YES
Ian Rankin, author: “Here’s the man I know: serious yet playful,
warm-hearted yet mysterious, open-minded but never forgetting his roots.”
Peter Howson, artist: “If Tracey Emin, Martin Creed and Damien Hirst can get into the Tate, then Jack Vettriano deserves to be in national collections. I think the elite really have a fear of him.”
Sir Jackie Stewart, racing driver: “Jack Vettriano is an important Scottish artist, who is recognised around the world. It was a great honour to be painted by him.”
NO
Professor Duncan Macmillan, art expert: “Dim erotica.”
Sandy Moffat, former head of painting at Glasgow School of Art: “Badly conceived soft porn.”
Richard Calvocoressi, former head of the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art: “I’d be more than happy to say that we think him an indifferent painter and that he is very low down our list of priorities (whether or not we can afford his work)”: in an internal e-mail, published in The Herald after a Freedom of Information inquiry.
