Artist profile

Norman McBeath lives in Edinburgh and is a photographer and printmaker, specialising in photogravures.

As well as his own work he draws inspiration from creative collaborations with other disciplines - particularly poets and writers.  These collaborations have led to exhibitions, illustrated books and limited edition artists' books.  When text and image are paired the relationship between them is not about simple illustration or description but more to do with deeper connections, opening up new potential for the imagination. The poet Paul Muldoon described him as having ‘that rare ability to allow nothing, least of all himself, to come between the subject of a photograph and the perceiver’. McBeath likes to reveal what is already there to be seen.

Collections which hold his work include the British Library; National Library of Scotland; National Portrait Gallery; Scottish National Portrait Gallery; the British Council; Harvard University and Yale Center for British Art.