Thomas MacGregor

Thomas’ association with a well-known Edinburgh Comedy Club in the late nineties lead him into a body of iconic portraitures of comedians and various local faces of the time. He also taught drawing and painting as a lecturer in the Scottish Prison Service. The combination of these factors and his work needing to compete with the harsh lighting of a comedy club contributed to his stark and contrasting style.

In 2007, Thomas held a two-year residency in Cochabamba, Bolivia and regularly returns to show work. In 2018 whilst back In Cochabamba he was granted access to a Bolivian Parachute regiment to document and make a body of work.

Back in London when enrolled at Turps Art School’s studio programme, he developed this body of work into something completely different. The figure and Landscape remain but with an ambiguous and more immediate style which allows the work to materialise at a much faster rate.

He was able to draw on this for his appearances in Landscape Artist of the Year; you can see the soldiers featuring in his Dystopian rendering of the Barbican.