Perth Museum and Art Gallery has added to its award-winning collection in recent months, with assistance from The Art Fund and The National Fund for Acquisitions.

The Art Fund, the UK’s leading independent art charity, has supported the acquisitions with a total of £6,000 towards three new purchases.

The first of these sees a fitting return to Perth for a unique vase by Vincent Ysart. The Perth-based Ysart family had a huge impact on the production of art glass in Scotland and their Monart and Vasart glass has inspired future generations of Scottish art glass as well as individual makers. The vase, which was made as a birthday gift for his wife during the 1950’s, is currently taking pride of place in the museum’s permanent display of Perth glass.

The other two works join the collection of over 4,000 examples of Fine Art at the Museum.

‘Bike Perch’ by Derrick Guild featured last year in Guild’s Festival of the Arts exhibition ‘Picnic Hamper for Heaven’. One of the most striking pieces from that show, it depicts a variety of beautifully painted bird life perched upon a bicycle.

Derrick’s childhood in Perth in the 1960s and 70s was marked by his regular visits to the museum and art gallery in George Street, where he believes that early exposure to art, natural history and historical artefacts entered his subconscious and still to this day subliminally inspires his work. The artist considers Bike Perch to be his most important painting to date and made a generous reduction in the asking price in order that it might be secured for the public museum and art gallery in his home town.

Thomas Duncan’s Sketch for The Entrance of Prince Charles Edward Stuart to Edinburgh after the Battle of Prestonpans is a preparatory study painted around 1838 for the artist’s major painting Prince Charles Edward Stuart and the Highlanders entering Edinburgh on the Morning after the Battle of Prestonpans. The sketch is one of a number of studies which Duncan is known to have executed for this most ambitious painting.

Thomas Duncan (1807-1845) was born in Kinclaven, Perthshire. He attended Perth Academy where his friendship with fellow painter D O Hill (1800-70) was first nurtured. He became Master of the School of Colour and subsequently Master of the Academy in 1844. He was a founder member of the Scottish Academy and also exhibited with The Royal Academy in London. Outwith the collections of the National Galleries of Scotland, Perth Museum & Art Gallery has the largest and most important holding of the work of Thomas Duncan.

David Barrie, Director of The Art Fund, said: “Ysart’s striking vase was blown at a glassworks in central Perth during the 1950s, and both Duncan and Guild were born locally. These three works each demonstrate great technical and artistic skill, and I am very pleased The Art Fund has ensured they now have a home in Perth Museum and Art Gallery’s permanent collection.”

These purchases were also made possible thanks to assistance from The National Fund for Acquisitions administered with Government funds by the National Museums of Scotland. Both paintings will feature in future exhibitions at Perth Museum and Art Gallery.

Perth Museum and Art Gallery in George Street is open Mon – Sat, 10am until 5pm, with special summertime opening on Sundays from 1.30pm until 4pm until September. Admission is free. For further information please contact 01738 632488 or www.pkc.gov.uk/museums