Edinburgh-born photographer Wendy McMurdo is the subject of a major retrospective exhibition titled "Wendy McMurdo: The Digital Mirror," opening May 30 at the National Galleries Scotland: Portrait (formerly the Scottish National Portrait Gallery) in Edinburgh. The show features around 50 works spanning her career, including her early series "In A Shaded Place: The Digital And Uncanny," which explores doppelgangers and psychological unease, as well as later projects like "Pollinators," "Radical Road," and "Night Garden." The exhibition occupies the Mapplethorpe Gallery, Library area, and Upper Great Hall, and includes a video wall, text installation "Chat Rooms," and objects that influenced her, such as Henry Raeburn's painting "The Reverend Robert Walker Skating On Duddingston Loch."
This exhibition matters because it positions McMurdo as a pioneering figure in digital and psychological portraiture, highlighting her long-standing engagement with the uncanny—a theme that has defined her work since the 1990s. By bringing together her early experiments with doubles and later botanical studies, the show underscores how McMurdo has consistently used photography to evoke intense psychological states rather than mere documentation. The retrospective also draws attention to the National Galleries of Scotland's commitment to showcasing contemporary Scottish artists, and it offers audiences a rare opportunity to see the breadth of a career that has influenced discussions around surrealism, technology, and identity in photography.