GO TO FRANK TO FOR NEW PAINTINGS, THE EDINBURGH EVENING NEWS November 18th 2009

ONE of Scotland's newest young fine artists, Frank To, is to exhibit a selection of his work at the Edinburgh Art Fair 2009.

Mr To's unique painting technique has won him international recognition. The fair is at the Corn Exchange from Friday to Sunday.

For more information, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist.

TO BOLDLY GO TO FRANK'S DISPLAY By Peter Carroll, The Glaswegian 22/04/09

GLASGOW-BASED artist Frank To reached the final frontier when he welcomed an other worldly guest to his latest exhibition - Star Trek legend Patrick Stewart.

Frank, from Newton Mearns, welcomed the sci-fi icon to his latest exhibition held at The Leith Gallery, Edinburgh, this month.

But don't think the 27-year-old artist, who is based at the WASPS artist studios in Dennistoun, has nothing more to do than KLINGON to his famous guests.

Frank and Patrick, who is currently treading the capital boards in Samuel Beckett's play, 'Waiting For Godot', go back light years. Well, more than five years actually.

Frank told The Glaswegian: "I've known Patrick ever since 2004 when he came to my degree show at Huddersfield University. He has been a great supporter of my work and has five of my paintings in his collection."

But Frank says when he was first introduced to the English actor things weren't so pleasant.

He said: "I first saw Patrick on Star Trek Generations when he was playing Captain Jean-Luc Picard, but he had been turned into a baddie. I was seven at the time and totally terrified.

"He's a really nice man though and it was great for him to come along on Thursday."

Frank's exhibition in the capital closes on Saturday and he is currently working on his next show, to take place in Dundee in September.

To view the actual article, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Art.

SCOTS ARTIST WHO CAUGHT PATRICK'S EYE by Tim Cornwell, The Scotsman 18/04/09

ACTOR Patrick Stewart took time out from a "marvellous" run in Edinburgh this week to visit an exhibition at the Leith Gallery featuring Frank To, a young Scottish artist whose work he collects.

Stewart has been buying art for 20 years, he said, including five works by To.

"This is my private passion. I like to have pictures around me, I have two homes and I've run out of wallspace."

The two men first met at Huddersfield University, where Stewart is chancellor. Falkirk-born To, 26, was a student there before returning to Scotland to do his masters at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee.

He has since shown work alongside Peter Howson and Damien Hirst.

"I think he's very gifted, and I'm delighted he's beginning to get an international audience," Stewart said. "He's adventurous and bold, and not afraid of a big canvas."

To's portrait of the actor is on sale as part of the show, for £1,700, the last of three he completed.

For more information, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist.

FRANK GOES WHERE NO ARTIST HAS GONE BEFORE IN ROMAN PORTRAIT by Hazel Mollison, The Edinburgh Evening News, 17/04/09

Patrick Stewart hails image as it goes on display in Capital

Patrick Stewart hails image as it goes on display in Capital

HE has boldly gone where no artist has gone before.

Frank To created a striking image of actor Patrick Stewart, aka Star Trek Captain Jean-Luc Picard, in the style of a Roman emperor.

And when the artist showed it to the man himself at a gallery in Leith, the 68-year-old Stewart - currently in the Capital performing in Waiting for Godot at the King's Theatre - gave it his seal of approval.

The actor became friends with the young artist when Mr To was a student and he was chancellor of Huddersfield University.

Stewart admired his work at a graduate exhibition and bought two pictures. Since then, he has eagerly followed his career and was happy to sit for a portrait.

His profile, in red and orange colours, is one of the eye-catching paintings now on display at the Leith Gallery, on The Shore.

Stewart said: "For me, it was especially gratifying to find a student whose work was so exciting and fresh. Since then, I've got to know him and keep abreast of his exhibitions. I've got pictures by him in both my homes. I'm very impressed by his latest work. It's very different from his earlier pictures, which were very abstract."

He said he has enjoyed returning to Edinburgh for the first time in more than a decade. He is performing until tomorrow in the sell-out production, opposite his X-Men co-star Sir Ian McKellen.

He said: "I'm here with my girlfriend this time, and we've had time to be tourists. We've loved it - I wish I could stay longer.

"It's such a beautiful city and unlike anywhere else. I'm a fan of architecture and I've enjoyed walking up streets and looking at all the details on old buildings. We also enjoyed the Turner and Italy exhibition.

