ARTIST Jack Vettriano has taken a break from painting to complete his new home in Edinburgh.
The 62-year-old moved back to the capital earlier this year after becoming "fed up" living in London, where he lived and painted in one room.
He said visitors had to "suffer the indignity of smelling turpentine" in his London abode, but his house in the Scottish capital is more spacious.
Vettriano said that once he has perfected it he will paint again.
He said: "I moved back to Edinburgh five months ago. I just got fed up with London, and being one of ten million people.
"Edinburgh is a gorgeous city to live in.
"I haven't looked around the scenery with a point of view of painting it. But what Edinburgh does give me, and what I didn't have in London, was in London I used to paint and live in one room. That was all I could afford because I lived in a very expensive part of London.
"Now I've got a huge studio and I love it because I've got space.
"It allows me to have people come to my home and not have to suffer the indignity of smelling turpentine. It kills their perfume."
Vettriano, who was brought up in Methil, Fife, rose from working in the coalfields to become one of Britain's best-known contemporary artists. In 2004 his most famous painting, The Singing Butler, fetched £744,800 at auction. A recent retrospective exhibition at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow was the attraction's most successful ever special exhibition, attracting more than 123,000 visitors in its 23-week run.
He added: "I was astonished by it. It took almost three years in the organisation and I always promised myself I would have some kind of break afterwards.
"But moving to Edinburgh has not been without its difficulties because when it comes to a new house I can't leave things unfinished. I've got to get it finished.
"I'm trying to find things that will finish it. When it's finished I'll paint."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article