#fifer

Scottish artist Jack Vettriano was born on November 17th 1951.

Born Jack Hoggan 1951 in St. Andrews, I think many of us will identify with Jack’s upbringing in the industrial seaside town of Methil, in Fife.

The family lived in a spartan miner’s cottage, sharing a bed with his brother and wearing hand-me-down clothes. From the age of 10, his father sent him out delivering papers and milk, cleaning windows and picking potatoes — any job that would earn money, he took half his earning from the youngster.

At 16, like so many in the Fife area he went into the pits, as a mining engineer, he also spent sometime as a bingo caller at the Beachcomber Amusements on Leven Promenade.

For his 21st birthday, his then girlfriend gave him a set of watercolour paints, from there he taught himself to paint. His first attempts at painting were copies of impressionist paintings such as Poppy Fields by Claude Monet. His early influences also included works displayed in the Kirkcaldy Museum and Art Gallery. He moved to Edinburgh in 1987 and adopted the last name of Vettriano, his mother’s maiden name. Jack applied to study Fine Art at the University of Edinburgh, but his portfolio was rejected.

A year later he submitted two paintings for sale to the Royal Scottish Academy. He sold both paintings, and galleries began approaching him to sell his work. Vettriano successfully exhibited his work in many cities, including Edinburgh, Hong Kong, London, and New York. Vettriano’s paintings typically sell for between £48,000 and £195,000, and his total income from royalties is £500,000 per year.

The Royal Academy rejected The Singing Butler for its 1992 summer exhibition, but it sold for £744,500 in 2004, and I say good on him, I suspect their refusal was more to do with snobbery than anything else.

Jack went on to create a series of seven paintings in 1996 that commemorated Sir Malcolm Campbell’s land-speed records at the Bonneville Salt Flats. The most expensive painting in this series was Bluebird at Bonneville, which sold for £468,000 in 2007.

It’s not all about pocketing his earnings though, Bethany Christian Trust, Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres, Quarriers and Teenage Cancer Trust are just a few of the charities to have benefitted from the sale of some of his paintings.

Vettriano collaborated with Sir Jackie Stewart in 2008 to create Tension, Timing, Triumph – Monaco 1971, a triptych that commemorated Stewart’s overall victory of the 1971 Formula One racing season The Weight is Vettriano’s self-portrait, which has been displayed in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery since 2011.

He likes to gamble on horses, but only bets what he can afford to lose, which I think would mean every day!!!

Jack set up the Vettriano Trust, and planned to leave his money in the trust “to do good work”

His work rarely fails at auction - he points out that a recent oil painting of his sold for £35,000, well above the estimate. Reproductions of the painting remain the best selling art print in the UK.

But while Vettriano is loved, he's also loathed.

His work has been variously described as "brainless erotica", "just colouring in" "mere wallpaper" and "crass male fantasy ". But another artist David Mach says: "If he was a fashion designer Jack would be right up there. It's all just art world snobbery." Just as I said earlier.

One of my favourites by Vettriano is “Dr Connolly I Presume” –which Glasgow street artist Rogue One reproduced in a giant mural outside Hootenanny Bar at Dixon Street.

ver b (skyes cheek isnt visible)

sketch

Reynard the Bard.