Andy Goldsworthy Fifty Years: nature-inspired art at the Royal Scottish Academy

The monumental exhibition Andy Goldsworthy: Fifty Years has taken over Edinburgh’s Royal Scottish Academy (RSA) through November 2nd, 2025, bringing together five decades of work by the acclaimed nature artist Andy Goldsworthy. This large-scale presentation, organised by the National Galleries of Scotland, offers an unparalleled opportunity to experience the art of Andy Goldsworthy indoors — a rarity for an artist celebrated for his outdoor, site-specific works in landscapes across the globe.

The art of Andy Goldsworthy in an immersive setting

Spanning more than 200 pieces, the show transforms the RSA’s historic galleries into a single immersive installation. Designed specifically for the building, the exhibition integrates the architecture, natural light, and materials into the artworks themselves. The result is a seamless dialogue between heritage spaces and nature-inspired art, reflecting Goldsworthy’s long-standing interest in how land, people, and structures interact — and sometimes clash.

Nature artist Andy Goldsworthy: from forest to gallery space

Known for working with clay, stone, leaves, wood, ice, and other organic materials, Goldsworthy has spent over forty years in Dumfriesshire, creating works that capture the cycles of growth, decay, and renewal. Here, the land is literally brought indoors. In Oak Passage, a 20-meter corridor made from intertwined oak branches mirrors the texture of the gallery’s own oak floors. A monumental cracked clay wall slices through another room, evoking geological formations and the RSA’s masonry. Elsewhere, 10,000 reeds cascade from a skylight, suspended between gravity and weightlessness.

Indoor installations with a rural pulse

The exhibition also confronts themes of access, labor, and land rights. Sheep fleeces dyed in the markings of different farmers tumble down the RSA’s main staircase, connecting the agricultural economy to the urban art space. In a poignant work, an entire gallery floor is covered with gravestones from over 100 Dumfriesshire churchyards, a stark meditation on the human body’s return to the earth.

Andy Goldsworthy: Fifty Years is not just a survey — it’s an immersive, site-specific creation that redefines the possibilities of indoor installations. Rarely does the nature-inspired art of this scale and vision come indoors, and even more rarely within sight of the landscapes that shaped it. For Edinburgh, it’s a cultural landmark; for Goldsworthy, it’s a work that stands apart. As the artist has said, calling it an exhibition feels wrong — it is a work in its own right.