One of the biggest jobs in Scottish culture is up for grabs.
Creative Scotland has started the search for a new figurehead after chief executive Iain Munro decided to step down from the role, which comes with a salary of more than £110,000.
Iain Munro has worked for the Scottish Government agency and its predecessor, the Scottish Arts Council, for 30 years.
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He is the third chief executive to lead Creative Scotland since it was launched by the government in 2010 following a merger of the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen.
Creative Scotland chair Robert Wilson said it had already started the recruitment process for Mr Munro’s replacement, adding: “We look forward to a high level of interest in an opportunity of such significance.”
Creative Scotland’s chief executive for the last eight years, Mr Munro led the arts agency through the Covid pandemic.
He was a key advocate for the Scottish Government to increase funding for culture to head off mounting financial problems for festivals, venues and organisations.
Ministers first pledged to roll out £100m worth of new investment in October 2023, with Creative Scotland securing an additional £40m for its long-term funding programme.
However Creative Scotland was hit by funding delays or cuts several times in recent years, despite repeated warnings from Mr Munro about the risk of organisations collapsing.
The Scottish Government ordered an independent review of Creative Scotland in September 2024, weeks after the arts agency was forced to close its “open fund” for artists due to uncertainty over its government funding.
The review, by former local authority chief executive Angela Leitch, called for the arts agency to demonstrate "greater ambition and aspiration", and have a "greater appetite for risk".
Her report suggested that the handling of funding applications was curbing "innovation and creative risk, and stifling Scotland’s creativity over the long term".
It also highlighted how many applicants for Creative Scotland funding were said to have suffered a "negative impact on their mental health" and "burnout".
A statement announcing Mr Munro’s departure said: “From starting out with the Scottish Arts Council in 1996, Iain was central to the launch of National Lottery funding for culture in Scotland and to the delivery of capital funding for countless award-winning projects across the country, as well as later leading the teams which delivered the Scotland-wide cultural programmes for the London 2012 Olympics and Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games.
“Following the establishment of Creative Scotland, Iain served as deputy chief executive, interim chief executive and then chief executive, representing the organisation across the UK and around the world.
“He was integral to establishing and growing the success of Screen Scotland, the successful introduction of multi-year funding for cultural organisations that has transformed the landscape of support across the country, and has been at the heart of securing the biggest budgets from the Scottish Government for culture that Creative Scotland has ever seen.”
Mr Wilson said: “Iain has been a tireless champion of Scotland’s culture and creativity for thirty years and his positive contribution to the sector, and to public life more broadly, has been immeasurable. We are all thankful to him for everything that he has achieved.”
Culture secretary Màiri McAllan said: “I am grateful to Iain for more than 30 years of dedication and hard work to Scotland’s culture and creative sector.
"That was never better demonstrated than the role he played in supporting Scotland’s creative industries through the COVID pandemic.
”I thank him for his service to public life and wish him all the best for the future.”
