into the distance, an undiscovered country waiting for our arrival.

It’s a romantic notion of the sublime which appeals to me very much.

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[22]

From the Rock oil on panel • 20 v 16 ins • 50.8 v 40.6 cm

Patinir’s paintings often featured these quite bizarre rock formations. It’s almost as if they were symbolic to him in some way – like naturally occurring monuments to the landscape. I show him here, sat at the base of one of these little mountains amongst the scattered dandelions, trying to capture that wonder he perhaps felt at this dawn of Northern Renaissance thinking.

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[23]

The Floating World oil on panel • 20 v 16 ins • 50.8 v 40.6 cm

Hokusai’s famous print, The Great Wave off Kanagawa was the first in his series of Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji.

In it, the wave dwarfs the great mountain as it swells and rises to that dramatic point of collapse. I wanted to show this master of image making, somehow maintaining control of all that immensity and chaos by capturing it forever with the deft touches of his brush. I couldn’t resist this title, with its multiple meanings – relating to that ‘Ukiyo’, or ‘sorrowful world’ universe of Edo-period Japan, whilst also saying something about Hokusai’s physical and mental place within the environments around him, and of his own creating. It can feel like an impenetrable culture to our Western minds, but that sense of the romantic landscape is clearly a universally held concept.

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[24]

The Lighthouse oil on panel • 24 v 24 ins • 61 v 61 cm

My uncle was a lighthouse keeper and I always wondered how that life would be. Surrounded by the raging sea on a black stormy night, with the symbol of the guiding light – for me an irresistible subject.

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[25]

Contemplating A Landscape

by Moonlight oil on panel • 20 v 16 ins • 50.8 v 40.6 cm

This painting shows the studio of another favourite of mine; the German romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich.

His paintings have a unique, spare intensity about them which I’m sure would have been present in his character.

He often used a device in his compositions known as ‘Rückenfigur’, whereby the figure is seen from behind.

This places the viewer in the position of the subject and intensifies the sense of being present in that landscape, I often use this now. It was said that he had discovered ‘the tragedy of landscape’ and here, unable to sleep, he has come down to his studio in the night, to attempt to resolve some troubling issue.

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[26]

The Silence oil on canvas • 12 v 14.5 ins • 30.5 v 36.8 cm

The influences of those famous photographs by Herbert Ponting of Captain Scott’s ill fated polar expedition are clear here: the tent sitting alone in this great white silence, a dying fire the only sign of life at this fading outpost of Empire. With recent events, it might also talk of where we may soon find ourselves: sitting in not so splendid isolation.

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[27]

Believers oil on canvas • 35.25 v 48 ins • 89.5 v 121.9 cm

I’m in no way a religious person but I think a belief in something beyond us, or rather beyond our understanding, can be a valuable thing to have – if we can just let the mystery be. To feel something is ticking away, watching over the checks and balances, would be very comforting as we make our way along the road at night.

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[28]

Scene Painter oil on canvas • 16 v 20 ins • 40.6 v 50.8 cm

Mountains are very dramatic, operatic things; Wagner could make good use of this scenery I hope. I relished playing with scale as our eponymous scene painter spends his day, lost up in those mountains. He could have been much smaller.

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[29]

Terra Nova oil on canvas • 30 v 40 ins • 76.2 v 101.6 cm

I’ve long admired the photographs of Herbert Ponting who travelled with Scott to the Antarctic and documented the daily trials and tribulations there. There’s an otherworldliness to them – perhaps they were viewed in their time as we now view the latest images from NASA. I find this whole era fascinating; the age of discovery, pushing back the frontiers and creating new outposts, finding new truths and realities beyond those we previously knew.

There is a sublimely harsh, uncaring beauty to these parts of the world too – perfect subjects for romantic image making.

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[30]

Land of Mist and Snow oil on canvas over panel • 16 v 12 ins • 40.6 v 30.5 cm

The title of this painting is from Coleridge’s The Rime of The Ancient Mariner, but I was also thinking about that search in the 19th century for the Northwest Passage; the body of sea in the Arctic that connects the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. So many attempts were made before success came and it seems a fitting title to give to this painting which took its time to arrive. That romantic thing of the ‘un-found land’ seems to blur both fact and fiction.

