It is something of a truism, but there cannot be many people who did not learn to appreciate the natural world in the last year, whether the rugged wilds of moorland left to its own devices, a sparrowhawk glimpsed over the city, or the infinite variety of variously flowered flora that started sprouting from pavements up and down the country whilst local councils called a halt to their bi-annual spraying. Hannah Mooney was one of those people, although as a landscape artist she has long had an eye for the world around us - although when I say long, I should clarify, for Mooney, despite her very successful career to date, and a number of awards, is in fact just four years out of Glasgow School of Art. And if making a living as an artist might seem a desired but unknown prospect for many art students, for Mooney, who grew up in a family of artists, the leap of faith was less pronounced.

Mooney will have her second solo exhibition at the Scottish Gallery in Edinburgh this month, focusing on a variety of work she has completed in the past two years, the small scale landscapes that caught the eye of the Fleming Wyfold Foundation in 2018, winning their prestigious £14,000 annual bursary with mentoring from curator Susannah Beaumont. Mooney's works are muted yet rich in colour, still landscapes filled with sense of place, and many here are of her home ground on the windswept west coast of Ireland. Capturing the intricacies of that landscape, the effect of weather, is part of Mooney's ongoing process, part of what keeps her returning to the natural world for inspiration, of looking ever closer, of thinking, refining and reworking.

Mooney, who has also worked in still life, first turned to landscapes in her third year of a BA in Painting and Printmaking at GSA. “I think, because I grew up beside Lough Swilly, walking it daily and spending a lot of time by the sea, I always wanted to paint outside. I loved that idea. And I was also just finding work in the studio difficult at the time. It wasn't until I started working outside that I began to feel more spontaneous and brave.”

“The first time I went to paint outside, I was using gouache, not oil, and I just loved how the sky changed throughout the day. At the very end of that first day, I remember the colours had changed, and all my seascapes were quite abstract and loose. I was trying to capture a sense of transience and movement in the sky and the colour,” says Mooney. “A lot of my early work was about feeling. Now it's about landscape itself, becoming more observational – I can really see how I can progress my work.”

Mooney, some few years down the line, no longer relies on working outside to create her landscapes, but often uses photographs that she has taken. “I would like to go outside again and observe more, but I love the studio now. I don't know why, but I really thought that there was something wrong with looking at photographs when I first started out! Now I just enjoy the privacy of my studio and the quiet, returning to old paintings and developing a relationship with paint.”

Until a year or so ago, Mooney was still based in Glasgow, creating her landscapes in the supportive environment of creative peers that exists in the city. But when the pandemic began, and her frequent visits home to Ireland became an impossibility, she decided to move back to County Mayo permanently. “And I've never been happier in a place,” she says. “Since I moved back, I've explored and gone back to landscapes that I know.”

“There are certain landscapes that will always attract me – trees, particularly...lochs and water, and trying to create relationships between the sky and the water... And it's true that sometimes you want to be able to paint something, and you won't actually be able to capture that subject in painting yet - it will take a long time to have the technical skill to recreate what you want in painting,” says Mooney, if somewhat self-effacing. “Like anything, it takes time.” In Mayo, she has found more balance, more inspiration – she feels she has the creative space for her work to evolve. “When I wake here in the middle of the night, I love looking out. The sky is a dark shade of blue and I love being able to see the hawthorn tree against it. I have access to beautiful skies all the time!” Mooney has clearly found her place deep in rural Mayo,working now on slightly larger scale paintings, keen to get another body of work on the go. “Leaving my simple studio routine, even for a few days, feels very strange,” she tells me, laughing. “I'd never want to leave for the city now.”

Into the Landscape: Hannah Mooney, The Scottish Gallery, 16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh, 0131 558 1200, www.scottish-gallery.co.uk Until 23 Dec, Tues - Fri, 11am - 5pm; Sat 11am - 2pm (Today only, 1pm - 3pm)

Critic's Choice

For the past half year or so, a group of young artists aged 14-18 have been attending workshops and courses at Hospitalfield as part of the organisation's free Young Artists Club, an artistic and social endeavour that supports young, interested artists in Angus and Arbroath. The participants were varied, some feeling themselves stuck, perhaps, in a rut of doing only what they'd been taught at school, or only the things that they were good at, and all curious to explore more of the diverse practices and techniques in art. This weekend sees the culmination of that year of varied activity in an exhibition that is open tomorrow only, showcasing artworks, ceramics, large banners, and a chance to discuss the Young Artist Club Manifesto.

Hospitalfield's Kirsten Wilson worked with Amy Jones, the lead artist on the programme and co-founder and co-director of Dundee Print Collective, meeting with the Young Artists every Saturday at Hospitalfield House, encouraging them to develop their own “visual toolbox”, whether through a long project exploring “alternative portraiture”, or time spent further afield working alongside artists, including Bik Van Der Pol, Anna Orton and Alison Brown on site specific works in Dundee, taking part in a costume performance and making of wax sculptures that would become the brass padlocks of Sally Hackett's “Padlocks of Self Love” project.

“YAC allowed us to try things that we didn’t even really know existed,” says one participant. “I realised art places aren’t as scary as I thought they were. I’m now making art at home more often and doing it because I want to not because I have to. It has let me realise that I am able to actually try new things.” Do get along if you can and support this excellent programme.

Young Artist Club exhibition, Hospitalfield, Hospitalfield House, Arbroath, 01241 656124, www.hospitalfield.org.uk Sun 5th Dec only, 12pm – 3pm

Don't Miss

The diminutive Burnside Gallery in Selkirk gets set for Christmas with this group winter exhibition of every artist they've shown this year - which, this being their inaugural year as a gallery, could perhaps be seen more like a statement of intent - plus a number of guest artists. Plenty here for Christmas, if you're looking: Artists' books abound, including letterpress pamphlets from Leonard McDermid's Stichill Marigold Press. Elsewhere, Val Menon's landscapes and co-owners Javier Ternero and Charly Murray exhibit evocative silver gelatin photgraphs and watercolours, respectively, alongside many diverse others.

Winter Exhibition, Burnside Gallery, 48 Market Place, Selkirk, 01750 491 348, www.burnsidegallery.co.uk Until 24 Dec, Weds - Sat, 10am - 1pm; 2pm - 4.30pm