By Cara Sulieman
ROLLING Stone Ronnie Wood is hoping to prove he has more to him than sex, drugs and rock n’ roll when he unveils his art exhibition in Scotland.
The 61-year-old wrinkly rocker’s work is a mixture of celebrity portraits and animal scenes; showing he doesn’t just paint it black.
But Wood himself is unlikely to visit the capital during the show as he is thought to have escaped to LA with his 20-year-old Russian lover Ekaterina Ivanova.
So the public will be left to decide if the guitarist’s art gives them any satisfaction when it is unveiled at The Dome in Edinburgh later this month.
The exhibition’s curator Jonathan Poole reckons Wood is becoming better known for his art than his outlandish behaviour.
He said: “I don’t think people are interested in his domestic life, they’re interested in him as an original artist. The works most certainly stand up on their own merit.
“He sold an original called Beggars’ Banquet for £1.2 million – no-one would pay £1.2m just because he’s a rock star. He’s a good investment and he’s a good visual artist.”
It certainly helps that Wood has a barrage of famous friends willing to pose for portraits – adding an extra dash of appeal.
As well as famous faces such as Paul McCartney and Jack Nicholson, there are plenty of paintings of the Stones in action on stage.
Poole explained: “Obviously the majority are going to include the music world because that’s his world, but we’ve got a number of animal paintings as well. There’s one called Tusk that is of rhinos and elephants, for example.”
Poole has been involved with rock art for years and has in the past arranged exhibitions of work by John Lennon and Miles Davis.
“With these exhibitions, it’s a very personal thing. Other people back him up on stage, but he’s on their own when he does this. I have the utmost respect for him as an artist.”
But offstage Wood is notorious for his extravagant and erratic behaviour, hitting headlines last year for leaving his wife for a girl 40 years younger than him.
