Peter Howson exhibition to close with artist-hosted film screening

An exclusive documentary screening alongside a Q&A session with artist Peter Howson will take place this Friday (September 29) to mark the closing of the exhibition ‘When the Apple Ripens‘.

Hosted at the City Art Centre, ‘When the Apple Ripens: Peter Howson at 65: A Retrospective’, traces the illustrious career of Peter Howson, from his early days to the present, featuring over 100 works over three galleries, painstakingly assembled from both public and private collections across the UK and Europe.

Directed by Charlie Paul, and produced by Lucy Paul, Prophecy is an evocative exploration of a single oil painting and the first major film to reveal the motive and techniques behind each stroke of paint as the artist creates.

Released in 2019, the 90-minute feature documentary transports the audience into the darkly comic, obsessive mind of Peter Howson, seeing directly through the artist’s eye. What begins as a blank canvas, emerges as Howson’s monumental oil painting, ‘Prophecy’.

Prophecy reveals what it takes to create a large oil painting, the techniques, the materials, the skills, the thinking behind creation, and the intentions and difficulties that push Howson to achieve this ambitious, masterful, and detailed 6ft x 8ft canvas.

The painting is currently on display at When the Apple Ripens.

Tickets for the screening can be purchased on the Museums and Galleries Edinburgh website.

Culture and Communities Convener, Councillor Val Walker said: “This Friday’s screening and Q&A session represents the culmination of one of the most unique, harrowing, and powerful exhibitions we have ever hosted at the City Art Centre.

“Peter Howson has made an indelible impact on British and Scottish art, and we have been truly fortunate to be able to display his life’s work in the heart of Edinburgh.

“Prophecy provides a rich and unique perspective on the arduous and painstaking process of creating work of this calibre. I would encourage residents and visitors to book their tickets now to bot the documentary screening and wider exhibition and experience the full power and fury of Howson’s work”.