Sir Andy Murray, the double Wimbledon champion, Olympic gold medallist and former world number one, chooses his favourite painting for Country Life.
The tennis superstar chose a picture that is one of a set of four which hang together at Cromlix, the hotel near his childhood home in Dunblane which he owns with his wife, Kim. You can see the full picture in the 17 January 2024 edition of Country Life magazine.
Andy Murray on his choice, ‘I’m so excited’ by David Shrigley
‘This screenprint is one of four David Shrigley limited-edition pictures that I bought a few years ago; they now hang as a set in my hotel, Cromlix, in Scotland. I love their childlike quality – it looks like something anyone could do, but, actually, they are really brilliant and clever and that is where the talent lies.
‘I love his use of bright, vibrant colours – we have them against a deep-red wall in the hotel and they really pop. His turn of phrase is always on point and really appeals to my sense of humour.
‘David’s art always makes me smile, but this one in particular really resonates with me because I have dogs and this is how they are most of the time – really, really excited about not very much at all.’
Andy Murray is a former world number one tennis player. Along with his wife Kim, he owns the Cromlix hotel in Dunblane, Scotland, a member of PoB Hotels.
The deep-red piano area at the Cromlix, Andy Murray’s hotel near Dunblane. Picture: Cromlix / PoB Hotels
Charlotte Mullins on ‘I’m so excited’ and David Shrigley
In the 1990s, when working as a guide at the Centre for Contemporary Arts in Glasgow, David Shrigley would use the gallery’s photocopier to turn out small books of his drawings. Like half-completed comic strips, these drawings were often shakily sketched and surreal. A wobbly pyramid warned you, ‘I am in league with the devil so do not ask me to babysit’; a stick man jumping over a prickly cactus was captioned ‘Athlete in desert’.
Scroll forwards 30 years and Mr Shrigley is still creating his wonky yet beguiling black-and-white drawings, but his practice has expanded to include prints, installations, photographs and animations. His oversized thumbs-up sculpture Really Good graced the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square in 2016 and he was nominated for the Turner Prize in 2013. Although he has exhibited in major museums, you are as likely to encounter his work on a coaster, a billboard or as a cartoon in a national newspaper.
The Fourth Plinth sculpture, ‘Really Good’ by British artist David Shrigley, pictured in Trafalgar Square on September 29, 2016. “Really Good” is a seven-metre high hand with a disproportionately long thumb giving a thumbs up. (Photo by Daniel LEAL / AFP)
I’m so excited is a limited-edition screenprint showing a bounding red dog leaping across the paper. Mr Shrigley always combines words and images in such a way that his deadpan humour and off-the-wall one-liners bring a smile to your face. He has photographed posters for a lost pigeon — ‘normal size. A bit mangy looking. Does not have a name’ — and offered glasses of water for sale (‘serious offers only’).
He often anthropomorphises animals, having them swear at the daily grind, or evokes total meltdown with a casual aside: ‘If you need me I will be in the refrigerator.’
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