Billy Connolly has returned with his 11th instalment of his ‘Born on a Rainy Day’ art collection for Castle Fine Art in Glasgow.
Fans of the Big Yin will find Connolly’s trademark winning personality shining through his artwork as they exude not only humour and itelligence, but a profound insight into the mind of the Glaswegian comedian, musician, writer, actor, and artist.
Castle Fine Art, across from the Gallery of Modern Art on Queen Street, is proud to publish Billy’s art - which is incredibly popular with art collectors in Glasgow for their insight into the Big Yin’s creative sense of humour and personal philosophy.
The four new limited edition pieces released by Billy are only avaliable from Castle 37 gallery’s, like the Glasgow branch on Queen Street, or online at the Castle Fine Art website.
Billy began his career as an artist with the first Born on a Rainy Day collection of drawings for Castle in 2102; he started drawing whilst on tour in Canada and picked up paper and pens in a Montreal art store after he’d tired of looking at the animals in the window of a local pet shop.
Billy said:“I’d never drawn in my life until this point, but I just started drawing weird islands and carried on drawing,”
“I asked my wife (Dr Pamela Stephenson-Connolly) to tell me if they were getting better and she said ‘definitely’.
“My manager sent them to the gallery, and now I make pictures and they’re lovely to me. And the fact that other people like them and want to live with them in their homes blows me sideways. To have somebody who wants a part of your mind in their life - I thought my wife had been the only one to fall for that, but it turns out that she’s not alone”.
The 4 pieces are:
- ‘Pontius Tries Pilates’,
- ‘One Armed Juggler’,
- ‘Nightmare’
- ‘Drunk Donkey’
You can watch Billy discuss the new artworks in this Youtube video - or you can check below for an HD look at the Big Yin’s new drawings up close!
1. Nightmare
“I have lots of nightmares. I never really remember them. But I’m famous for shouting in the night and singing and laughing; my daughter has seen me; I’ve never remembered it. And I was directing a play in my sleep. I was talking to the actors and then I would become the actors, singing songs.” Photo: Billy Connolly/Castle Fine Art
2. One-Armed Juggler
"He’s an example of the fact that most of the figures in my work are doing things that don't matter. Just doing the things they do, thinking they'll do you good - I've spent my life doing that. You see guys in their sixties out running in the evening and you think: "Get a chair. Get a chair and a bottle of beer and switch on the telly; who are you kidding?". But all my guys are doing that, they're trying to be part of it wherever 'it' is.” | Castle Fine Art
3. Pontius Tries Pilates
“I always wanted to give him a kind of keep-fit name and the idea suddenly came to me when my wife was going to the Pilates gym. I said it would be funny to call it Pontius Pilates, then I thought people would be offended by that, so I fiddled around and I got ‘Pontius Tries Pilates’. He's just a guy trying at the gym, trying his best. I don't understand the whole gymnasium culture, but he's he does and he's good. “I'm not that keen. I go to the gym, and I go to the massage parlour and do Tai Chi, but nothing changes my body. I keep hoping that one day I'll wake up and everything will work; I'll be slim and muscular. I think I can forget it!” | Billy Connolly/Castle Fine Art
4. Drunk Donkey
“I used to have two when I lived in Scotland. I just let them wander about the place eating the grass. They're lovely, they're friendly, they're like dogs. They cling to you, they've got a real tie to human beings. Donkeys are funny animals but it's an endearing kind of funny. Our donkeys used to escape over the wall of the garden, run down to the village and the villagers would bring them back. “Donkeys always look drunk and behave drunk. This one’s a friendly looking guy and I think he's been drunk a few times because he's got a beer belly on him. And he's got the drunk legs!” | Billy Connolly/Castle Fine Art