Ross Ryan | From the Wheelhouse

This new collection of paintings is from two years of chasing gales, sailing to offshore lighthouses and discovering the people and their islands that found my messages in bottles. As the world has also temporarily battened down the hatches I hope this exhibition is a reminder of the beautiful seascapes of the West Coast that await for us.

Lying west on the outer banks are two of the Stevensons’ largest lighthouses: Dubh Artach and Skerryvore. They are known by few but have offered salvation to thousands. Over 150 years their lights have blinked a simple message, a warning of the utmost danger. During this time, rage-filled seas have continued to de denied their rights for demolition

Of the Message in Bottles launched during the 2017 ‘solo winter voyage’, several have been found. Three of them took me to Tiree and Coll. I painted where they washed up and met those that discovered them.

During the winter I painted from the shore, recording the sea in all her anger. Here is a force that could move a beach overnight and flick rocks like unwanted peas. Many of these paintings are from when the pressure dropped, started and completed in the one sitting. Not all of them made it.

The seas were now massive, flashing their green fronts before tripping and folding into huge sold tubes. A stinking dead seal that had been close by got clawed back off the beach, I watched in awe as the tide somehow pulled it back out through the waves.

By enduring the harshest of environments, Ross Ryan’s collection of artwork, photographs and Logbook creates such a vividly illustrated narrative of his seafaring adventures.

Anyone who caught Ryan’s last exhibition at the Scottish Gallery in Edinburgh in 2018 will be aware of his commitment to creating work in the open air, no matter how attritional the conditions.