The Junor Gallery

21/12/2024

The prettiest tree ....
Warmest best wishes on the Winter Solstice
for a peaceful, happy Christmas

10/10/2024

An announcement - Iyad Hayatleh reading his poem 'Children of Gaza' at .palsoc in St Andrews is now up on my YouTube channel. A great poem, in the artistic tradition of Guernica.

Who else but the poets of Palestine can attempt to encompass in words the magnitude of what's happening in Gaza now, and for past generations....

My thanks to everyone .palsoc for their warm welcome on the night, to Faris, and most especially to the two poets who read.

To view, put 'Junor Gallery youtube ' into your favourite search engine.

03/10/2024

Happy National Poetry Day!

These nautical flags spell POETRY - and were donated to the Scottish Fisheries Museum on Friday by Jean Johnstone and on behalf of her late husband, Brian, who was one of the co-founders of StAnza, St Andrews' annual international Poetry Festival.





Poetry Day

27/09/2024

Sometimes a poem is a prayer. This is Iyad Hayatleh, one of Scotland's finest poets, reading The Children of Gaza.

Full reading soon to be available on my YouTube channel

19/09/2024

Very saddened to learn of Norman Ackroyd's passing.
Sending my heartfelt condolences to his family and friends.

15/09/2024

Roman glass beads - seemed fitting to find these on UK publication day of 's terrific new novel, The Glass Maker

5. Roman Glass Melon Beads heavily worn, indicating long use
6.Fragments of 5 Glass Bangles, Roman
Perth Museum, Scotland

10/09/2024

This young person's confident there's no 'right' or'wrong' when looking at art - I hope he never loses that confidence . . . . He's writing about Cowie's portrait group shared in my last post.

09/09/2024

This is James Cowie's 'A Portrait Group' , a favourite in the gorgeous new Scottish Galleries in the National Gallery

11/07/2024

This is artist Sarah Longley with her Dad, poet Michael Longley. And this post is to alert you to a series of interviews with poet Michael Longley on BBC Sounds ...put BBC Radio 3 The Essay into your favourite search engine and be inspired by this voice of long experience in writing poetry. Another episode tonight.
Sarah's father celebrates his 85th birthday on 27th July this year.
Here they're pictured in my Gallery in St Andrews in 2019, when I was so pleased to exhibit a solo show of Sarah's great artwork. Her mother, renowned literary critic Edna Longley, and father attended the opening as well as Sarah's own family.
See my website in bio for more of Sarah's work.

04/07/2024

18/06/2024

'[Kirkwall] has many fine old buildings, one of them a jewel of great price: Saint Magnus Cathedral. It is beautiful, in spite of a clutter of plaques and memorials - the Victorians worshipped themselves in Orkney too. It stands in the centre of the Islands, splashed with the red of martyrdom, and the years and the generations fall behind it. ...' - George Mackay Brown, in An Orkney Tapestry (Birlinn ed.)

I wonder what GMB would have thought of this modest plaque behind the altar of the Cathedral. I hope he wouldn't be too alarmed. There's one to Margaret Tait too. I'm glad they're there.

15/06/2024

was a medical doctor, short story writer, founder of , poet.
How good it was to come across this plaque on Broad Street, Kirkwall....There's another on Rose Street Edinburgh, where she used to show her films


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