"We've had a wonderful welcome, with full houses every night. One of the most charming things is, in every city, we've used local young actors. We've really enjoyed working with them."

Mr To, 26, who is originally from Falkirk, said Stewart's interest and encouragement had been a huge morale boost.

He is already making a name for himself as a figurative artist, with exhibitions in Edinburgh, Glasgow and London. His work has also featured on STV's Rebus.

He said: "I met Patrick by chance when he came to my degree show. I was very surprised.

"It's been nice to have someone like that support me and believe in me. It was a massive boost."

He said he had been inspired by depictions of kings and emperors on ancient coins when painting the portrait. He said: "I was thinking about art and propaganda, and why they put the head of the monarch on to coins. Patrick acted in Anthony and Cleopatra, and that inspired the idea."

For more information, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist.

GALLERY ROUND-UP, The Herald April 11th 2009

The Leith Gallery

65 The Shore

0131 553 5255

www.the-leith-gallery.co.uk

Mon- Fri 11am- 5pm;

Sat 11am- 4pm

Until April 25

The Leith Gallery in Edinburgh has always had a policy of promoting young artists, and its annual Faces exhibition features the cream of Scotland's art school graduates. Graham Flack was one of the featured artists in 2001, while Frank To exhibited there in 2006.

Flack, whose work reveals a fascination with the human head and the space around it, was born in Northern Ireland and studied at Edinburgh College of Art. He won third prize in the BP Portrait Award in 2003 and was one of four shortlisted artists for the Aspect Prize in 2007. He has been recommended as one of the ‘Top 20 of Scottish Art' new and old to invest in, and his work is in many collections including The Scottish Office, Edinburgh College of Art and that of actor Robert Carlyle.

At just 26, Frank To has garned himself an impressive reputation with his psychologically intense studies of the human form teased out of an abstract background. His most famous collector is the actor Patrick Stewart. To has produced a powerful study of Stewart's head specially for this exhibition.

For more information, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist

SHOOTING STAR, Homes and Interiors Scotland Magazine Issue 64 March- April 2009

Text by Catherine Coyle

Despite an uncertain start to his artistic career, Frank To's stock has rocketed since he graduated from Duncan of Jordanstone in 2005. Twice rejected by Glasgow School of Art and snubbed by many of the city's art galleries, To has nevertheless won massive success and is now much sought- after. Tipped by Homes & Interiors Scotland magazine back in 2006 as one to watch, To exhibits a brand new body of abstract paintings in his show, Boundaries, at the Leith Gallery, alongside fellow artist Graham Flack. Prices for To's work have trebled in the last few years, demonstrating the investment potential in this young talent.

Boundaries, The Leith Gallery, 65 The Shore, Edinburgh, April 4- 25

0131 553 5655, www.the-leith-gallery.co.uk

For more information on the artist, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist

BEAULY GALLERY LURES TOP GLASGOW ARTIST by Samantha Chetwynd,The Press & Journal Inverness 06/09/08

ARTIST INSPIRED BY MICHELANGELO

By Samantha Chetwynd

A GRADUATE from Dundee Art School who draws inspiration from Michelangelo will exhibit his work at an Inverness- shire gallery next week.

Frank To, 26, will have four paintings on display at the Art and the Word show at the Kilmorack Gallery, Beauly.

His work will be exhibited alongside several established Scottish artists who have created work inspired by literature.

Mr To, who is based in Glasgow, is already creating a reputation as a contemporary figurative painter, having established a loyal following that includes a number of high- profile buyers such as Star Trek legend Patrick Stewart.

His work has also been featured in television detective drama Rebus.

And in recent years his work has been exhibited alongside that of Tracy Emin and Damien Hirst.

He said: "This exhibition will provide me the opportunity to show the public how I am inspired by literal text.

"In a way, I'm showing a more personal side with the new work."

The exhibition opens on September 12.

TO BOLDLY GO....FOR A SHOWCASE

A New breed of Glasgow artist whose work is collected by Star Trek hero Patrick Stewart is to showcase his latest work at Glasgow Art Fair.

Newton Mearns- based Frank To is showing three new pieces of work following successful exhibitons in London and the United States.

The 26- year- old who paints at the WASPS Artists' Studios in Dennistoun is being promoted by the Mansfield Park Gallery.

Only Time, Rewrite and Titan are some of his most evocative works to date.

He said: "My work used to be more figurative, but my new work is more personal. People will be able to relate to what's in the paintings more."

