USA artist offers up Outlander painting to help raise funds to save the Old High Church in Inverness
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An American artist is auctioning a painting inspired by the international hit TV series Outlander to boost efforts to save the Old High Church in Inverness for the community.
Laura Rispoli from New Jersey produced an original watercolour showing main characters Jamie and Claire Fraser embracing while battles of the American War of Independence rage behind them.
Her friends in North Carolina, Pamela Smith and Beth Pittman of the Fraser’s Ridge Homecoming Outlander fan group, approached her to request the work and another depicting the historic Old High Church building itself.
Ms Rispoli obliged as a special gift to the group’s fundraiser on behalf of the Friends of the Old High, which was set up in September 2022 to purchase it from the Church of Scotland.
The group wants in a bid to preserve its historic importance and make it available to the community, but needs to raise at least £150,000 to do so.
Fundraising efforts have stalled a little of late despite links to the worldwide Outlander phenomenon attracting overseas interest.
Ms Rispoli explained: “I’m grateful to have got to know so many kind friends through a mutual love of the Outlander series and all of Diana Gabaldon’s books.
“They introduced me to a great love for Scotland too.
“My friend Pam contacted me asking if I could create a couple paintings to be auctioned off at the Fraser’s Ridge Homecoming event in North Carolina, to benefit the historic Old High Church in Inverness.
“I’m grateful that Pam, and also Beth Pittman thought of me to create the paintings. It’s so important to protect and preserve history.”
The Outlander painting, hand-signed by the artist, is the subject of the silent auction with bids starting at $250 dollars.
It is to be autographed by Charles Vandervaart, the actor who plays William Ransom in Outlander and is finished with an intricately detailed wooden frame, imported from Italy.
The Old High Church painting is also being auctioned at a starting price of $250.
The Old High has obvious historic links to the subject matter of the TV series, drawn from author Diana Gabaldon’s books, which charts a time-travelling love affair set in initially in the turbulent Jacobite era.
Prior to the Battle of Culloden in 1746, some Government troops were held prisoner in the Old High’s church tower.
When the Duke of Cumberland took control of Inverness, those prisoners were liberated and Jacobite captives were held there and in other places including the Gaelic Church, now Leakey's bookshop.
They were then taken outside, blindfolded and executed one by one outside the door of the tower.
Musket ball marks can still be seen in the wall of the tower.
Some prisoners were too weak to stand so they were propped up against gravestones before being shot in the back.
Similar scenes were depicted in Outlander Series 3.
