Art auction to help raise funds for Marie Curie charity in Highlands
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End-of-life care charity Marie Curie is holding an online art sale to help plug a funding gap caused by the pandemic.
The Marie Curie charity art auction hopes to bring colour, cash and comfort to those in need of end-of-life care at home.
Artists from across Scotland are bringing a new perspective to Marie Curie’s annual Great Daffodil Appeal with an online auction of paintings and other works which could raise thousands of pounds for the charity, which is struggling to find funds in the pandemic.
The fundraising initiative, Art Works for Marie Curie, is sponsored by Saffrey Champness Accountants Inverness. It’s been organised by a small group of Highland art lovers determined to help fill a funding gap for the nursing care charity whose normal funding channels have all but disappeared because of Covid-19.
The wide-ranging collection has been supplied by artists from across the country with some of the Highland’s most celebrated painters, including Allan MacDonald, Fiona Matheson, Clare Blois and Arie Vardi, supplying original works.
Nearly 200 submissions of art, from landscape to still life and abstract works, many paintings set in virtual rooms, will be auctioned online to help finance the charity which has been busier than ever trying to provide home-based nursing care for those urgently in need of end-of-life support.
Marie Curie’s community fundraiser for the far north of Scotland Vonnie Stevenson said: “The stunning collection, which includes works from amateurs and professionals, mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, reflects a determination to bring some light to those individuals and their families facing the darkest of times at the moment.
"Being terminally ill and having to prepare for losing a loved one in the middle of a pandemic is unimaginable to many of us, but the desire to fulfil someone’s dying wish to pass away at home is something we can all comprehend.
"Our patient hours in Highland alone have increased by 16 per cent compared with the pre-Covid year period and even more if you look at the actual number of patients we are seeing. We hope that this fundraising event can go a long way to bringing comfort through professional nursing support to scores of people and their families in our communities.”
The charity is urging the public to start bidding, share the auction site link and help it fundraise for vital services across the country by bidding or donating directly to the charity in its Art Works for Marie Curie Online Auction.
Nursing hours and services will also be up for sale as part of the auction, which runs at https://givergy.uk/artworksformariecurie until 9pm on March 21.
