Tag Archives: scottish landscape art

Forest of Pishwanton 3

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Above: ‘Birch Forest’. Pishwanton. Mixed media on 14×14″ wood. Rose Strang 2026.

Today’s painting of birch trees in the forest of Pishwanton in East Lothian follows on from the last two posts depicting birch forests emerging from winter. I love trees, and it’s so inspiring to learn about this place, which in cared for by the Life Science Centre in Scotland.

I’m delving into the philosophy behind the Life Science Centre, and it really resonates with the way I approach painting, especially the nature of observation.

I have some projects to get on with right now, but I’ll explore more of that in the next blog.

Braemar Literary Festival September

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I’m excited to be part of the Braemar Literary Festival this year. Not as an author, more as an artist in thrall to an author; namely Nan Shepherd and her much acclaimed book about the Scottish Cairngorms: The Living Mountain.

My paintings from the Living Mountain Series will be showing in the Highland Pavilion, Braemar on the 27th and 28th September and I’ll be there for ‘meet the artist’ from 12 noon to 1:30pm.

If you follow this blog you’ll maybe remember the exciting commission I was given by the Folio Society, London, in 2021. The Folio were re-publishing their own edition of The Living Mountain, and sought an artist to illustrate the book. I felt honoured and surprised – this being one of my favourite books of all time! (the Folio edition is now completely sold out – it’s possible to buy a copy online from booksellers but it’s now into the £100s. How I wish I’d held on to more of the copies they gave me. I have just one left)

The Braemar Literary Festival was founded by world-famous art collectors Hauser and Wirth, who own the Fife Arms Hotel in Braemar. The’ve turned the hotel into a quite extraordinary experience, the place is festonned with stunning original works of art including a Picasso and an enormous Bruegel in the dining room. The atmosphere is high-end but not uppity, the style in keeping with its Victorian heritage, they even have a framed letter by Queen Victoria tucked away in an alcove somewhere.

Guest speakers to the festival will include Monica Ali, Alexander McCall Smith, David Nichol (known most recently for the televised version of his heart-rending novel; One Day), Giles Coren and many more interesting authors, journalists and presenters (link Here)

Hope to see you there! Here’s the info again …

My paintings from the Living Mountain Series will be showing in the Highland Pavilion, Braemar on the 27th and 28th September and I’ll be there for a ‘meet the artist’ hour from 12 noon to 1:30pm.

Exhibition Saturday 19th July

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Coming up in just 9 days, The Edinburgh Festival Exhibition at The Graystone Gallery, Edinburgh!

Saturday 19th June, 2 to 4pm, Graystone Gallery

Here’s a litle vid showing the inspiration of Iona and clips of the painting process …

Storm Island

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Above. Storm Island. Oil on 50×50″ linen canvas. Rose Strang 2025.

Part of a series in progress for the Graystone Gallery‘s Edinburgh Festival exhibition launching to the public Saturday 19th July 2025 from 1 to 3pm

The photo below includes me to show scale …

The painting’s called Storm Island because it shows a somewhat abstracted view from the north beach of Iona to Eilean Annraidh, which means (you guessed it!) Island of Storm in Gaelic.

It doesn’t look remotely stormy from the shore, it generally looks somewhat tranquil, even mystical in the way that islands do until you’re on them. A sense of untouched purity with its white sand and luminous tuquoise water.

I can never capture in traditonal or realist paintings that feeling of mystery. Abstracting this painting a little, and painting from a place where I’m thinking of colour, shape and texture rather than what’s actually there, maybe gives more of a sense of that feeling.

The foreground suggests a rockpool. The rock pools on the north beach of Iona are incredible sometimes, you feel you’ve stumbled upon some sort of dragon’s lair, with this lime green water among the jagged jet black rocks.

I have one more of these semi abstract works to finish this week, then the series for the Graystone Gallery is complete. The exhibition launches with a preview on Saturday 19th July from 1 to 3pm. Hope to see you there!

Iona Sea, new exhibitions

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Above: Iona Abbey from North Beach. Oil on 30×20″ linen canvas. Rose Strang 2025

Today’s painting, above, is one of two landscapes for the upcoming Graystone Gallery exhibition in Edinburgh which launches on Saturday 19th July this year from 1 to 3pm

I’m taking these two landscapes as a starting point for two much larger abstract works for the Graystone, about which I’m very excited as I really awant to play with colour, mood and texture, not just views of Iona, lovely as those are to paint!

Just looking at my palette at the end of today is an inspiration!

More next week …

Iona Sea and new exhibitions in 2025

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Above: North Beach Iona, May. Oil on 30×20 inch linen canvas. Rose Strang 2025

Lots of exciting new projects coming up!

The painting above is one of a series I’m creating for the Graystone Gallery, Edinburgh for their Edinburgh Festival exhibition, which launches on Saturday July 19th from 1 to 3pm

The painting below is for the Limetree Gallery‘s upcoming Summer Exhibition which launches 3rd July. You can preview or reserve paintings now by contacting them on their website.

(If you’re interested in buying or reserving one of the paintings please contact the galleries direct on the links in the above paragraph, thank you).

I have another three at larger sizes for the Graystone coming up. Readers of the blog will know how much Iona means to me, and to thousands of other people who visit the island every year. It’s a special place I’ve been visiting now for about thirty four years and I’d say it’s one of my biggest inspirations as an artist.

The next larger paintings will be a bit more abstract, but I know that people find these paintings of turquoise sparkling water joyful, and so do I!

