Caroline is an artist based in Maybole. Although originating from Art College in Yorkshire, her future should have been as a Graphic Designer, but a restless soul took her away from that and into various other avenues of work whilst always gravitating back to her art, working on commissions and exhibiting.
Over the last three years, Caroline has had the privilege of helping adults gain self-esteem, confidence, and skills in painting. Her workshops are called "Everyone CAN Paint" and some students are now exhibiting and selling their own art work.
The West Coast of Scotland is a favourite place to paint, and Ailsa Craig appears quite often in Caroline's work.
Caroline's studio is within The Smiddy Gallery at Culzean.
In her youth, Barbara enjoyed painting. It is only in the last seven years that she has started developing her work seriously.
Having enjoyed almost 40 years of rural life in Carrick, her lifelong love of the countryside directs her focus. The natural world provides her with an endless supply of inspiration.
Her work started in acrylics and move on to include pastels. Her subjects include flowers, birds, animals, and landscapes.
She now paints in her sunroom which has become her happy place.
Louise McBride is an artist from Ayr who predominantly works in soft pastel, creating colourful landscape paintings which are often inspired by the area around the Ayrshire coast and particularly, its dramatic skies. She also enjoys using graphite, charcoal and pastel pencils to create her work.
Louise originally studied Visual Communication at Glasgow School of Art before a meandering path led her back to fine art. She is a self taught pastelist after discovering a passion for the medium, which began with oil pastels, several years ago.
Louise enjoys creating a broad spectrum of commissioned art work, including portraiture which has become another passion in recent years. Overall she hopes that her joy in capturing the wonderful light, colours and textures of nature is conveyed through her art for others to share.
Roy's love affair with clay started back in 1990, when he took night classes held by Auckland Studio Potters in New Zealand.
Working primarily as a thrower, he enjoys exploring vessels in all forms along with all ceramic processes.
Roy studied for a Diploma in Ceramic Art through Otago School of Art and developed an interest in low-fired burnished clay techniques and the use of Terra Sigilatta.
Since returning to Scotland, Roy has been inspired by the wonderful Ayrshire coastline and the River Clyde, where his father, uncles and grandfathers worked to help shape an industrial Scotland.
He finds the juxtaposition of a relatively industrialised area being set amongst the background of the natural beauty of the West of Scotland fascinating and feels drawn to represent that in his work.
Linda lives on the coast in a beautiful part of the Carrick area. She has stunning views across the sea to the Isle of Arran, which inspire much of her work.
Having no formal training in art, apart from gaining a "Higher Grade Art" certificate in secondary school, she has the joy of creating work with few boundaries or expectations. She now experiences the joy of painting again, after a career completely outwith the artistic field.
Linda's original paintings are in oil, pastels or watercolours, and usually always vibrant. From these Linda has a collection of quality prints, canvases, keepsake items and printed cards.
A passion for Culzean she has had from childhood, having visited many times as a youngster and then with her own family, Linda hopes you may be able to visit this wonderful place in the future and enjoy the spectacular scenery and feel the magical atmosphere - it is truly stunning!
Elspeth is mainly a self-taught artist with a passion for animals and nature. She has been drawing all her life and, after receiving many requests to draw or paint pets and horses for people, she decided to turn her hobby into a career and became a full-time artist in 2015.
Elspeth has had a lifetime connection to Culzean, having grown up in the nearby village of Kirkoswald. She worked at Culzean as a guide in the castle in her late teens and then returned to take on the co-running of the Coach House Gallery in the Clock Tower Courtyard opposite the castle in 2015.
In 2020, Elspeth helped to set up C.O.A.S.T. Gallery in Troon along with another artist and a local framer. Elspeth's studio is at Souter Johnnie's Cottage in Kirkoswald.
Angus works with fused glass to create intricate designs and abstract patterns.