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[31]

Poet's Cave oil on canvas • 46 v 45.75 ins • 116.8 v 116 cm

I’m interested in the importance of solitude for both artists and writers, they have a lot in common. This cave seems recently abandoned, the candle having just blown out. The pages of the book lie open, blank and unwritten, much like the blank scroll which Herman Melville had inscribed on his gravestone to tell of all those unwritten possibilities. The only occupant here now is the silent bust of Homer. I’m reminded of an inscription which the Italian artist and writer, Giorgio de Chirico had on one of his self-portraits; ‘what shall I love if not the enigma?’

There’s a hidden inscription here too, which seems to be suggesting that the outside world, the loss of solitude, would be the true danger for the creative mind.

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[32]

Northern Reach oil on panel • 4 v 6 ins • 10 v 15.2 cm

This painting is doing a few things at once I hope. I wanted to make a painting which reminds us of its existence as an object: it’s never just ‘a picture.’ The distressed surface reminds me of the nature and language of old photographic plates, that human element of actually making something – the thumbprint and scratched surface is a quality which we seem to be losing in this digital age.

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[33]

Defoe's Window oil on paper • 11 v 13.5 ins • 27.9 v 34.2 cm

I was imagining Daniel Defoe’s view from his writing room in St Giles Cripplegate, London. The sound of him scratching away with his inky nib; overlooking the city through that old leaded, bubbled glass with all the human drama playing out before him, all grist for his mill. That city must have been a constant inspiration to him and I hoped this little work on paper (quite unusual for me) would have that feeling of age. As an object, it reminds me more of print than painting which seems apt for Defoe.

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[34]

Modern Cosmology (Man at the Shore) oil on canvas • 12 v 14.5 ins • 30.5 v 36.8 cm

I was listening to a cosmologist being interviewed on the radio one day and he was asked to explain the position of modern cosmology, where were we at with it? His answer was fascinating as he went on to describe the analogy of a beach which had recently been vacated – the sand churned up and the only light being that from the coals of a dying fire. He said the job of cosmologists today was to look into the embers of that fire and try to figure out who had been on the beach and how long the party had lasted. It reminded me of something I read by another cosmologist, Carl Sagan, who said that we were standing at the shore of the cosmic ocean, it being where we came from – and that we long to return.

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[35]

The Glory oil on panel • 11.75 v 17.75 ins • 45.1 v 29.8 cm

The trawler in this painting seems quite happily lost I think; a wanderer just following the warmth of that dipping sun beyond the endless horizon.

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[36]

The Source oil on canvas • 17.75 v 13.75 ins • 45 v 35 cm

I was thinking about the raw elemental nature of the mountain; ice at the top, fire at the bottom; all those ingredients for life. There’s also a little reference to the Swiss symbolist painter Arnold Böcklin, the shrouded figure approaching with the boatman, seeking out this place of beginnings.

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[37]

Place with No Name oil on canvas • 16.25 v 17.75 ins • 41 v 45.1 cm

This made me think of an early colony somewhere, far away, almost an in-between place where the vague shape of a woman sits in dappled light, contemplating the deep surface reflections of the lily pond.

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[38]

A Garden in Winter oil on panel • 8 v 9.5 ins • 20 v 24.1 cm

I always enjoy the garden in winter – when everything is dormant and you see the bare bones of structure revealed beneath. This painting went through so many seasons too. There was a lot of adding… then scraping off… then adding again, eventually giving me that surface. In the end, the hard fought, resultant subject of the painting – those bare black stems – had a satisfying simplicity for me.

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[39]

Starlit Night (Study) oil on paper • 30.25 v 22.5 ins • 76.8 v 57.2 cm

This began with a very deep, broad, cobalt blue wash and then I almost just let the painting happen by itself. The stars came out, the tree grew, and the house appeared with not very much thought – but I enjoyed finding them.

And behind it all, I loved the endless feel of that deep blue cobalt night.

