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Category: Glasgow Museums’ Collection

black ink monoprint line drawing of a punishment mask, drawn from the viewpoint where you can see the breathing holes in the nose and mouth, but also the jagged grips designed to hold the mask in place.

Guest Post – Hold Your Tongue

This guest blog is from Ailie Rutherford an artist, activist and co-director of the Feminist Exchange Network in Glasgow. I invited her to respond to the exhibition Domestic Bliss, which… Read more Guest Post – Hold Your Tongue

Still Glasgow: Notes on an exhibition, Katie Bruce, November 2025

Still Glasgow Katie Bruce, November 2025   “Glasgow is a magnificent city,” said McAlpin. “Why do we hardly ever notice that?” “Because nobody imagines living here…think of Florence, Paris, London,… Read more Still Glasgow: Notes on an exhibition, Katie Bruce, November 2025

New Acquisitions #1: two works by Sam Ainsley for Glasgow Life Museums’ collection

Glasgow Life Museums is delighted to announce that we have recently acquired two works by Sam Ainsley RSA for the collection. Blue Body, Red Centre, Green Acanthus (2023) and Where… Read more New Acquisitions #1: two works by Sam Ainsley for Glasgow Life Museums’ collection

Publication Launch – Sam Ainsley: Wednesday is Cobalt blue, Friday is Cadmium red

Come celebrate the launch of Sam’s Ainsley’s artist publication with us! FREE tickets available through the Glasgow GoMA Eventbrite

A Life In Pictures . Page 116 to page 120 . Canongate 2010 by Alasdair Gray … Only the last was completed. It was based on sketches and ideas for the Monkland Canal picture.I had given up trying to paint as a third year art student in 1955. Almost 4 feet by 8 it is still my best big oil painting. The buildings are shown accurately in relation to each other, though the road up to the canal on the right and downhill on the left was actually straight, with the central road ( leading to the city's destructor plant ) at right angles to it , so a sliding viewpoint shows the place from Port Dundas in the north to St Aloysius Church in the south round an angle of 180 degrees. this bent perspective means that the distant gas lantern on the right and the near one on the left are different views of the same . The near electrical street lamp with the old man on the right are both distantly viewed in the left. ( In 1955 street lighting still had a few gas lamps in proximity to electric ones. ) The picture also has a time shift . The foreground faces belong to the couple whose figures are downhill left.

Glasgow Life Museums acquires famous oil painting by legendary Scottish artist Alasdair Gray

Alasdair Gray’s iconic painting, Cowcaddens Streetscape in the Fifties, has been acquired for Glasgow’s museum’s collection.

Anniversary notes on attempts to date and place a poem (p.117)- Ama Ata Aidoo

Letter in January and in the notes section at the end of the book Barby discovered that the poem is placed in Glasgow and dated September 21, 1991. We are now 30 years on from that date and are marking this anniversary and noting that her words continue to resonate today.

Still from Urgent Nature (2019) Jo Ganter. Courtesy & © the artist

Scotland: the climate crisis and a changing landscape

Drink in the Beauty is an exhibition of work from Glasgow Museums’ collection at GOMA which will open to the public on 4 June 2021. The show looks at landscapes and nature through art and encourages us to think about how nature is changing as we interact with it – positively and negatively. Today is Earth Day and in advance of this show we are publishing this blog post which talks about how the climate crisis is affecting animals and the landscape in Scotland.