His work incorporates contrast and complex detail that he weaves into his pieces. Designing with a contemporary flair, he brings his own unique perspective to each piece. Balancing blocks of colour to form a base, in juxtaposition with contrasting and often delicately fused accents, Angus is inspired by the world around him, warping into a colourful, complex and radiant form in his glasswork.
Privileged to have won the Prince's Trust Enterprise 'Determined to Succeed' award, Angus has represented Ayrshire young entrepreneurs on more than one occasion.
Gillian studied Jewellery Design and Manufacture and has always looked at her surroundings to take inspiration from the natural world around her, being fascinated by textures and shapes which are unusual and tactile.
Much of the work she produces is within the world of “fold forming”, or forging, where each piece of jewellery is individually made by hand, flame and hammer from a flat piece of metal, resulting in unique three-dimensional shapes which are biomorphic in appearance. She likes to think of these 3-dimensional pieces as mini sculptures to be worn.
A second area of design arises through the corrugation of metal on a small scale. The resulting effects also imitate nature and can be construed as ripples on the sand or the bark of a tree. The sheet metal is then cut by hand and the pieces used as jewellery components.
Gillian enjoys producing jewellery pieces for exhibitions and her work is often seen around the United Kingdom. She is a member of Visual Arts Scotland and The Association for Contemporary Jewellery, and her full Artist’s Statement and Biography can be found on their websites.
From Lockerbie, Dumfriesshire, Merlin has enjoyed a varied professional career since graduating in 1980 with a 1st class B.A. Hons in Theatre Design. Painting scenery and making trick panto props for Jimmy Logan led to seven years as Prop-Maker/Scenic Artist with the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, allowing the opportunity to also work on many West End, Film and TV productions, culminating in 5 years as Props consultant on 'Les Mis' for Cameron Mackintosh.
Merlin has held many exhibtions around the UK, including at the Edinburgh Festival, as well as South America, displaying a keen observation of people through travels in Brazil, India, Nepal and Thailand, while more playful portraits and character studies were displayed in the Traverse Theare, complementing in the International Children's Festival and the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh.
"My personal style is varied and eclectic, from illustrative sketches, simple portraiture in oils, humourous pen & ink character studies to sculptural structures and graphic stories".
Returning to Scotland to settle in the wee village of Barr in Carrick 20 years ago, Merlin built up a studio and created the "Barr Wee Gallery" to showcase local artists, forming one of the key destinations for the Carrick Art Trail.
Merlin's multiplicity of skills and wide-ranging experience has proven a key asset in utilising versatile and practical props skills and diverse materials to provide creative residencies, workshops, and community engagement projects across Scotland and is currently passing on years of experience working as a Props tutor at the Royal Conservatoire, Scotland.
Andrew has been a life-long creative and has enjoyed expressing himself through a wind range of media, including but not limited to; book-binding, printing, digital art, water colours, multi-media collage, jewellery making, macrame, paper mâché, festival décor, music and writing.
He bought his first glass kiln around 2009 and feels that with glass he has found his creative home.
Completely self-taught, he originally experimented with bottles and art glass before settling on using recycled windows as the material for the bulk of his work. Used double glazing panels are non-recyclable, Andrew likes to intercept them on their way to the landfill and turn them into useful and decorative items.
The prospect of total calamity is never far away when working with glass, something that Andrew finds quite exciting. He enjoys taking a very rigid material and trying to imbue it with softer, more organic shapes and patterns.
In his studio, glass artist Duncan Stewart combines heat, gravity, and time (and glass) to create his pieces of kiln-formed (fused) glass.
Whether working with ordinary "float" glass, or specialist art glass, Duncan enjoys experimenting with new designs and techniques, and looks forward to opening the kiln after a "firing": "It's like Christmas morning".
A founder member of the Carrick Artists Collective, in 2024 Duncan relocated to Torquay in Devon. But he still supplies the Smiddy Gallery with his Ailsa Craig Suncatchers.