BEAUTIFUL SHAMBLES - A VISUAL LOVE LETTER TO GLASGOW
28TH – 30TH NOVEMBER 2025

Private View
Friday 28th November, 5 pm to 10 pm (RSVP required)

RSVP

I am happy to announce that I will be presenting new work in the group exhibition Beautiful Shambles, a visual love letter to Glasgow with all its character, charm and contradictions. For one weekend, four Scottish artists come together to share what this city means to us, each in our own language of image, colour and place.
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My new body of work explores power, propaganda, class struggle, and forgotten communities through reimagined characters from Orwell’s Animal Farm, transposed into a gritty Glaswegian housing estate. Anthropomorphic creatures wear tracksuits, carry old protest scars, and stalk the corridors of derelict tower blocks. It’s Orwell via Possilpark. Surreal, unsettling, and weirdly familiar.The allegory of revolution and corruption remains, now infused with Glaswegian voices, local grit, and surreal familiarity.
I will present portraits of the main protagonists in this darkly comic, unsettling retelling--Orwell via Glasgow city.

Christopher Swan will be taking a deep dive into my immediate location, focussing on the overlooked scenes and idiosyncratic occurrences which make the urban environment of Glasgow such an interesting and vibrant subject. Twelve works will be presented on aluminium, celebrating the extraordinary within the ordinary, the beauty within the grit - elevating what can appear on first impression to be a mundane scene into something fresh and vital.
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Nick Smith will be showing new screenprinted artworks on paper and canvas, along with a light box, all exploring Glaswegian slang. Through his process of psycolourgy, Nick takes these familiar, braw expressions and gives them a visual life of colour, turning everyday patter into something vivid and gallus (bold). Nick and Chris are also collaborating on a triptych of large-scale screen printed canvases - a process which has been an absolute joy. 
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Ross Ryan, known for painting the rugged coastline of Scotland, will be setting his easel in an entirely different landscape. He steps into an ultra urban environment shaped by concrete and the ghosts of industry. Bringing his plein air practice into the heart of the city, he will take his dinghy up the Clyde to capture Glasgow’s once industrial artery, a rural painter navigating cranes, steel and cold water. 


Private View
Friday 28th November, 5 pm to 10 pm (RSVP required)

RSVP
Open Hours
Saturday 29th & Sunday 30th November, 11 am to 5 pm
Venue
The Glue Factory
22 Farnell Street
Glasgow G4 9SE




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