National Galleries of Scotland

Since reopening in November 2012 after a massive refurbishment, the Scottish National Portrait Gallery has been incredibly busy playing host to a raft of fantastic exhibitions, bringing together portraits of homegrown Hollywood icons, royals from through the ages, world-beating sports stars and the great and good of Scottish history in equal measure. Looking ahead, 2013 promises even more fabulous exhibitions drawing on a truly diverse range of talent, past and present, from all over the world.

Annie Lennox, one of the nation's most internationally acclaimed singer-songwriters, will present her exhibition The House of Annie Lennox early next year. Curated in partnership with the V&A and the artist herself, it will be given pride of place on the ground floor from 23 March 2013. The exhibition focuses on the artist’s work over three decades, as an iconic performer, singer-songwriter, recording artist and political activist with an array of stunning photographs, iconic videos, and a dazzling selection of costumes taken from her personal archive.

The Robert Mapplethorpe Photography Gallery is the venue for two significant exhibitions of mid-20th century photography. Man Ray Portraits, presented in collaboration with the National Portrait Gallery in London, is the first major museum retrospective of the highly influential artist’s photographic portraits and features over 100 works from his career in America and Paris, dating from 1916 to 1968. It will feature portraits of lovers, friends and contemporaries, ranging from two of his most significant muses, Lee Miller and Kiki de Montparnasse, to fellow artists, Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali.

Viennese-born photographer Edith Tudor-Hart left Austria for Britain in 1933. Edith Tudor-Hart: In the Shadow of Tyranny will include remarkable black and white photographs that reflect the politically-charged atmosphere of interwar Vienna and Britain, along with Tudor-Hart’s later psychologically penetrating images of children, some of which were created in Scotland.

Glasgow-based contemporary artist, Ken Currie is regarded as one of the outstanding figurative painters of his generation. Currie is widely admired for his intensely powerful and provocative work, which includes his haunting, luminous painting Three Oncologists (2002) and the searing self-portrait Unfamiliar Reflection (2006). We will present an exhibition of previously unseen work by Currie. 

Scotland’s special contribution to the world of comedy will be celebrated in Tickling Jock: Comedy Greats from Sir Harry Lauder to Billy Connolly. The exhibition will bring together images of 50 stars including Lex McLean, John Laurie, Molly Weir, Rikki Fulton, Jack Milroy, Stanley Baxter, Johnny Beattie, Una Maclean and Ronnie Corbett.

Dress and fashion is at the heart of the Gallery’s events programme in 2013, though the fun starts early in December 2012 with Dressed to Thrill, a dynamic evening event in celebration of Scotland’s sartorial past. The Gallery will provide a portal to the 16th and 17th centuries for an evening of music, talks, interactive demonstrations and a historical catwalk show with commentary from one of Britain’s greatest costume designers, Jenny Tiramani.