A self-portrait by Jack Vettriano goes on display in Edinburgh today, March 1, on the first anniversary of his death. The painting, Portrait Of The Artist, will hang at National Galleries Scotland: Portrait for the next three years, the first of two self-portraits being loaned by the artist’s estate.
Vettriano was 73 when he was found dead in his flat in Nice, France, on March 1 last year. Whatever the art establishment thought of him, and opinions were always divided, he was one of Scotland’s most recognisable painters. The Singing Butler remains one of the most reproduced images in British art.
Portrait Of The Artist was painted in 1993, a year after The Singing Butler. It will be followed by Homage To Fontana?, painted in 1999, which references the Argentine-Italian artist Lucio Fontana and his famous slashed canvases of the 1950s and 60s. That second portrait will take over when the first comes down in early 2029.
Imogen Gibbon, head of portraiture and photography at National Galleries Scotland, said it felt “particularly significant” to showcase a self-portrait on the anniversary of his death. Carolyn Osborne, director of Jack Vettriano Publishing Limited, added: “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.”
Vettriano’s story remains remarkable. He left school at 15 to become a mining engineer and took up painting after a girlfriend gave him a box of watercolours for his 21st birthday. He was self-taught, learning by copying the Old Masters, Impressionists, and Scottish artists at Kirkcaldy Galleries. In 1988 he submitted two works to the Royal Scottish Academy’s annual exhibition and both sold within the first day. By the 1990s he had achieved international success that few artists, self-taught or otherwise, ever manage.