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[40]

In the Woods oil on canvas over panel • 12 v 12 ins • 30.5 v 30.5 cm

The figure (or car) lost in the woods is something I find myself returning to from time to time. I suppose it’s the scene of many a mystery, used in everything from the fairytales you’re told as a child to the beginning of the journey of Dante’s The Divine Comedy. These places of many meanings are very useful to storytellers it seems.

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[41]

The Sound oil on canvas • 13.5 v 17.5 ins • 34.2 v 44.5 cm

Sometimes a title can be helpful to muddy the waters and provide another layer of mystery. I think of Munch’s famous The Scream, which suggests the title is due to the agonised cry of the human subject but which Munch later claimed was a scream he felt passing through nature itself. The pink swathe of cloud through the dark sky in my painting reminds me a little of that. Are the figures reacting to a sound? Is the title merely referring to geography, with that inlet of water? I think questions in art are far better than answers.

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[42]

Nocturne oil on panel • 7.75 v 10 ins • 19.7 v 25.4 cm

I enjoyed the loose, fluid feel of painting this; I was thinking of Whistler’s Nocturne paintings of the Thames with those broad fluid strokes from his loaded brush.

He would mix various weights of paint which he called ‘sauce’ and work in thin layers – wiping, adding, wiping and so on until he got the desired result. The versatility of oil paint, this very old medium, is a marvel.

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Barry McGlashan Personal info 25th June 1974

Born in Aberdeen, SCOTLAND

Awards

2015 Open

1992–96

BA Hons (First Class) GRAYS SCHOOL OF ART, ABERDEEN

2011

Eye Gallery Award (VISUAL ARTS SCOTLAND, ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY)

The Cuthbert Award (ROYAL GLASGOW INSTITUTE) Commendation (ABERDEEN ARTISTS SOCIETY)

2009

First Prize, The Meffan, Winter Exhibition

2006

The Meyer Oppenheim Award (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY)

2005 The James McBey Travel Award

Aberdeen Visual Arts Awards Scheme Grant

Commendation (ABERDEEN ARTISTS SOCIETY) 2003

The Shell Expro Award (ABERDEEN ARTISTS SOCIETY)

2001

he Alastair Salvesen Travelling Scholarship – T three months study in the USA (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY) The Shell Premier Award (ABERDEEN ARTISTS SOCIETY)

2000

1998 1996

1995

The Shell Expro Award (ABERDEEN ARTISTS SOCIETY) The Guthrie Award (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY) The MacAllan Award (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY) The John Kinross Scholarship – three months study in Florence (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY)

The Steele-Cornwall Scholarship (GRAYS SCHOOL OF ART)

Grays Former Pupil Award (GRAYS FORMER PUPIL SOCIETY)

1994 The Hector Memorial Prize (GRAYS SCHOOL OF ART)

The Wood Group Purchase Prize (GRAMPIAN HOSPITALS ART TRUST)

Image left: The artist in his studio, January 2017

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Solo Exhibitions

Selected Group Exhibitions

2017

The Glass Mountain (THE SCOTTISH GALLERY, EDINBURGH)

2016

2016

Mudlarks And Connoisseurs (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON)

W Gordon Smith Award (DOVECOT GALLERY, EDINBURGH)

2014

The Burning Heart (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON) The Sunken Dream (THE SCOTTISH GALLERY, EDINBURGH)

2015

Spring Masters (PARK AVENUE ARMOURY, NEW YORK) Society of Scottish Artists (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY) Visual Arts Scotland (ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY)

2013

That Howling Infinite (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON)

2012

Art Toronto (CANADA)

2012

Quiet Please (OPEN EYE GALLERY, EDINBURGH)

2011

Edward Cutler Gallery (MILAN, ITALY)

2011

The Secrets (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON)

2010

Cabinet (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON)

2010

The Whiteness of The Whale (FOYER GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

2009

The Threadneedle Prize (MALL GALLERIES, LONDON)

2009

Somewhere in The North (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN) Wonderland (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON)

2008

BP Portrait Award (NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, LONDON)

Figurative Art Today / Columbia Threadneedle Prize (MALL GALLERIES, LONDON)

