Dr. Donnie Ross has been an active member of Aberdeen Artists Society for 40 years, serving as President in 1990-92 and 2021-23. He was a founder-member of Grampian Hospitals Arts Trust, which he chaired for 10 years. He has been a flamenco guitarist (El Escocés) in a South London Chinese Restaurant and in a Stockholm nightclub, a medical officer at Brand’s Hatch Racetrack, a co-pilot in the Isle of Man air-race, a hospital consultant for 35 years, a medical director for 8 years and an Aberdeenshire crofter / tree planter for 40 years, now mixing Scottish native species with Sequoia and other giant redwoods.
In general, science and medicine abhor ambiguity, but art and creativity revel in generating alternative interpretations, constantly raising expectations only to subvert them. The twist in the tale or in the tune; the double take of visual phenomena, the pattern-matching hardwired into our every sensory modality, all of which by their very nature are vulnerable to playful subversion. So I believe if it ain’t subversive, it probably isn’t art!
A constant preoccupation for me has been how can we in our current era relate authentically to nature, to integrate our milieu intérieur with the external world. And maybe the crux of the problem lies in our emotional and neurophysiological evolution in mesolithic times, which could account for the dysphoria, the restless sense of unease that often afflicts us in cities, where we may feel shrunk, peripheralised and negated by the endless stony vistas, the crowd of unfriendly strangers, the haughty imposing buildings, and by all the desolate manmade spaces created in this appalling anthropocene age both in peacetime and war. Becoming aware of our essentially mesolithic nature, can we perhaps more specifically address our central need for meaningful environments which support rather than erode our sense of wellbeing? Is this what art might be about?
One can learn quite a lot in a lifetime of eighty years of constant observation of the world, self and others, and through the unceasing acquisition of skills; but at every turn the frontiers of one’s ignorance are starkly evident in every direction
Ach weel… For further information please see my experimental e-novel !Leonardo Mind for Modern Times, available as a free download from Apple Books:
Born in the North-East of England in 1953, I didn’t follow the usual path through art school. I chose instead an Art & Design course at Northumberland College of Education and after that taught in Cumbria. In 1981 I moved to Orkney where I set up my own studio and gallery in Birsay and did a number of jobs teaching art to children and adults. During the next 10 years I developed my work and began to exhibit in a variety of venues both in Orkney and around other parts of Britain. In 1991 I moved to Shetland and soon took up an art teaching appointment. I have had numerous exhibitions both in this country and abroad and taken part in an artists’ exchange with the Netherlands and took courses on printmaking and sculpture. Between 2006 and 2008 I worked with Voluntary Service Overseas as a teacher trainer in West Africa. Upon my return to the UK I resumed teaching art part-time and painting.
In 2013 I retired from teaching and I now devote my time to painting. I was a founder member of Veer North, the Shetland artist’s group, and since 1994 have been an occasional arts reviewer and critic for The Shetland Times. In 2014 and 2016 I received Visual Arts Awards from Shetland Arts/Creative Scotland to develop my interest in handmade paint and work towards an exhibition based on visits to Iceland. ‘Elemental’ was shown at the Bonhoga Gallery in July – September 2016. I was awarded The Donnie Ross Prize for Innovation in Watercolour at Aberdeen Artists Society exhibtions in 2020 and 2021. In 2023 I was awarded the John Busby Award at the 142nd RSW Open. I was elected to the RSW in September 2023.
I am currently represented by a number of Scottish galleries including Kilmorack Gallery in Inverness-shire, the Birch Tree Gallery in Dundas Street, Edinburgh and Gallery Heinzel in Aberdeen.
Aberdeen Artists Society’s 2022 Exhibition at Aberdeen Art Gallery
Aberdeen Artists Society is one of Scotland’s longest-established artist-led membership bodies, dating from 1827, and since Aberdeen Art Gallery opened in 1885, the Society has regularly exhibited here.
After a break during the redevelopment of the Art Gallery and then the lockdown during the first stages of the Covid-19 pandemic, we are delighted to present our 2022 Exhibition in this beautifully re-imagined exhibition space, filled with new artworks: paintings, prints, three-dimensional works, silverware, jewellery, videos and more. We continue to live through extraordinarily dark times, but human creativity burns ever more brightly, and AAS 2022 represents an enduring illumination from the combined light of 178 creative minds.
A great deal of careful preparation is necessary to succeed in making a major exhibition. AAS Council spent over a year planning the event, based on knowledge from past times and the techniques and traditions left to us by the people who organised exhibitions throughout the 1980s and 1990s and beyond. Not many of these major figures are still available, and so the process entailed a steep learning curve for our tiny band of volunteers.
