Day: February 28, 2026

Self-portrait by Scottish painter Jack Vettriano to go on display at National Galleries of Scotland

National Galleries Scotland: Portrait

Portrait of the Artist, Jack Vettriano

1 March 2026 –  2029

Free

Commemorating one year since the passing of celebrated Scottish painter Jack Vettriano, National Galleries of Scotland has announced it is to showcase two works by the artist.

Celebrating the life and prolific career of Vettriano, the artist’s estate will loan two self-portraits Portrait of the Artist and Homage to Fontana? over a six-year period. Portrait of the Artist will go on display on the one-year anniversary of his passing on 1 March 2026, at National Galleries Scotland: Portrait.

Free to visit, the painting will stay on display until early 2029 when it will then be swapped with Homage to Fontana?.

A self-taught painter, Vettriano was loved at home in Scotland and internationally for his evocative and timeless works that continue to captivate and inspire. His career made a huge contribution to the Scottish arts and culture scene and even broke records in the UK and Scotland.

In 2004 his painting The Singing Butler achieved a record price for a Scottish painting sold at auction and went on to become the best-selling art print in the UK. The work even inspired Banksy, whose reimagining of the painting sold in March 2025 for £4.3million. Vettriano is internationally recognised, with the likes of Jack Nicholson, Sir Alex Ferguson and Sir Tim Rice among collectors of his work.

Portrait of the Artist, painted in 1993, is an early self-portrait by Vettriano and was painted a year after The Singing Butler. It depicts the artist taking a break from painting at his Edinburgh flat where he had a studio. A dramatic depiction of light and shade sets the scene for a moment of contemplation. The artist’s paint-splattered clothes emphasise the task at hand.

The cinematic Homage to Fontana? was painted later in 1999. The title and slashes in the painted canvas reference the Argentine-Italian artist Lucio Fontana (1899–1968) whose slashed canvases of the 1950s and 60s blurred the distinction between two and three dimensions to create ‘an infinite dimension’.

Vettriano invites us to follow his act of contemplation in relation to what lies beneath the surface and beyond. The painting returned to Edinburgh in July 2025 after its inclusion in a Vettriano exhibition at the Palazzo Pallavicini in Bologna and is the largest of three versions of this composition.

Born Jack Hoggan, Vettriano grew up in the coastal mining village of Methil in Fife. After leaving school at 15, he followed his father down the mine, working as an apprentice engineer.

He later moved on to white-collar jobs in management services, taking up painting as a hobby in the 1970s when a girlfriend bought him a set of watercolours for his birthday.

From then on, Vettriano spent much of his spare time teaching himself to paint.

He learned by copying Old Masters, Impressionists, Surrealists and a plethora of Scottish artists, taking inspiration from studying the collection at Kirkcaldy Galleries. It was his experience living near Leven Beach which prompted him to make the decision: ‘I’m going to set some paintings on beaches.’  

A figurative painter, Vettriano described his work as ‘more or less autobiographical.’ He worked from photographs of scenes he staged with models in his studio.

His paintings evoke the nostalgia of the 1940s and 50s and were often set, in the artist’s own words, in ‘sombre and sordid interiors’. Vettriano’s dramatic use of light and shade is a distinctive element of his work and heightens the stories of love, sex and betrayal in his paintings. 

In the late 1980s he moved to Edinburgh and took his mother’s last name, Vettriano. The artist’s breakthrough came in 1988 when he submitted two works to the Royal Scottish Academy’s Annual Exhibition, with both works selling within the first day.

Subsequently he was courted by several galleries, with his first solo exhibition in Edinburgh in 1992. Soon, his works began to gather international acclaim, leading to exhibitions in London, Hong Kong, Johannesburg and New York.

The first major retrospective of his work was at Kelvingrove Art Gallery in 2013 and featured Homage to Fontanna?.  The exhibition was record-breaking, attracting more than 136,000 visitors over its five-month run.

Imogen Gibbon, Head of Portraiture & Photography & Chief Curator at the National Galleries Scotland, said: ‘‘We’re thrilled to be welcoming visitors to the Portrait gallery to come and see Portrait of the Artist – by Jack Vettriano. It feels particularly significant that we are able to showcase a self-portrait to celebrate Vettriano’s contribution to Scottish culture on the anniversary of his death.

