The Story of Scottish Art

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Lachlan Goudie

Matthew Springford

Pauline Law

David Harron

Maurice O'Brien

The Story of Scottish Art: Episode 4

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Episode 4

BBC Two - The Story of Scottish Art, Episode 4

A look at how Scottish art has wrestled with questions of identity over the last century.

Lachlan Goudie traces the development of Scottish art. He explores how it has left a remarkable legacy over the last century through wrestling with questions of identity.

The climactic episode of the series explores how, over the last 100 years, Scottish art has wrestled as never before with questions of identity and exploded like a visual firecracker of different ideas and styles. During the last century, Scottish artists embroiled themselves with some of the most exciting and dynamic art movements ever seen - provoking, participating and creating stimulating works of art that have left an extraordinary legacy.

Lachlan Goudie discovers how artists such as William McCance attempted to bring about a Scottish renaissance in the visual arts, while a creative diaspora of artists such as Alan Davie and William Gear would court controversy and play vital roles in the revolutions of postwar art. 

Long before the 'Glasgow Miracle', the Glasgow School of Art was responsible for upholding a very different kind of tradition, of which Lachlan's father was proud to be a part. He discovers how artists such as Joan Eardley helped to bring the city to life, just as John Bellany did for the fishing villages of the east coast. Rebels such as Bruce McLean help explain how conceptual art would come to play such a large role in the Scottish art of today, and Lachlan meets one of the world's most expensive living artists, Peter Doig, to delve into the complexities of what it actually means to be a Scottish artist in today's market-dominated art world. He finishes his epic journey on the Isle of Lewis with a powerful call to arms for the continued relevance of Scottish art today.

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media: Arts

Tracing the development of Scottish art from the Neolithic Era to the present day.

In a four-part series, artist Lachlan Goudie traces the development of Scottish art from the Neolithic Era to the present day, and looks at its impact on the international art world

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