Fortunately modern IT is a lot more flexible and generally accepted than it was 30 years ago, when during my first tour of duty as AAS President, with the help of Christine Leith I introduced the use of spreadsheets and once-only entry (on an early laptop computer) at hand-in, making possible information-flow direct to the catalogue and creating a letter to entrants without transcription. In those days it wasn’t always easy to convince creative people that computers might have a useful role in their lives, but the potential of IT systems to reduce both workload and transcription errors did in time become evident to a number of people, and for me personally in my parallel existence as a medical specialist and budding information systems originator in the NHS, this experience was very helpful. By then, though, along with my colleague Dr Pradeep Ramayya, I’d already designed a prototype bedside patient-record system and installed it in the intensive care unit at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary (ABICUS, 1984) which led to us publishing many research papers on computing in medicine and anaesthesia, and subsequently to my participation in a European Community funded international project studying artificial intelligence in Medicine.
In a further parallel existence, in 1985 I became involved in setting up Grampian Hospitals Art Trust, assisting Norman Matheson, Arthur Watson, Ian McKenzie Smith, Andrew Dewar, Syd Burnett, Sandy Fraser and other eminent artists. This was a transformative series of events in which professional artist members of AAS donated more than 100 artworks to kick-start the GHAT collection, and led to solid and enduring links between Aberdeen Artists Society, Grampian Hospitals Art Trust, Aberdeen Art Gallery, RGU / Gray’s School of Art, the NHS in Grampian, and Peacock Printmakers. Many individuals played major roles within and across these organisations, but the transformative catalyst who provided the central vision and drive was Arthur Watson. We were thrilled that Arthur was able to speak at the opening of our 2022 exhibition at Aberdeen Art Gallery.
I hope this brief background illustrates how a shared vision can create cooperative working between disparate groups to the advantage of everyone.
At the same time it might be worth observing how skills developed specifically in one area of life can readily be transferred from one situation to benefit another elsewhere; and actually this goes to the heart of how volunteer organisations work, where everyone in the team, whatever their background and life-experience, brings what they know and can do in service to the community, unified by a vision and a common set of values.
Long before selection, hand-in and hanging, the entire process has to be planned meticulously. In everyday life, usually subconsciously, we all use mental modelling all the time from moment to moment, but when it comes to more complex tasks which will play out over many months, effective software tools are readily available to help simplify and build these mental models in a form which can be shared, critiqued and redesigned.
There is an infinite number of ways of hanging an exhibition, and for the best impact how to layout the artworks is of vital importance to the curators and their team. Of course, the final result is what actually matters, and all theoretical considerations are cast to the winds once the layout commences. An arrangement will invariably start off with quite a lot of conscious thought, but over the course of many hours everything gradually changes, so that in the end it’s the combination of intuition and feeling which are the deciding factors. “Seeing with the heart”; and Mono no aware, as the Japanese say.
AAS artists are amazing! We adapted and thrived during the four-year closure of our main exhibition venue, we successfully created our first on-line exhibition in 2020, and we are looking forward to what comes next.
An exciting new initiative is now being launched to celebrate our talents and our diversity by producing one collaborative composite artwork – “Facing Forward” Members are invited to donate images of self-portraits which will be arranged in a grid format as a poster for the AAS. Here we all are! The final combined image of all our faces will be primarily used for publicity purposes and may take any form – website illustration, projection onto internal or external walls, or printed as AAS promotional stationery. And all arranged within current Covid 19 health restrictions!
A small example of a composite image – members of AAS council
AAS Video project
Last summer saw AAS embark on an exciting new venture. We commissioned Aberdeen based film maker Martina Cook to produce a series of documentaries about the Aberdeen Artists Society called ‘A Conversation in Time’. Our first release put the spotlight on Anna Shirron, an early career artist and member of the society. It follows Anna’s career since graduating from Gray’s School of Art and highlights her engagement with Grampian Hospitals Art Trust and explores her aspirations for future projects. The film is accessible via a link on our website: https://aberdeenartistssociety.co.uk/video-documentaries/
The Gillian and Malcolm Inglis AAS Membership Awards
As part of the visible success of the 2020 online exhibition Coming Home we attracted this charming prize from Canada.
Malcolm Inglis has generously donated funds to support 4 memberships of AAS. The Inglis family have several historical links with Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire, and have a direct family connection with AAS Member Dr. Roderick Scott, whose art they particularly admire.
Following discussions with Libby Curtis, Head of RGU Gray’s School of Art (GSoA), we now invite applications from art students at GSoA.
