Mhairi McGregor RSWScotland and Italy

I had longed to go back to Italy ever since winning the RSA’s John Kinross scholarship as a student and living in Florence. It was wonderful, but I was younger and car-free and there was so much I never saw as a result. Outside of the city, I saw brief snapshots of inviting landscapes through bus windows, but I could rarely stop in the right place. Later, on a trip to Venice, there were yet more landscapes through the windows of the Orient Express, but I couldn’t get the driver to stop then either! This was my chance to go back and be in control of when and where I stopped. Scotland, though, is my first and greatest love and, when the light is right, there’s nowhere else I’d rather paint.