“This portrait and the subsequent work Homage to Fontana? will take their place on loan in The Modern Portrait display amongst the many other contemporary portraits of Scots who have made an impact at home in Scotland and internationally.

“National Galleries of Scotland extend our thanks to the artists estate, who came to us with this idea and supported us to make it happen’.”

Carolyn Osborne,  Director, Jack Vettriano Publishing Limited, said: ‘Jack was known as The People’s Painter and it’s entirely fitting that the public will be able to see one of his paintings in such a beautiful setting within a mile of where it was painted.’

Terminally ill people and their families urge MSPs to vote for the Assisted Dying Bill

Terminally ill people and families of those who suffered as they died have come together to urge MSPs to vote for Liam McArthur MSP’s Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults Bill in the Scottish Parliament.

The letter, signed by 54 people with lived experience across Scotland, tells of the fear of facing a painful and protracted death without the option of an assisted death, and the bleak options with which they are left, including ending their own lives behind closed doors.

Those who have witnessed a loved one suffer as they die highlight extreme suffering that is beyond the reach of any palliative care, leaving those behind with harrowing memories.

The lead signatory of the letter, Norma Rivers, 73, from Ayr, has terminal myeloma – a rare form of blood cancer. Having witnessed her father’s traumatic death from cancer, she knows she doesn’t want to suffer as she dies.

Norma said: “Having no choice can force people into things they don’t want to do. I want to live as long as possible, but I am running out of treatment options.

“If the Bill isn’t passed before I die, I will take matters into my own hands. I have just been living in fear, trying to work out which of my drugs I need and how much, and scared I’ll end up worse if it doesn’t work.

“All I ask if for a peaceful ending surrounded by my family.”

FULL TEXT OF THE LETTER

Dear MSPs,

We have come together as terminally ill people and families of those who suffered as they died, to ask you to vote for the Assisted Dying for Terminally Ill Adults Bill at Stage 3.

We are the real people at the heart of this Bill. Some of us face a terminal diagnosis ourselves, while others have witnessed a loved one suffer unbearably at the end of life. When you voted for the Bill at Stage 1, we know that you did so with our stories in your minds, and we ask you to please do the same at Stage 3. The Stage 1 vote brought such relief and hope to us, that no one else might have to suffer as we have.

For those of us with a terminal diagnosis, denying us choice will not stop us seeking it out. Without assisted dying, we are coerced into suffering against our wishes. Many of us have already seen a loved one suffer and know what is coming. Like the vast majority of Scots, we are priced out of travelling to Switzerland.

We do not want to die alone in a foreign country, but could not risk our loved ones facing prosecution when they return without us. The only other option is to end our own lives behind closed doors. This means endless sleepless nights calculating the combination and amounts of drugs we need and the intense fear that none of it will work and we will end up in a worse position than before.

Watching a loved one suffer has put us in impossible situations too. The agony we have witnessed, even with the very best palliative and hospice staff doing everything they can, is unimaginable.

We have been left powerless, hands tied by the law, as our closest family begged us to help them; to take them to Switzerland when we know they are too far gone, or  o scour the dark web for pills, not knowing what’s in them or where they come from.

The law abandoned us when we needed it most, leaving us to scramble around in the dark with no process, no safeguards, and no compassion. We are only left with harrowing memories, guilt that we were powerless to help, and our own health conditions caused by the stress.

Assisted dying would be a lifeline. It would let us live the rest of our lives in peace, making precious final memories with our loved ones, without the constant dread of how our lives will end. It’s too late for our loved ones who have died, but we have the opportunity to make things  ight so no one has to suffer as they did.

This issue is not going away. Voting against this Bill will not stop us from dying, but will deny us a lifeline to a safe, peaceful death surrounded by our loved ones.

You have before you an opportunity to shape what an assisted dying law in Scotland looks like.

A law that is safe, compassionate, and provides choice to those who so desperately need it. Without it, our options are bleak. The most dangerous thing you can do for us is nothing.

Please give us hope by voting for the Assisted Dying Bill.

Thank you.