If you are an art student at RGU GSoA and would like to avail yourself of this excellent and worthwhile opportunity to join AAS, please send your name and contact details, along with a note of your year of study at Gray’s, and an indication of your main creative interests, For Attention AAS President Dr. Donnie Ross, by email to: info@aberdeenartistssociety.co.uk
AAS Membership Subscriptions
Memberships renewals and new applications for membership can be made on our website:
From Saturday 12th June to Sunday 29th August 2021
Welcome to the AAS Summer Exhibition 2021
As I hope you will agree, our Online 2021 Exhibition reaches a particularly high standard this year, and the icing on the cake is that Aberdeen Artists Society has accordingly been able to award prizes to several brilliant works by extremely talented artists.
We send our warmest congratulations and best wishes to the prizewinners, and hope that these successes will encourage artists both young and old, professional and amateur, to develop their own special talents & potential, and to follow their own unique pathway towards the marvelous worlds of artistic practice.
Aberdeen Artists Society
Exhibition 2021 Prizewinners.
List of Prize Winners for Aberdeen Artists Society 2021 Exhibition
AAS Prizes for Excellence
(Four prizes of £250 each)
Hun Adamoglu:Wild Aloe Vera of Mare Monte’ – Oil on canvas
Lisa Gribbon:Drifting Blue – Watercolour
Kirsten McAllister:Vesuvius – Oil on canvas
Tamar Chatterjee:Agnes – Oil on canvas
The Dr. Donnie Ross Prizes for Innovation & Creativity in Watercolour:
(One prize of £500 and two prizes of £250 each)
Lisa Gribbon:Drifting Blue – £500
Rowena Comrie:Interruption – £250
Peter Davis:Fjora – £250
The MSD Design Ltd* and GRP Aberdeen Ltd* prizes for Drawing and Painting 2021 were gifted by Martin Stevenson, who is the owner of both Companies, with the aim of encouraging and championing traditional drawing and painting imbued with the British school aesthetic.
Martin states: It would be expected that prize winners would display mastery in the techniques underpinning drawing and painting: draughtsmanship and understanding of the emotional palette.
AWARD FOR DRAWING AND PAINTING 2021
Prize £500
Hun Adamoglu:Wild Aloe Vera of Mare Monte’ – Oil on canvas
Shelagh Brown Ann Craig Andrew Dewar Alan Florence Melanie Guatelli Susie Hunt Rita Kermack Claire Kidd Gail McMillan Trisha Richie Dr Donnie Ross Jenny Ross Martin Stevenson Gerry Stott Bruce Swanson Fenneke Wolters-Sinke
Hanging Committee
Andrew Dewar Susie Hunt Dr Donnie Ross
Organising Exhibition Committee
Andy Dewar Susie Hunt Claire Kidd Trisha Richie Gerry Stott
Special Thanks
Andy Laffan – Int-Tech Martina Camatta – Film Maker
Video Production Group
Chaired by Rita Kermack Martina Camatta Dr Donnie Ross Susie Hunt Andy Dewar Gail McMillan Trisha Richie Mel Guatelli
Judges Panel
Andy Dewar Martin Stevenson Gerry Stott Bruce Swanson Susie Hunt
Aberdeen Artists Society has risen to the challenge that Covid 19 is presenting to us and has taken the unprecedented decision to move its Coming Home Exhibition online. Originally planned to open in the Aberdeen Art Gallery on 6th June, the online exhibition will open two weeks later, on the 20th June. The extra two weeks will give artists more time to prepare and maybe consider to enter another work. The extended deadline for submissions from 1st May to 17th May.
The Call for works published in March still stands, with the following exceptions/clarifications:
The size limitation on all works will no longer apply.
It is now possible to submit a maximum of three works.
The deadline for works is extended to midnight on 17th May.
The selection phase is similarly delayed.
The exhibition opening online will now be 20th June.
Prizes are now confirmed: £1000 Aberdeen Artists Society Prize for best in show, £500 MSD, £500 Donnie Ross Watercolour.
We continue to work closely with Aberdeen Art Gallery and, while the gallery is closed, are working out how to show works via their online platforms as well as participating in the Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museum (AAGM) programme of talks and workshops and exhibitions in an appropriate medium.
While the main AAS show will be online, AAS will continue to select work since we continue to hold out the hope and possibility of showing work in the Aberdeen Art Gallery spaces at a later date. This will be subject to these be offered to us in the AAGM programme once it re-opens. If this outcome materialises we will communicate directly with the artists who have had work selected. In this instance the size restriction will likely be reinstated as exhibition space in the gallery is limited. In any case ALL submitted works will be shown on the online gallery and, if the gallery spaces become available, as digital images projected onto a wall within the gallery.
We have been encouraged by the positive response to this decision from Aberdeen Art Gallery and from artists more broadly and hope it offers artists encouragement and an opportunity to show and sell work, to engage with an audience online while staying safe at this difficult time.
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