This print was created in conjunction with the Glasgow Print Studio 50th Anniversary Here & Now Legacy Project. "My grandmother lived two blocks from ‘the Art Galleries’, and this print is a combination of my associated memories of growing up with the Kelvingrove Museum on my doorstep."

"The surrogacy the building provided during my early life - an infant rainy day babysitter, childhood summer holidays with siblings & cousins, and the obligatory affected teenage posturing. The memories of the objects (and infamous smell) held within, its nooks & crannies, and the relationships I formed with various displays and paintings."

"I was always aware of the romanticism of the building, and while it would be a long time before I understood the importance of the collection, I felt lucky that it was ‘ours’. My earliest inspiration was the Spring/Winter wildlife Diorama, the pure magic of the animals inhabiting two landscapes entranced me and I made a beeline for it on every visit."

"It wasn’t until I started to work within the museum, delivering public events that I was privy to the basement space where the ‘mounted specimens’ used to be stored, and my childhood fascination with giving voice to dolls & puppets immediately expanded to these inanimate characters."

"Since that discovery I have worked with museum staff to create my own archive of images, developing an ongoing relationship with the exhibits and the building, which continuously inform my paintings & prints."

Diane Dawson was born in Glasgow in 1963, she studied Art & Design to HND level, which was then followed by a long public career in Arts Management. She went on to study Fine Art Painting & Printmaking at Glasgow School of Art, graduating in 2010, where she was the recipient of a Glasgow Print Studio prize and she has maintained membership since then.

Storytelling is at the heart of her work, articulating real and imagined scenarios, to cast a light on human behavior. Specifically, using our personal territory as a starting point, and examining how, as individuals we are assigned roles determined by our environments.

Urban architecture, particularly social housing and public spaces, play a strong part in her exploration of the links between habitat and behavior. She repeatedly uses animals, benign personas and celebratory motifs, to describe stories from human society. By consciously employing characters which are often out of place, intruding or excluded, she can address themes, which are at times unsettling.

Familiar habitats and animals as character actors, allow audiences to engage with her storytelling and relate to it through their own personal responses.