Staff ready to welcome visitors back to Kirkcaldy Galleries

The library, museum, art gallery, local and family history room are now accessible to the public for the first time in over four months and a sense of normality has finally been able to return to services.

However, it won’t be business as usual for the time being as there will be distancing measures and other processes in place, including booking timeslots to visit the Galleries and one-hour appointments for Local Studies.

Gavin Grant, service development team leader (collections) and Sara Kelly, local studies officer, spoke to the Press about what Fifers can now expect.

Gavin said the staff have been kept busy during lockdown: “We have been very busy doing a lot of digital work online to try and make the collections and services we have available in other ways,” he said.

“We have been putting online images from archives, libraries and museum collections as well as paintings, documents and objects of interest and it has had a great response from people.

“A lot of work has been going on behind the scenes to prepare for re-opening again. We have also done a project on the lockdown itself to try and gather people’s responses, images they have taken and diaries people have been writing. It is called Fife in Lockdown and we have been collecting things for it now rather than wait until future years so it is easier.

“At some point down the line we will have an exhibition but it’s really just about starting to build an archive.”

He said staff are delighted to welcome people back: “We have safety measures in place along with a booking system - people can book an hour slot for their visit online for free as we have to control the numbers so people can come and enjoy the exhibitions in a safe way.”

He also revealed just what people will be able to see during their visit: “In terms of the museum we have the fantastic art collection on the first floor. We have works by William McTaggart; highlights from the Scottish Colourists for example we have the best collection in the world of Samuel Peploe’s paintings and some of them are on display; in the third room is a contemporary art exhibition with some paintings by Fife artists.

“And in the final art gallery we have paintings to do with Fife. Here we have a painting called ‘Satan Watching the Sleep of Christ’ by Dunfermline artist

Joseph Noel Paton and this is also where one of our most popular paintings is - Spring Moonlight by John Henry Lorimer which is a beautiful interior painting of Kellie Castle and shows a mother with her baby dancing across a moonlit wooden floor.

"It is a great chance for people to see their old favourites and also for new visitors to come along and see what we have got.

“While on the ground floor we have our Moments in Time exhibition showing highlights from Kirkcaldy’s history looking at linoleum, coal mining, Adam Smith, Raith Rovers and the Links Market.”

Visitors will also be able to see a family friendly exhibition all about gardening called Blooming Marvellous from September 12. There will be paintings, objects and new interactives which have been developed safely for the display which will run until February and can be booked to visit.

Meanwhile, Sara said a team in Local Studies has been busy making amounts of content available online, particularly the Galleries’ collection of local photographs from across Fife on Flickr.

She said: “We have been digitising our photograph collections that has been used on our Facebook page and we have created a Flickr page which allows people to go in and search photos by locality. So if you are looking for Kirkcaldy, Dysart or Pathhead you can click on an album and find a small number of old photographs from the 1890s onwards from these areas.

“We have also had great success with our On at Fife Archives Facebook page during lockdown, it has been really popular and we have had photographs with different themes. Last week it was the World of Work and this week it is Kids at School, keeping abreast of relevant topics.”

Visitors to Local Studies can also take advantage of a free, personalised service as there will be one member of staff available to them for the hour they are doing research, whether it is on their family or their house.

Sara said: “People can research their local history, family history or the history of their house but the service is limited as they will only have an hour at a time.

"We have staff who are really skilled at research including finding out who has lived in your house, dating back to the first cenusus in 1841 as well as other ways of looking even further back than that.”

She added: “House histories is fairly new but becoming increasingly popular.”

To book a visit to Kirkcaldy Galleries visit: https://www.onfife.com/venues/kirkcaldy-galleries

Thank you for reading this story on our website. While I have your attention, I also have an important request to make of you.

In order for us to continue to provide high quality and trusted local news on this free-to-read site, I am asking you to also please purchase a copy of our newspapers - the Fife Free Press, Fife Herald, St Andrews Citizen and East Fife Mail.

Our journalists are highly trained and our content is independently regulated by IPSO to some of the highest standards in the world. The dramatic events of 2020 are having a major impact on many of our local valued advertisers and consequently the advertising that we receive. We are now more reliant than ever on you helping us to provide you with news by buying a copy of our newspaper.

Thank you

Allan Crow, Editor, Fife Free Press