Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum is an institution based in Stirling, Central Scotland, dedicated to the promotion of cultural and historical heritage and the arts, from a local scale to nationally and beyond. The Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum – formerly The Smith Institute – has played a very special part in the history of Stirling since its foundation in 1874. Established by the bequest of artist Thomas Stuart Smith (1815–1869) on land supplied by the Burgh of Stirling, it is an historic public-private partnership which has continued to the present day. It was founded as a gallery of mainly contemporary art, with museum and library reading room ‘for the benefit of the inhabitants of Stirling, Dunblane and Kinbuck’.
When the writer and former suffragette Eunice Murray made her impassioned plea for Scottish folk museums, it was in the wake of the Second World War. She saw the establishment of museums as an essential feature of a peaceful and civilised society, and being familiar with Continental folk museums, regretted their absence in Scotland. At this time, the Smith Institute was already 70 years old and had a large collection of folk life material relating to lighting, heating, cooking, spinning and weaving, agriculture and Stirling life in times past. Its use as a billet for troops in both World Wars curtailed its potential and kept it closed, in the latter instance, until 1948. The rest of the twentieth century was spent in repairing the damage and recovering from the war, and none of the other rural communities to whom Eunice Murray was appealing found the resources to set up additional museums. Otherwise, Stirlingshire might well have had museums in Aberfoyle, Bannockburn, Callendar, Cowie, Doune, Dunmore, Fallin, Gargunnock, Killearn, Killin, Kippen, Plean, St . Ninians and Thornhill. The circumstances were right in Dunblane, where the museum was established in 1943.
Thomas Stuart Smith (1815-1869). Thomas Stuart Smith's uncle supplied funding so that he could travel and paint in Italy starting in 1840. By the end of that decade he was having his work accepted by both the Salon des Beaux Arts in Paris and the Royal Academy in London. In 1849 Alexander Smith died and eventually Smith's new inheritance enabled him to create an art collection at a studio in Fitzroy Square that included his own work. He decided to create an Institute in Stirling to house his new collection. He drew up plans for a library, museum and a reading room. He signed the trust into existence in November 1869 with himself, James Barty, the Provost of Stirling, and A. W. Cox, a fellow artist, as trustees. He was prevented however from seeing his plans fulfilled as he died the next month in Avignon.
The Stirling School of Arts which was part library, part mechanics institute was formed in 1825 with the intention of building an institution. It started out with a small lending library in a rented room in Broad Street in November 1825. Throughout its life, it attracted lecturers of national note. Its Annual Soirees were demonstrations of intent. In 1854 for example, the need for ‘a lecture room, library and museum, and a public place where interesting specimens of art may be deposited’ was again reiterated and Sir Archibald Alison declared that ‘Stirling will take its place in literature, science and art, which it has long in Scottish history taken in arms’. The 1854 Soiree showed the potential of a permanent gallery and museum. The Corn Exchange was hired for the purpose, and the walls hung with tartans and evergreens supplied by the Drummonds. There was also a plough and sheaf of wheat from the Drummond Agricultural Museum. It is evident that the different branches of the Drummond family had given considerable assistance. They were tartan retailers, seedsmen, evangelical and temperance publishers and the owners of the Agricultural Museum (established 1831) to show the latest innovations in agriculture. Along one wall, prints and casts were shown, and there was an arrangement of Grecian statuary in front of the platform. Model steam and water engines were displayed, along with the chair of the Reverend James Guthrie, who had been martyred for his beliefs in 1661. This chair became part of the Macfarlane Museum collection, and is now in the Stirling Smith.
There were various private collections of antiquities in Stirling in the nineteenth century. In the Douglas Room in Stirling Castle was an assortment of arms and armour, including the pikes and other weapons taken from the radical weavers of 1820, and the pulpit of John Knox. The collection of Dr. Alexander Paterson (1822–1897), ‘long one of the chief attractions of Bridge of Allan’ had the skull of Darnley, a piece of Sir William Wallace’s fetters, a fragment of Robert the Bruce’s coffin and the key of Loch Leven Castle. The collection was sold in January 1899 and items from it were given to the Smith over the years. The Macfarlane Museum was assembled by John Macfarlane of Coneyhill, Bridge of Allan (1785–1868) whose wealth was derived from textile manufacture in Manchester. He was the great local champion of the principle of the free library in Stirling where he opened a library and reading room in 1854. In 1881 the Macfarlane Free Library was transferred to the Smith along with the Macfarlane Museum which contained many important local objects and the Smith curator was charged with the additional task of looking after it. The Museum Hall, Bridge of Allan was built by the Macfarlane Trustees in 1887 as a Concert Hall.
The collection at the Sterling Smith Art Gallery and Museum contains over 40,000 objects, artwork and photographs, presenting the world to Sterlong and Sterling to the world. Sterling was the anvil wgere Scotland's histopry was hammered out. Six battles which changed the course of Scottish history took place in and arouns Stirling. Stirling is Scotland's heart and the Smith reflects Sterling's soul. There are over 1800 items of arcaeological material, including 200 Romano-British finds from Buchlyvie Broch and 20 local beakers and cinerary urns with associated human remains. Important acquisitions through Treasure Trove in recent years include the early Christian grave slab from Ballangrew Farm and the Bronze Age palstave fron Stoneyacre Farm. The S,mith has a collection opf 40 Scottish bank notes including examples from the Stirling Banking Company which traded from 1777 - 1826, the Sterling Merchant Bank Company (1784 - 1814) and the Falkirk Union Bank.
The Smith's collection of Scottish pottery was used to illustrate J Arnold Fleming's standard work on the subject, 'Scottish Pottery', first published in 1923. The Smith has a small collection of 18th and early 19th century maritime instruments, including a ship's compass, 1764, which is of French manufacture and was used to guide the slave ships of Captain James Forrest of Alloa (1740 - 1810). Sporting history, encompassing horse-racing, golf, football and curling is well represented and includes the world's oldest football and curling stone. The Smith has a fine collection of old 'hard' tartans, woven at Wilson Mills, Bannockburn during the period 1760 - 1820. After the Disarming Act of 1746, the weaving and wearing of tartan was forbidden in the Highlands. Bannock burn was the first place to seize theinitiative in the Lowlands and Wilsons built up a world-wide trade by 1830.
There is a ramp to the main entrance. The entrance hall, cafe, Gallery 1 and toilets are all on the ground floor. There is level access throughout. There is a lift, suitable for wheelchairs, to both the lower level and the upper floor. There is an audio loop system fitted in the lecture theatre. There are disabled toilet facilities. There is disabled parking available. There are wheelchairs and mobility aids available for loan. Assistance dogs are welcome.
Location : 40 Albert Place, Dumbarton Road, Stirling, Stirlingshire FK8 2RQ
Transport: Stirling (National Rail) then 10 minutes. Bus Routes : B12 and P2 stop outside.
Opening Times: Daily, 10:30 to 17:00; Saturday opens at 10:00; Sunday opens at 14:00
Tickets : Free
Tel. : 01786 471917
