New showcases for Scottish art send flagship gallery's visitor numbers soaring above two million

More than two million visitors have flocked to Scotland's flagship art gallery since a £38.6m revamp to give more prominence to Scottish work was unveiled a year ago.

Visitor numbers to the Scottish National Gallery are said to have soared by almost a quarter since work began on new exhibition spaces overlooking Edinburgh's Princes Street Gardens.

And the revamp is expected to see the Scottish National Gallery rival Edinburgh Castle and the National Museum of Scotland for visitor numbers by the end of this year.

More than 900,000 visitors are said to have viewed some of Scotland's most important art treasures since they were given more prominence at the historic attraction a year ago.

The figure is around three times higher than the number of visitors to the previous home of the Scottish collections at the site at The Mound, which is run by the National Galleries of Scotland.

The project has more than doubled the amount of space dedicated to Scottish artists and has allowed some work to go on public display for the first time.

It took nearly five years to create the 12 new exhibition spaces, which feature more than 130 works drawn from across 150 years of Scottish art history.

Described as one of the most complex engineering projects carried out within a heritage building in Scotland, the revamp involved extensive excavation of the original gallery building, which dates back to 1959, as well as the transformation of new spaces created when it was extended in the 1970s.

The new exhibition spaces, which focus on paintings, drawings and early photographs and prints created between 1800 and 1945, have given much more prominence given to Scottish artists like William McTaggart, Anne Redpath, Phoebe Anna Traquair, William Dyce and Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

The Scottish National Gallery was already the business art gallery in the UK outside of London before the overhaul was carried out, regularly attracting more than 1.5 million visitors a year. 

However less than a fifth of visitors to the attraction were said to make it to the Scottish collections, which were previously on display in windowless basement areas.

In the final 12 months before work began on the project in the autumn of 2018, the Scottish National Gallery attracted nearly 1.65 million visitors.

However the National Galleries of Scotland has revealed that just over two million visitors have been recorded over the last 12 months.

Its research found that 95 per cent of visitors to the new galleries said they had learned more about Scottish art, while 96 per cent felt that Scottish art was being presented in “an accessible and engaging way.”

Anne Lyden, director-general of the National Galleries of Scotland, said: “We’re excited to celebrate the one-year anniversary of the new Scottish galleries, after what was an incredible first year.

“Having transformed the visitor experience we welcomed more people than ever to explore the world’s greatest collection of Scottish art.

“We set out to create an accessible gallery which proudly showcases 150 years of Scottish art in all its richness and depth and puts the visitor at the centre.

“We are delighted that the galleries have been so well received and we have achieved what we set out to do, offering our visitors the best free experience possible in the heart of our nation’s capital.

“These galleries belong to the people of Scotland and we want to ensure everyone knows they are here for them.”

Dr Patricia Allerston, chief curator of European and Scottish Art, added: “We’ve been absolutely humbled by the public’s overwhelmingly positive response to the new Scottish galleries at the National.

“Scottish and local visitors alike have taken ownership of them, while tourists visiting from outside Scotland are enjoying discovering them.

“We aimed from the start to create a visitor-centred, accessible museum experience that celebrates the fantastically rich national collection of Scottish art and reinvigorates this rather grand Victorian building at the heart of Edinburgh.

“We are incredibly proud that visitors think we have achieved this.”