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Ripping it up and starting again

Pauline McLean | 21:20 UK time, Tuesday, 14 April 2009

Even the most optimistic onlooker would have been surprised to see singer Edwyn Collins back out conducting press interviews, just fours years after the double brain haemorrhage which almost killed him.

But earlier today, he was doing just that, his speech vastly improved since i last met him at the Tartan Clef awards just two months ago.

As if re-learning to speak and walk wasn't enough, he's already released an album (largely recorded before his stroke), has various gigs under his belt and a slot confirmed at this year's T in the Park.

But it's his art not his music that brings him to Glasgow this week.

A keen wildlife artist as a schoolboy - both parents were students at Edinburgh College of Art, his father is an artist as well as a lecturer - he returned to his hobby with a vengeance.

He set himself the task of creating a picture a day - "except on sundays," he says with a cheery grin - and the show in Glasgow's CCA documents the change from simple line drawings of birds to complex and colourful sketches of all kinds of wildlife.

It's already been seen in London's Smithfield Gallery, and requests for additional showings have come from as far afield as Turkey.

Collins is modestly dismissive of some of the earlier work, which he says is crude. But family and friends have persuaded him to leave it in, to charter the progress he's made over the last four years.

He makes it look deceptively easy but it's clearly been a long, slow journey.

Part of the challenge has been that the stroke removed him of all ability in his right hand.

I clumsily try and shake hands with him twice during our filming but he laughs it off, well used to the faux pas.

Much harder has been the task of retraining himself to draw with his left hand.

Guitar playing is more complex yet. He can form the chords but needs a friend to do the strumming.

But he's done it. And this exhibition is just the latest event in an extraordinary road to recovery which inspires way beyond the realms of any other art exhibition.

The only fly in the ointment - the frequent offers of work mean Edwyn's wife Grace's plans to retire to a quieter life in their family home in Caithness look less and less likely at the moment.

As for Edwyn, he has modest ambitions.

"To keep working, to keep enjoying life and to keep improving," he says.

I'm sure I'm not the only person rooting for him.

Comments

  • Comment number 1.

    Inspirational stuff. Saw Edwyn twice last year and can´t wait to see him at T in the Park in July where he´ll get a hero´s welcome.

  • Comment number 2.

    Truly inspirational. Whatever trivial elements go on within your life, you do have to look at the people who have real problems and the way they tackle adversity and take it in their stride. Good luck for the future Edwyn.

  • Comment number 3.

    As much as I congratulate him on his continuing recovery, and would not wish him ill; I fail to see what makes him a "talent" in the pop world. He cannot sing,his songs are really inept- I mean Rip It Up was possibly the most inane release ever with the possible exception of Brimful of Asha by Cornershop. Just another example of pop critics jumping on a trendy bandwagon and lauding minor talents as though they were The Beatles.

  • Comment number 4.

    Glad to see Edwyn is on the fast track to recovery. is albums are brilliant and I cant wait to get the next one, I have no idea what thehellhecould is on about!!! Must be the spice girls.

  • Comment number 5.


    Edwin is a hero to those with aphasia but we need to take the pressure off him and people like him to 'recover' and be cured. He's right just to want to enjoy life and improve but it's nobody's fault if he doesn't get back to how he was - he has 2 large permenant holes in his brain!

  • Comment number 6.

    To answer the nasty comment form "thehellhecould" above, I think "A Girl Like You" is probably one of the best pop songs ever written.

    Why do those with no talent feel so jealous of those who have?

  • Comment number 7.

    Great to hear Edwyn is still pushing forward, saw the documentary last year; an inspiration as others have said and the amazing recovery is a great tribute to him and his family.

    As for whether one likes specific songs that's just individual taste, I've liked some tracks and not others but I say the same about Beatles tracks, Beethoven, Miles, Django, whoever.

  • Comment number 8.

    So 'thehellhecould'. Despite Edwyn Colllins having a 25 year+ musical career spanning 10 albums, you've based your assessment on one commercial hit. Take your blinkers away from the top 40 and you'll discover there is a whole different world of music out there.

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