Sir Billy Connolly will be celebrated next summer with a major exhibition at one of the Glasgow landmarks that has meant most to him throughout his life.
Billy Connolly’s Big Wee Exhibition will open at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in June 2027, bringing the story of the Big Yin back to the city where his career began.
The exhibition is being developed with Connolly and will explore his life, career and distinctive personal style.
Tickets are expected to go on sale in early 2027, with a precise opening date and the full list of exhibits still to be announced.
Connolly first visited the Kelvingrove Art Gallery & Museum as a boy and has spoken repeatedly about the impression its vast galleries, armour, paintings and objects made on him while growing up in Glasgow.
Earlier this year he recorded a personal audio tour of the museum, recalling childhood visits and choosing 12 objects to discuss.
The project was created by Glasgow Life Museums with Connolly and his wife Pamela Stephenson.
Connolly said of Kelvingrove: “That frontage is tattooed on my brain and it stays with you forever.”
His memories include sliding across the museum’s tiled floors in his socks. His own audio tour of the building also takes in objects and artworks that have caught his imagination, including Fulton’s Grand Orrery, a working model of the solar system which predates the present museum.
Kelvingrove itself is celebrating its 125th anniversary in 2026. The red sandstone Glasgow landmark opened in 1901 and today has 22 galleries and around 4,500 objects on display, ranging from paintings and natural history to Scottish history and design.
It is also home to some of Glasgow’s most recognisable museum exhibits, including Sir Roger the elephant, a suspended Spitfire and Salvador Dalí’s Christ of Saint John of the Cross.
The exhibition will add another chapter to Connolly’s long association with Glasgow’s museums. His visual art has previously been exhibited in the city, while portraits of the comedian have also become part of Glasgow’s cultural landscape.
Connolly began his working life as a welder in the Clyde shipyards before moving into folk music with The Humblebums and eventually establishing himself as one of the most influential stand-up comedians of his generation.
His career subsequently expanded into film, television, travel programmes and art, with Glasgow remaining central to his work and storytelling.
Introducing the exbibition, Billy Connolly said: “Glasgow Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum are having a special exhibition about my life, my times, my clothes, my comedy and you’re very welcome to come along along and have a laugh.
“It’s a most extraordinary place, a very dear place in my heart. When I think of it, I think of Salvador Dali and then how you arrive at Billy Connolly from that, I don’t know.
“But if you’re bored with it, there’s a special restaurant there. They have the best chips in town - be my guest, come along.”
A Glasgow Life spokesperson said: “We’re very excited to be working on this fabulous exhibition for the city.
“What could be better than celebrating a Scottish national treasure, Sir Billy Connolly, in Glasgow’s very own treasure trove, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum?
“We look forward to sharing more details soon about the opening date and what you’ll get to see in the exhibition.”
In March the museum’s Jane Rowlands said Connolly, widely regarded as one of the greatest comedians of all time, was the obvious choice to present a personal guide to the art gallery.
She said: “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.”