Skip to content

Sir Billy Connolly creates audio guide for Kelvingrove Museum

Pauline McLeanScotland arts correspondent
News imageBBC Sir Billy sitting in a theatre with colourful upholstered chairs in the background. He is wearing a denim jacket with a patterned red cloth in the pocket.BBC
Sir Billy first visited Kelvingrove Museum with his family as a child

The iconic red brick building which houses Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum contains thousands of artefacts - from a full sized elephant beneath a spitfire to Salvador Dali's Christ of St John of the Cross.

But it's also a place of memory for the millions who have visited over the last 125 years.

Among them, comedy icon Sir Billy Connolly who has recorded a new audio guide.

Glasgow Life - the charity which runs the city's museums - first worked with Billy more than a decade ago, when he showed his first art exhibition at the People's Palace.

News imageGetty Images Historic red‑sandstone building with ornate towers and archways, displaying the signage ‘Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum,’ with people walking and sitting in the open area in frontGetty Images
Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum contains thousands of artefacts

So when the idea of creating a personal tour of the museum came up, he seemed like the obvious choice.

"We wanted to create something which would make the listener feel like they were talking to Billy," said Jane Rowlands, head of Glasgow Museums and Collections at Glasgow Life.

"Because he hasn't been here for a little while we sent some up-to-date images and a little video of the galleries and he selected 12 objects which he wanted to talk about."

'Rich and famous'

Among those selected was Fulton's Grand Orrery, a working model of the solar system which predates the museum itself.

"I loved it," Billy said.

"It was on the first floor, a mechanical map which you could wind up. It explained the solar system to children in a way which I have never seen.

"I got the chance to wind it up once. That's what happens when you're rich and famous."

Jane added: "We weren't looking for facts and figures about the building or our collections.

"We were looking to hear his memories and it comes across with such personality and he speaks about the place with such fondness that you can't help but be engaged by it."

News imageA child in a striped shirt leaning on a stone balcony inside a large museum hall with arched balconies, ornate lighting, a marble floor, and exhibits including a suspended aircraft, a giraffe model, and an elephant sculpture
Visitors to the museum can see a a full-sized elephant beneath a hanging spitfire

Like many visitors, Billy first came to Kelvingrove with this family and it is memories of those visits, including sliding around the tiled floors with his sister Flo, in their socks, that he recalls.

"As a wee boy, you knew it was classy," he said. "The guys who looked after the place were kind and nice.

"They would explain stuff to you, usually to get you to stop running about. It had life in it. It wasn't like a museum, and I thought 'I belong here'.

Jane said the museum was hopeful the tour could be extended to other items in the collection.

She added: "People have said I've always wanted to walk with Billy around Kelvingrove and now I can."