Calum Colvin (born

Glasgow Glasgow is the Cities of Scotland, most populous city in Scotland, located on the banks of the River Clyde in Strathclyde, west central Scotland. It is the List of cities in the United Kingdom, third-most-populous city in the United Kingdom ...

, 1961) is a

Scottish art Scottish art is the body of visual art made in what is now Scotland, or about Scottish subjects, since prehistoric times. It forms a distinctive tradition within European art, but the political union with England has led its partial subsumation ...

ist whose work combines

photography Photography is the visual arts, art, application, and practice of creating images by recording light, either electronically by means of an image sensor, or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film. It is empl ...

, painting, and installation, and often deals with issues of Scottish identity and culture and with the history of art. He has had solo exhibitions at the

Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art National Galleries Scotland: Modern (the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art) is part of National Galleries Scotland, which is based in Edinburgh, Scotland. The Modern houses the collection of modern and contemporary art dating from about 1 ...

Scottish National Portrait Gallery National Galleries Scotland: Portrait is an art museum on Queen Street, Edinburgh. Portrait holds the national collections of portraits, all of which are of, but not necessarily by, Scots. It also holds the Scottish National Photography Collec ...

, and

Royal Scottish Academy The Royal Scottish Academy (RSA) is the country's national academy of art. It promotes contemporary art, contemporary Scottish art. The Academy was founded in 1826 by eleven artists meeting in Edinburgh. Originally named the Scottish Academy ...

and has a number of works in the collections of the National Galleries of Scotland, Tate Galleries, and the British Council. He is also Professor of Fine Art Photography and Programme Director, Art & Media at

Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design (DJCAD) is part of the University of Dundee in Dundee, Scotland. It is ranked as one of the top schools of art and design in the United Kingdom. History Attempts were made to establish an art sch ...

, part of the

University of Dundee The University of Dundee is a public research university based in Dundee, Scotland. It was founded as a university college in 1881 with a donation from the prominent Baxter family of textile manufacturers. The institution was, for most of its ...

Life and work

Colvin studied at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee from 1979 to 1983, gaining a diploma in sculpture, and at the Royal College of Art, London from 1983 to 1985, where he was awarded an MA in photography. His art generally involves taking a roomful of objects and painting a design on them so that when seen from one particular viewpoint it appears to form a flat image in a ''

trompe-l'œil ; ; ) is an artistic term for the highly realistic optical illusion of three-dimensional space and objects on a Two-dimensional space, two-dimensional surface. , which is most often associated with painting, tricks the viewer into perceiving p ...

'' style. However, when seen from any other viewpoint the illusion would be broken. Colvin then takes photographs of the room from the particular viewpoint that preserves the illusion and exhibits the photograph. This means that at first glance the viewer thinks they see a flat image and only gradually can pick out the details revealing they are seeing a three-dimensional scene. His images are full of bright colours, and he initially worked with the Cibachrome colour process, commonly used in advertising and commercial photography. His exhibition ''Ossian Fragments of Ancient Poetry'' (2002) was inspired by

James Macpherson James Macpherson ( Gaelic: ''Seumas MacMhuirich'' or ''Seumas Mac a' Phearsain''; 27 October 1736 – 17 February 1796) was a Scottish writer, poet, literary collector, and politician. He is known for the Ossian cycle of epic poems, which he ...

's fraudulent works attributed to the ancient Celtic poet

Ossian Ossian (; Irish Gaelic/Scottish Gaelic: ''Oisean'') is the narrator and purported author of a cycle of epic poems published by the Scottish poet James Macpherson, originally as ''Fingal'' (1761) and ''Temora (poem), Temora'' (1763), and later c ...

. His exhibition ''Natural Magic'' (2009), took its title from

David Brewster Sir David Brewster Knight of the Royal Guelphic Order, KH President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, PRSE Fellow of the Royal Society of London, FRS Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, FSA Scot Fellow of the Scottish Society of ...

's ''Letters on Natural Magic''; Brewster pioneered photography in Scotland as well as inventing the

kaleidoscope A kaleidoscope () is an optical instrument with two or more reflecting surfaces (or mirrors) tilted to each other at an angle, so that one or more (parts of) objects on one end of these mirrors are shown as a symmetrical pattern when viewed fro ...

and other optical devices. Colvin played with ideas about illusions and vision, including examining claims that Renaissance artist

Jacopo Chimenti image:San Lorenzo,L'Empoli, il Martirio di San Sebastiano.JPG, 250px, ''Martyrdom of St. Sebastian'', San Lorenzo di Firenze, San Lorenzo, Florence Jacopo da Empoli (30 April 1551 – 30 September 1640) was an Italian Florentine Reformist painter ...

had invented stereoscopic images. The exhibition received a five star review from ''The Scotsman''.

Exhibitions

*''The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things,'' 1993. Inspired by

Hieronymous Bosch Hieronymus Bosch (; ; born Jheronimus van Aken ; – 9 August 1516) was a Dutch people, Dutch painter from Duchy of Brabant, Brabant. He is one of the most notable representatives of the Early Netherlandish painting school. His work, gene ...

. *''Sacred and Profane,'' Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, 1998 *''Ossian Fragments of Ancient Poetry,'' Scottish National Portrait Gallery, 2002 *''Natural Magic,'' Royal Scottish Academy, 2009 *''Burnsiana,'' 2013. Exhibition and book produced in collaboration with poet Rab Wilson.

Permanent collections

Colvin's work is held in the following permanent collections: *National Galleries of Scotland collection, including a portrait of composer

James MacMillan Sir James Loy MacMillan, TOSD (born 16 July 1959) is a Scottish classical composer and conductor. Early life MacMillan was born at Kilwinning, in North Ayrshire, but lived in the East Ayrshire town of Cumnock until 1977. His father is Jam ...

and versions of

Peter Paul Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens ( ; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish painting, Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque painting, Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens' highly charged comp ...

's The Feast of Herod and

Titian Tiziano Vecellio (; 27 August 1576), Latinized as Titianus, hence known in English as Titian ( ), was an Italian Renaissance painter, the most important artist of Renaissance Venetian painting. He was born in Pieve di Cadore, near Belluno. Ti ...

Venus Anadyomene ''Venus Anadyomene'' (, "Venus, Rising from the Sea") is one of the iconic representations of the goddess Venus (mythology), Venus (Aphrodite), made famous in a much-admired painting by Apelles, now lost, but described in Natural History (encycl ...

. *British Council *Tate Galleries.

Awards

*Member of the Royal Scottish Academy *

OBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

, 2001, for his contribution to the visual arts

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Colvin, Calum Scottish artists 1961 births Academics of the University of Dundee Alumni of the University of Dundee Officers of the Order of the British Empire Living people Alumni of Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art & Design