Publications

Detailing the history of the family and the house, the Mount Stuart guidebook takes the reader on a fascinating tour of Mount Stuart's house and gardens. The book is Illustrated with beautiful images of the house and grounds - including many areas only available for viewing by private arrangement, such as the Victorian Swimming Pool and Burges Chapel. The guide book is a perfect companion for visitors to Mount Stuart, and those with an interest in art, culture, history and botany.

The book is published by Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the 2010 Visual Arts programme at Mount Stuart. Lee Mingwei describes his artistic orientation as "social conceptualism". Visitor participation is integral to his projects. Born in Taiwan and based in New York City, he has often "focussed on issues of trust and hospitality, particularly between strangers, creating participatory installations, where strangers can explore trust, intimacy and self awareness". The project at Mount Stuart is a sound installation composed of new work in three separate parts which focus on the artist's perception of the nature of contextual sound.

Available in an edition of 500 copies with text by Pieranna Cavalchini, Contemporary Curator, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston.

Published by the Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the Visual Arts Programme in 2009, Katja Strunz selects work to exhibit within the context of Mount Stuart : "a constellation of several metal objects, two paper works and a photographic work collectively titled "The Great Bear (je meurs où je m'attache)". The installation, developing from the original exhibit Kunstmuseen Krefeld, Haus Esters 2006, reflects the artist's ongoing enquiry into cultural history, philosophy, architecture, temporality and the ownership of space and collections.

The objects, placed within the context at Mount Stuart, and demanding a renewed focus, flow from the contemporary exhibition space of the visitor centre into the outside and provide a significant link to the garden and decorative interiors of the nineteenth century house. The objects 'Parasols' are built to resemble plants, mushrooms or umbrellas and their positioning follows the pattern of the stars called The Great Bear. The artist's proposal, rather than represent an exact copy of the constellation is to reflect the idea of mirroring The Great Bear into our space, a mimetic process. The subtitle of the exhibition references a photographic image taken in Nantes, France, 1929, and shows a group of people wearing camouflage made of leaves. With the help of their outfits they resemble plants. Looking through the photographer's camera into our time they hold a big sign which tells us "je me meurs où je m'attache". The metal objects together with the photographic image join the old saying "I will die where I am closely connected". Text by Dr Sarah Lowndes.

The book is published by Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the Visual Arts programme at Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute 2007.

The works (sculpture and drawings) are conceived in response to a planting project which begun in 1990 in conjunction with Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh. The initial planting at Mount Stuart was the first in a group of a hundred British sites and involves the propagation, planting and maintenance of threatened species as part of the International Conifer Conservation Programme.

Thirteen specific geographic areas of planting are mapped out in the grounds, Afro Alpine, Bhutan, Chile, China, Japan, Mexico, Nepal, New Zealand, Patagonia, Peru, Sikkim, Tasmania and Western North America. Available in an edition of 1000 with text by Sarah Staton, Penelope Curtis and Martin Gardner.

The book is published by Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the Visual Arts programme at Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute 2007. Moyna Flannigan makes an intervention within the interiors at Mount Stuart, "to leave a trace without disturbing the balance of the house".

The intervention includes existing work and a number of new paintings and drawings, which are produced in response to the context and art history of the public interiors and collections, at the same time developing the artist's practice.

The accommodation and relation of the work within five locations, reception room, main stair, and bedrooms, is an important consideration for the artist. Available in an edition of 1000 with text by Anthony Crichton Stuart.

Published by the Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the Visual Arts programme, 2006. Nathan Coley exhibits an illuminated sculpture within the 18th century landscaped parkland.

The emotive nature of the work has a magical and theatrical quality and takes ownership of the space in which it is located. Additionally Coley presents three new works referencing physical sites of the main religions of the world: Christianity, Judaism and Islam. These objects are trying to deny their visibility and disguise their form, using the appropriated language of 'Dazzle' painting or wartime camouflage.

Coley has chosen an object from the historical collection, previously unseen, to be exhibited within the house. The story of this object pushes the discussion back and forward in time, as well as asking questions of the present.

Available in a limited edition of 1000 with text by Andrea Schlieker.

The book is published by Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the Visual Arts programme at Mount Stuart, Isle of Bute 2005.

The project is a celebration of the island of Bute showing the spirit of the place, people and their times. The photos explore a dynamic society, at times in transition, detached from the mainland and often displaying a strong sense of humour.

This exhibition and book continue Mischa Haller's development of portrait and reportage photography. Over the past half decade, he has spontaneously and responsively recorded individuals and groups of people in the process of everyday living.

He uses a personal, documentary style of photography and frames momentary encounters using both classical and subject-based compositions. Available in an edition of 1000 copies with text by Francis McKee.

The book is published by Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the 2004 Visual Arts programme at Mount Stuart. Langlands and Bell's intention is to 're awaken' the space through a full-scale mirrored installation, enabling people to focus on the role and history of the Burges Chapel, and its unique characteristics as an architectonic environment dedicated to the spiritual and to art.

The installation encourages contemplation and a critical engagement with the space and its narratives. Visitors themselves step in to the 'reflection portrait', interacting with both actual and virtual space. Available in an edition of 1000 copies with text by Charlotte Edwards and Tim Knox.

The book is published by Mount Stuart Trust in conjunction with the Mount Stuart Visual Arts Programme 2001. 'Shadow of a Necklace' continues Kate Whiteford's investigation into the resonance left on the landscape by succeeding generations and cultures, and forms one of a series of important land works completed over the last twenty years. Whiteford refers to the prehistory of the island and in particular to the discovery at the end of the last century of a jet necklace found within a Bronze Age burial site in the grounds at Mount Stuart. The necklace became the inspiration that defined the project and interpreted the strands binding past to present. Available in an edition of 1000 copies with text by Yves Abrioux.

In the Mount Stuart archive lies an eyewitness account of the execution by Sir Robert Wingfield of Upton, who attended as an observer for his uncle William Cecil, Lord Burghley, Chief Minister to Elizabeth I of England. In 2007 - some 420 years after the fateful execution - the Mount Stuart Trust published the manuscript in its entirety for the first time, together with a foreword by Mary's celebrated biographer Antonia Fraser.

John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute (1713 - 1792) is best known as King George III's tutor and as the Prime Minister responsible for the Peace of Paris in 1763. He was also an outstanding patron of the arts and one of the greatest of eighteenth-century collectors. His contribution to the Royal Collection, his own collections, notably of pictures and books, and his architectural undertakings are considered in the context of his public career and domestic life in this major study by the eminent art historian Francis Russell.