ALISON DUNLOP RSW

Born in Canada in 1958, Alison Dunlop began her art studies there before continuing her education in France and undertaking postgraduate studies at Edinburgh College of Art in 1982. With both Scottish and Welsh ancestry, Scotland was a natural place in which to make her home and develop as an artist. 

After many years of close involvement with Scotland’s national arts organisations, Alison followed a long-held ambition to establish a studio by the sea. In 2006, she began restoring a derelict croft house and barn in the North West Highlands, creating a studio overlooking a landscape of sea, islands and mountains that has become central to her work. A new studio building now also provides an intimate exhibition space in which her work can be seen in the landscape from which much of it emerges. 

Alison was elected a member of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW) in 1989 and has twice served as its Vice-President. During the 1990s she was a Council member and then subsequently President of Visual Arts Scotland, serving for three years and later being made one of its Honorary Life Members.

 She is a founding Director of The Exhibiting Societies of Scottish Artists (ESSA) and a founding member of the Edinburgh College of Art Alumni Association.   From 2001 to 2004, she was Honorary Arts Convenor of the Scottish Arts Club in Edinburgh.

 Alison has twice received an Elizabeth T. Greenshields Foundation Scholarshipand has been shortlisted on several occasions for the Noble Grossart Painting Prize. Her other awards include the Alexander Graham Munro Award, the John Gray Prize and the Walter Scott Award.

 Working principally in oils and watercolour, Alison’s work is held in public and private collections throughout the UK and Canada. Her work has been exhibited widely, including at Panter & Hall, Mayfair; Thompson’s Gallery; The Piccadilly Gallery; The Thackeray Gallery; The Bruton Gallery, Bath; The Scottish Gallery; Open Eye Gallery; Roger Billcliffe Gallery; Fidra Fine Art; Gairloch Museum; and other galleries throughout Scotland.

Her work has also been selected for the principal Open Exhibitions of the Royal Scottish Academy, Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour, Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts and Visual Arts Scotland.

In 2012, Alison published Spirit of Beyond: The Shiant Isles, which features, among contributing essays and poems (by Professor Annie Worsley and Scottish poet Brian Hill) and stories, an extensive collection of graphite drawings, watercolours, oils and photographs.   An enigmatic presence on the horizon, in the Minch, and visible from her studio, the Islands have remained an enduring presence in her work. 

Alison now works from her Mission Hall Studio on the coast of Wester Ross, which she acquired in late 2025. It has now been restored and reimagined as a working studio, exhibition space and place of gathering. It is open by invitation only.

 "After years of close involvement with national arts organisations, helping to promote the work of other artists in my adopted country, I decided it was time to follow my dream. In 2006, my husband Ross and I bought and began restoring a derelict 10-acre croft (small farm) on the coast in the North-West of Scotland.

Today, I work entirely from my studio up here in this magical place by the sea, which has been brought back to life as an endlessly inspiring work-space." 

ABOUT THE WORK

 Earlier Work

Drawing on an early influence of Canadian “magic realism”, Alison’s work has developed in compelling and thought-provoking ways since she began painting in the 1980’s.

“The series of paintings which I think of as my "Anima" series, began as I played about in my studio with the natural forms and props which I'd collected: driftwood, stones, feathers, shells (I'm an inveterate beachcomber) and lengths of white linen. I explored placing them together in unexpected ways, so that they might take on new meaning and come to life,  animated, spirited, if you like.... become symbols of something far greater than their surface appearances might suggest.

It's been fun to see now, how this body of work evolved from the very first oil entitled "Bound", hung in the Royal Scottish Academy's annual show in the late 1990's. It was a tentative start, quiet, meditative. Over the years, these subjects have seemed to lead me (as opposed to the other way 'round) along a certain path of discovery, with many digressions and diversions. At times, the subject would almost demand to leap across the canvas, its pulse and narrative frozen in a moment; but lately, the images seem to edge ever closer to abstraction, distillation. My focus shifts and the eye delves more deeply into the creases of the knots, into the shadows... sensing and hopefully communicating an unseen energy beneath the surfaces of what I paint.”

Inner Sound Series

“This series, in watercolour, began in 2009, when I first started working in my new studio in Wester Ross.