Patrick Stewart (aka Captain Jean- Luc Picard) has so far bought five of the Scot's paintings.

Frank studied art at Huddersfield University and Duncan of Jordanstone College in Dundee, and previously showed work with Tunbridge Wells- based gallery, Fairfax.

He added: "The Art Fair shows on an international level that Scotland has a strong art reputation, with artists such as Peter Howson, Ken Currie and Jack Vettriano. It helps put Scotland on the map in the art world."

For more information, please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist

YOUNG PROFESSIONAL by Jan Patience The Herald 02/02/08

Frank To's work is fired by ambition says Jan Patience

Young artists are not what they used to be. Once upon a time, any self respecting artist in their twenties spent whole days down the pub, smoking furiously, drinking heavily and arguing over weighty issues such as whether or not art schools destroy art. These days, you are more likely to find them networking with London galleries or with agents in New York, putting together business plans and setting up a website in order to market and control their own work.

Who is to say which is the better path, but what is certain is that being a talented young artist in 2008 is a vastly different experience from being such a creature a generation ago.

Frank To is the only exhibiting artist at the Queen's Gallery's New Generations exhibition who hasn't got his own website. But the 25- year- old, from Newton Mearns south of Glasgow, does have a New York agent called Michel Witmer and a London gallery, Albermarle.

He is currently riding the crest of a wave with his work, and prices are soaring accordingly. This time last year, a reasonable sized To painting would have cost you £800. Today it would be £1700.

There is real drama in his work- a brooding mental energy that sucks you in and leaves you wondering what, why, where? He talks about how his hero Michelangelo considered marble for days on end before teasing out the figure within, and how it is his preferred method of working too.

He places himself into the work at every turn. One painting in the New Generations exhibition, Time after Time, shows two figures facing each other with a gap between them, He says "This came out of a personal experience I had of having feelings for someone which were never realised although there is a sense of ‘what if?'"

There is a multi- layered approach to Frank To's work. In the first place, he creates an abstract scene. He works quickly, layering the paint in sweeping gestures. He then drips turpentine on the surface to create a mottled textured layer and uses whatever he has to hand- a discarded neon light strip is a favourite- to work the surface into a state of readiness.

At that point, he steps back, and looks for the figure within. His figures are then drafted in with a rag soaked in turpentine.

The influence of masters, old and young is obvious. He studied under Calum Colvin at Duncan of Jordanstone in Dundee, where he gained an MA in 2005. "Calum instilled in me the need to be professional and the way he presented himself was a huge influence," To says.

With the professionalism comes ambition. "My goal is to be made a member of the Royal Academy by the time I'm 30," he smiles. "Turner was admitted by the time he was my age, so I won't be the youngest ever, but it is a real burning desire."

For more information please visit the official website of Frank To Fine Artist

S.T.V Interview With Frank To Fine Artist

Interview by Nige Buckland

Scottish artist Frank To talks about his abstract paintings and recent RBS Young Entrepreneur nomination.

To watch the interview, please click here

FACE THE FUTURE By Catherine Coyle, Homes and Interiors Scotland Magazine Issue 46 March/ April

By Catherine Coyle

Buying art from up- and - coming talents is an exciting prospect. For the last ten years, Edinburgh's Leith Gallery has scoured the country's art colleges, picking the best pieces from rising stars, and exhibiting them at its New Faces show. Catherine Coyle has the lowdown on some of this year's artists who are tipped for the top.

Frank To
DUNCAN OF JORDANSTONE

Twenty- four- year- old Frank To graduated with a masters in fine art from Dundee's Duncan of Jordanstone college in last September and has since enjoyed huge success, particularly in London. To was rejected from Glasgow School of Art twice when he applied to do his undergraduate and masters course there. He was also turned down by some of the city's major art galleries as a student, but has witnessed massive interest in his work outside Glasgow. His abstract style featured in 11 exhibitions throughout the UK during 2005 and 2006 is already shaping up to be a busy year for the young artist. Drawing on literary influences such as the Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle, To explores the boundaries between figurative and abstract forms. He describes his style as "improvising with the activity of painting", and likens his method of visualising the subject matter prior to painting to that of Michelangelo. Currently its youngest exhibitor, To is now represented by London's Fairfax Gallery, and can count actor Patrick Stewart as a collector. His paintings range from in price from £450 to £900.

For more information, please visit the offical website of Frank To Fine Artist