This series is doubly special since my partner Adam and I prepared the canvases ourselves with sretcher bars and raw linen.

I’ve kept the lovely texture and colour of the linen by using clear gesso. If you look at the close ups of ‘Sea Light, Iona’ and ‘Iona North Beach, May’ below, you can see the unpainted canvas …

More soon …

Forest of Luffness, painting progress 6

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Above: In progress – First of June. Forest of Luffness 3. Oil on 12 x 12 inch wood. Rose Strang 2024.

It feels good to be getting into the swing of a series for the first time in a while. I’ve created three so far in this First of June series, though today’s panting does need a bit more work ..

A bit more definition would help the painting and a few tweaks on the faces. The figure I’m happiest with is that of Terry Ann Newman (in the foreground with her back to us). Terry is the Deputy Director of the Demarco Trust and a very talented artist, when she finds time to paint. She’s holding a mobile in her hand behind her back, and it’s part of this series that we’re recording and witnessing the day in our different ways – there will be more of that.

I think I’ve managed to capture the feel of Richard’s detemination and physical struggle. I remember on the day in question I was a bit worried Richard might not want to walk the path to the Carmelite friary, because at 94 walking has become a challenge and the path required struggling over uneven ground in a forest for about ten minutes. Richard was characteristically determined however! He took great delight in the dappled light, the architecture of the stonework protecting the effigy and many other aspects of the day.

I think it was partly that he’d been inspired by my description of the ruined Carmelite friary near Aberlady but also, on the day, he was telling us about Pope Pius II who in 1435 walked barefoot in the snow all the way from Dunbar to Whitekirk to give thanks for his survival from a shipwreck in the Firth of Forth.

Whitekirk is just a few miles along the road from Aberlady and apart from the church, St Mary’s (which dates back to the 11th century) it also has a beautiful two-story stone building that served as a hostel for pilgrims travelling from Iona to Lindisfarne. Aberlady was an important stop on the way. After Aberlady and our visit to the Carmelite Friary, we also visited St Mary’s.

Readers of this blog might remember I took part on Landscape Artist of the Year a couple of years ago. It was fairly pointless escapade, frankly, except for meeting some nice folks (the other artists) one of whom was called Gregory Miller (artist website Here). He recently sent me a link to a film called No Greater Love, about a Carmelite Convent in Nottinghill, London.

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It’s worth a watch if you’re curious about their lifestyle. The footage and camera-work is Vermeer-like at times – capturing the natural light from windows and candles. It’s very, very quiet for the first half hour, then we get to know some of the nuns, what inspires them and why they’ve taken on this way of life.

It’s viewable on Amazon, not sure where else  …

No Greater Love

More painting tomorrow.

Seascapes

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Above: Sea Triptych. Oil on three 33×22 inch wood panels.

Below, some smaller works in this new seascapes series –

This series is part-inspired by the Aberlady landscape – which has been a focus this year in most of my paintings.

This style of painting feels very natural and comes easily to me, but I’m still working on expression of the Luffness woods and Carmelite Friary (in Aberlady theme). Sometimes there are too many ideas and it’s better to simply paint instinctively for a while until something more unified swims into focus.

The upshot is that I’ll return to that theme after a brief hiatus into my ‘default mode’ of moody seascapes!

More details soon …

Maspie Waterfall

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Above – Maspie Waterfall. Acrylic on 17 by 16 inch wood panel.

A semi-abstract painting of layered acrylic depicting Maspie waterfall in Autumn.

Maspie Burn winds its way from the Lomond Hills in Fife down to the beautiful little town of Falkland. It’s a quiet place, best known for Falkland Palace – a favourite dwelling place of Mary Queen of Scots. There have been settlements here going back into the mists of time, or pre-history to precise. If you keep walking up to the source of Maspie Burn, you’ll eventually encounter earthworks named Maiden Castle, which show the remains of an ancient fort.

Falkland recently became better known as ‘Inverness’ in the tv series Outlander – it’s very much cuter than Inverness mind you, inverness having become a small but busy city. Photo below, me posing in Falkland, ala ‘Claire’, looking quite a bit sturdier and shorter than the model-esque Caitriona Balfe!)

I left the painting fairly abstract as it captures the energy of Autumn without going too pretty. The wood was actually part of a series of old cupboards from a flat owned by some friends of ours. Knowing I usually paint on wood, they asked if I’d like use it for painting. Yes indeed! I like re-using stuff.

Some photos of Falkland and a photo from our walk this weekend at Maspie Waterfall, you can walk behind it!

Autumn Exhibition

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Above – Aberlady Shorelines III. Oil on 8×5.5 inch wood in oak frame. Rose Strang 2024

I’m delighted to be exhibiting these small oil sketches, framed in oak, at The Limetree Gallery this October. If you’re interested in the paintings, or would like to reserve one, please contact the gallery for details.

The Limetree Autumn Exhibition launches on the 24th October at Limetree Gallery, Bristol

Here are a few photos I took with my mobile today, showing these lovely oak frames, then below those – at the end of this post – are more detailed photos of all the paintings available for the Autumn Exibition at the Limetree Gallery, with titles and sizes.

These paintings represent the start of my Aberlady-inspired series this year. They were quick oil sketches designed to capture the atmospheric solitude and moody colours of the east coast in winter, such a contrast to my later paintings of Aberlady in June this year! More on that tomorrow…

In the meantime, here are all the paintings, below, which will be on exhibition at The Limetree Gallery, Bristol. As mentioned,please contact the gallery if you’d like to reserve any of these paintings before they go on exhibition 24th October this year…