Open Eye Gallery

Alberto Morrocco: Drawing on Life

12 August – 4 September 2013

This exhibition of works by Alberto Morrocco OBE (1917 - 1998) spans the artist’s entire career, from early student drawings and sculptures to paintings and graphics produced in his final years. 

Many of the works included are being shown for the first time in public. Ranging from classical studies to abstract composition and from landscapes to portraiture, the exhibition helps to illustrate Morrocco’s influence on artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Quality of line and meticulous draughtsmanship were fundamental to his approach throughout his life and this exhibition highlights the importance that observational drawing continues to play in stimulating and facilitating the development of contemporary artists and makers.

Morrocco was born in Aberdeen in 1917, the son of Italian immigrants. At the young age of 14 he gained entrance to Gray’s School of Art and travelled in Europe after graduating. Most of his professional life was spent as Head of Painting at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art in Dundee where he maintained a nostalgic approach to art education with emphasis on technique and practice. His belief in the preservation of conventional teaching methods provided motivation for his own work in which his still lifes and portraits can be interpreted as laments for a lost tradition.

Mon–Fri, 10am–6pm

Sat, 10am–4pm 

Free admission