Perception of Light by Eilidh Thomson

Moray School of Art staff have organised this exhibition of work in memory of the late Eilidh Thomson, a recent graduate of the school who sadly passed away last Summer. Eilidh Thomson’s exhibition Perception of Light is open to the public from Tuesday 21st – Thursday 30th April (10am-6pm Mon-Thurs and 10am-5pm Fri, closed Sat 25th & Sun 26th April).

This exhibition has been organised to by the staff at the school to pay tribute to Eilidh’s many professional and creative achievements. The show also enables the wider community to remember Eilidh and to actively celebrate her life through the appreciation of her wonderful photographs. Some of the work in the exhibition is from the period around Eilidh's degree show in 2009 and includes work selected for the Society of Scottish Artists' annual show in Edinburgh. Eilidh was selected to participate in this exhibition two years in a row (2010 and 2011) an achievement of which she was rightly proud. Eilidh also showed her work in other locations in Scotland including Inverness Museum and Art Gallery, Bridge View Gallery Aberdeen, St Fergus Gallery Wick, and The Swanson Gallery Thurso with her first solo show being held in the Moray Art Centre in Findhorn.  We have also selected some more recent work for display in the exhibition and the school is very grateful to Leona Stafford at Jessops Inverness for providing the printing service to support the show.  These images include photographs that Eilidh shot of St Magnus Cathedral Kirkwall, the island of Hoy and the coastline of Moray. They are examples of her work using the digital technique of tone mapping which creatively enhances the saturation of colour within the image. Eilidh was working on many of these images in the period immediately preceding her untimely death in July 2014.

Eilidh was not only a keen photographer she was also passionate about the technical aspects of the medium which enabled her to gain employment with Jessops in Inverness, the UK’s leading photographic retailer. She quickly became a valued member of the team, progressing from Sales to Team Leader and on to Store Manager, leading the Inverness branch to Jessops Store of the Year. Eilidh herself won the accolade of Store Manager of the Year in 2012 and the fact that Jessops have now renamed this award to The Eilidh Thomson Manager of the Year Award is testament to just how highly she was valued by the company. Eilidh also inspired others through teaching at the Jessops Academy and through workshops in photography which she ran at Moray Art Centre and the Elgin Youth Cafe.

Dr Gina Wall, Curriculum Leader at Moray School of Art said: ‘Eilidh was completely dedicated to photography, it was her passion and her profession and it is particularly fitting to remember her through an exhibition of her photographs. Eilidh was a talented photographer and a very special young woman who was loved by the staff at Moray School of Art.’