2007 2006

New Ways to See the World (THE SCOTTISH GALLERY, EDINBURGH) Way Out West (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON) The Big Country (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

2005

The Great Adventure (JOHN MARTIN GALLERY, LONDON)

2004

Between Journeys (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN) There and Back Again (ROGER BILLCLIFFE FINE ART, GLASGOW)

2003

1996 – 2016

(THE DOVECOT GALLERY, EDINBURGH)

Recent Works (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

2002

Small Town Continuation (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

2001

The Alastair Salvesen Art Scholarship Small Town (THE ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY / THE FETTES GALLERY,

FETTES COLLEGE, EDINBURGH)

2000

New Lands (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

1999

Works on Paper (OPEN EYE GALLERY, EDINBURGH) Something New (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

1998

New Works (THE RENDEZVOUS GALLERY, ABERDEEN)

Chelsea Gallery (PALO ALTO, CALIFORNIA) The Royal Scottish Academy Open Exhibition (EDINBURGH) John Martin Gallery (LONDON) John Martin Chelsea (LONDON) Affordable Art Fair (NEW YORK) 20/21 British Art Fair (LONDON) New Acquisitions (ABERDEEN ART GALLERY) 20 Years of The Alastair Salvesen Scholarship

The Scottish Gallery (EDINBURGH) Transcultural Exchange Coaster Project (98 WORLDWIDE VENUES) The Morrison Portrait Exhibition (THE ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY) The Noble Grossart Finalists Exhibition

(GLASGOW SCHOOL OF ART / THE ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY)

The Islington Art Fair (LONDON) ArtLondon (CHELSEA) Open Eye Gallery (EDINBURGH) Recent Works (A.R.I. ART GALLERY, ABERDEEN) Compass Gallery (GLASGOW) Lemon Street Gallery (CORNWALL) Roger Billcliffe Gallery (GLASGOW) Peacock Visual Art (ABERDEEN) The Royal Glasgow Institute (MCLELLAN GALLERIES, GLASGOW) Contemporary Scottish Art (NAPIER GALLERY, ST. HELIER)

1995– 2011

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Aberdeen Artists Society Annual Exhibition (ABERDEEN ART GALLERY)

Public Collections Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museum Aberdeen Asset Management (UK & NEW YORK) Aberdeen City Council BP Grampian Hospitals Art Trust MacAllan Distilleries (SPEYSIDE) Paintings in Hospitals (EDINBURGH) Professional Footballers Association The Robert Gordon University (ABERDEEN) The Royal Bank of Scotland (EDINBURGH) The Royal Scottish Academy (EDINBURGH) National Galleries of Scotland (EDINBURGH) The Scottish Society (NEW YORK)

JUDGING PANELS 2014– ongoing Art

& Heritage University Collection Awards,

GRAYS SCHOOL OF ART (ROBERT GORDON UNIVERSITY, ABERDEEN)

2010 The

Alastair Salvesen Scholarship

(THE ROYAL SCOTTISH ACADEMY, EDINBURGH)

2010–11

My Future Aspirations Schools Competition

(THORPE MOLLOY RECRUITMENT LTD, ABERDEEN)

TEACHING EXPERIENCE Jan 1998– Jan 2005

Grays School of Art

(PART TIME LECTURER, DRAWING & PAINTING)

June 1998

Summer School (GRAYS SCHOOL OF ART, GENERAL PAINTING)

Image right: The artist's studio, January 2017

The Glass mountain Nº ARTWORK

MEDIUM

SIZE

Purgatorio 2 Tone Poem 3 To the Wall 4 A Wall in Montmartre 5 Northern Bacchanal 6 Gluttons 7 Fisher Widow 8 Birdcatcher 9 The Philosophers 10 Wood Gatherer (i) 11 Wood Gatherer (ii) 12 Enlightenment Society (Study) 13 Portrait of The Unknown Author 14 The Hermit in Winter 15 Hermit 16 The Custodian 17 The Wave 18 No Change Up Here Forever 19 Flemish Artist (And His Landscape) 20 Flemish Artist 21 Weltlandschaft 22 From the Rock 23 The Floating World 24 The Lighthouse 25 Contemplating A Landscape by Moonlight 26 The Silence 27 Believers 28 Scene Painter 29 Terra Nova 30 Land of Mist and Snow 31 Poet’s Cave 32 Northern Reach 33 Defoe’s Window 34 Modern Cosmology (Man at The Shore) 35 The Glory 36 The Source 37 Place with No Name 38 A Garden in Winter 39 Starlit Night (Study) 40 In the Woods 41 The Sound 42 Nocturne

