Marian Leven RSA RSW
Artist Statement
My painting is concerned with Scottish landscape and seascape, an expression of harmony, balance and emotional interaction I experience through remembered, mythical and historic associations. The land, sea and weather absorb me. Images for my paintings are collected in the landscape and in the studio the recollection moves into interpretation and metaphor.
My painting allows me to respond to this environment in the knowledge that I am part of a long history of people shaped by these conditions.
I work in two coastal studios. One looks east to the North Sea and the other west to the Atlantic. I am secure inside these boundaries but look beyond one or the other, looking to the horizon every day.
Selected c.v.
1962-66 Gray’s School of Art, Aberdeen
1966-67 Moray House College of Education, Edinburgh
1993 Elected member of The Royal Scottish Society of Painters Watercolour
2004 Elected Associate of The Royal Scottish Academy
2008 Elected Academician of The Royal Scottish Academy
Exhibitions include
2026 Living Colour RSA 200, St. Andrews Museum, Touring Exhibition curated by Kirkcaldy Art Gallery
2026 Origen Stories. Royal Scottish Academy
2026 Modern Miniatures RSA
2025 Christmas Show. RSA
2020 Landscape and Memory, Koel Gallery, Karachi, Pakistan
2020 21st Century Women, Backdoor Gallery, Clydebank Museum
2020 Anniversary Exhibition, Gallery Heinzel, Aberdeen
2020 Archipelago, Academicians Gallery, RSA
2019 Sommer Gaste, Galerie Herold, Hamburg, Germany
2019 Mixed Exhibition Galerie Herold Contemporary, Sylt, Germany
2018 Coastal Enigmas, Art at the Ceilidh Place, Ullapool
2018 Northern Women Artists, Galerie Herold, Sylt, Germany
2018 Ages of Wonder, RSA, Edinburgh
2014 Invited Artist, Pittenweem Art Festival
Public Sculpture
Collaborations with Will Maclean
Waterlines, University of Aberdeen.
An Suileachan, Isle of Lewis
Iolaire Memorial, Isle of Lewis
Na Dorsan, Isle of Lewis.
Lorg na Coigich, Acheninver
Awards include
2025 Na Dorsan, Galson, Isle of Lewis. The Marsh Award for Excellence in Public Sculpture. Marian Leven and will Maclean.
2004 RSW Council Award
1997 Winner, Noble Grossart, Scotland on Sunday Painting Prize
Collections include
Universities of Dundee, Aberdeen, St. Andrews and Stirling.
Demarco European Foundation
Kirkcaldy Museum and Art Gallery
Lillie Art Gallery