When I first moved to Wester Ross and began restoring the old stone barn which became my studio, it was as though a switch had been flicked in my mind. I sensed right away that my focus had shifted to needing to explore in paint, this experience of living on the edge of this coast - this vast amphitheatre of sea and islands that is the Inner Sound and the Minch.

This work is my attempt to find an equivalent in paint for the experience of looking out beyond my studio windows to these seas. As the series has grown, the images have inevitably become more and more abstract, distilled, re-defined.

It is watercolours which most lend themselves to these investigations in paint.

The energy and the light in this place is unlike any I’ve known before and living here is a daily immersion in a breathtaking (sometimes overpowering) drama played out by the elements. The process of pressing forward with this new imagery, not knowing what the next piece will bring or where it will take me, is very exciting - it has taken on an energy of its own.

Each piece seems to grow out of the previous ones, to teach the eye and the hand something new.  To let the hand, the pigment, the paper and the water grapple - and then act in unison, giving form to an (inner) experience of the drama unfolding beyond my window."

Detailed Biography

Graduated with Honours B.A. (Fine Art), University of Guelph in 1980, with one undergraduate year of study at L’Ecole des Beaux-Arts and L’Université de Franche-Comté, Besançon, France.

Attended Edinburgh College of Art in 1982-83 for Post-Graduate studies.

In 1989, elected Professional Member of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW)

 In 1995, elected Professional Member of Visual Arts Scotland

1997-99 President of Visual Arts Scotland

2002-03 Vice-President of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW) 

Founding Director of the Exhibiting Societies of Scottish Artists (ESSA) 

Founder Member of the Alumni Association, Edinburgh College of Art 

Honorary Art Convenor, The Scottish Arts Club, Edinburgh, 2001 – 2004 

Conferred Honorary Membership, Visual Arts Scotland, 2003

Solo Exhibitions

McLaughlin Gallery, University of Guelph, Canada

Galerie Rochon, Toronto

Edinburgh Gallery (the former)

 Scottish Arts Club, Edinburgh 

Tolquhon Gallery, Aberdeen  

Randolph Gallery, Edinburgh (x 3)

Gairloch Museum (x 2)

The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh

Two Person Exhibitions

Kingfisher Gallery, Edinburgh

 Bruton Gallery, Bath

Selected Group Exhibitions

An Talla Solais, Ullapool

Bruton Gallery, Bath

Compass Gallery, Glasgow

Courtyard Gallery, Crail

Fidra Fine Art, Gullane

Frames Gallery, Perth

Fraser Gallery, St. Andrews

Gallery Heinzel, Aberdeen

Gullane Art Gallery, Gullane 

Henshelwood Gallery, Newcastle 

Morrison Scottish Portrait Exhibition

Noble Grossart Painting Prize Exhibition 

Open Eye Gallery, Edinburgh 

Piccadilly Gallery, London

Panter and Hall, London

Red Rag Gallery, Bath

Roger Bilcliffe Gallery, Glasgow

Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts 

Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh

Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour

 Scottish Arts Club, Edinburgh

The Scottish Gallery

Society of Scottish Artists

Stenton Gallery, East Lothian

Strathearn Gallery, Crieff 

Thackeray Gallery, London 

Thompson’s Gallery, London and Aldeburgh 

Tolquhon Gallery, Aberdeen

Tracey McNee Fine Art, London and Glasgow 

Visual Arts Scotland 

Wade Gallery, Elie

Awards

Printmaking Award, University of Guelph

Ontario Arts Council Grant (x 2)

Elizabeth T. Greenshields Foundation (Montreal) Scholarship (x 2)

Alexander Graham Munro Award (RSW)

John Gray Award (RSW)

Derek Robertson Residency and Kelty Art Centre Award (RSW)

Walter Scott Award and Purchase Prize  (RSW)

Collections

Royal Bank of Scotland plc 

 Prudential plc

Walter Scott Investment Ltd.

Dickson Minto (London and Edinburgh)

  Davidson Chalmers, Edinburgh

Betty Davies Collection

David E. Bassett Collection (Canada)       

Gallery St. Thomas-Elgin (Canada)

Judith & Norman Alix Art Gallery, (Canada)