oil on canvas oil on panel oil on panel oil on panel oil on canvas conte on paper conte on paper conte on paper oil on canvas over panel oil on canvas oil on canvas oil on paper oil on paper oil on canvas conte on paper oil on canvas oil on panel oil on canvas oil on canvas conte on paper oil on canvas oil on panel oil on panel oil on panel oil on panel oil on canvas oil on canvas oil on canvas oil on canvas oil on canvas over panel oil on canvas oil on panel oil on paper oil on canvas oil on panel oil on canvas oil on canvas oil on panel oil on paper oil on canvas over panel oil on canvas oil on panel

37 v 37 ins • 94 v 94 cm 24 v 31.5 ins • 61 v 80 cm 13 v 11.75 ins • 33 v 29.8 cm 24 v 16 ins • 61 v 40.6 cm 75 v 82 ins • 190.5 v 208.3 cm 16 v 23 ins • 40.7 v 58.4 cm 15 v 12 ins •38.1 v 30.5 cm 15 v 12 ins •38.1 v 30.5 cm 12 v 16 ins • 30.5 v 40.6 cm 12 v 10 ins • 30.5 v 25.4 cm 12 v 10 ins • 30.5 v 25.4 cm 22.5 v 30.25 ins • 57.2 v 76.8 cm 12.5 v 11 ins • 31.7 v 27.9 cm 36 v 36 ins • 91.4 v 91.4 cm 11.5 v 7.75 ins • 29.2 v 19.8 cm 45 v 60 ins • 114.3 v 152.4 cm 24 v 28 ins • 61 v 71 cm 38 v 38 ins • 96.5 v 96.5 cm 24 v 28 ins • 61 v 71 cm 11.5 v 7.75 ins • 29.2 v 19.8 cm 30 v 40 ins • 76.2 v 101.6 cm 20 v 16 ins • 50.8 v 40.6 cm 20 v 16 ins • 50.8 v 40.6 cm 24 v 24 ins • 61 v 61 cm 20 v 16 ins • 50.8 v 40.6 cm 12 v 14.5 ins • 30.5 v 36.8 cm 35.25 v 48 ins • 89.5 v 121.9 cm 16 v 20 ins • 40.6 v 50.8 cm 30 v 40 ins • 76.2 v 101.6 cm 16 v 12 ins • 40.6 v 30.5 cm 46 v 45.75 ins • 116.8 v 116 cm 4 v 6 ins • 10 v 15.2 cm 11v13.5 ins • 27.9 v 34.2 cm 12 v 14.5 ins • 30.5 v 36.8 cm 11.75 v 17.75 ins • 45.1 v 29.8 cm 17.75 v 13.75 ins • 45 v 35 cm 16.25 v 17.75 ins • 41 v 45.1 cm 8 v 9.5 ins • 20 v 24.1 cm 30.25 v 22.5 ins • 76.8 v 57.2 cm 12 v 12 ins • 30.5 v 30.5 cm 13.5 v 17.5 ins • 34.2 v 44.5 cm 7.75 v 10 ins • 19.7 v 25.4 cm

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Published by The Scottish Gallery to coincide with the exhibition: The Glass Mountain Barry McGlashan September 6th — September 30th 2017

ISBN: 978 1 91026766 0 Designed by Sigrid Schmeisser Printed by Newnorth Print Ltd Photography by Stuart Johnstone

Cover artwork: Northern Bacchanal (detail) • cat 5 • oil on canvas • 75 × 82 ins • 190.5 × 208.3 cm

16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh EH3 6HZ | +44 (0) 131 558 1200 mail@scottish-gallery.co.uk | www.scottish-gallery.co.uk