Exclusive:Leading Scottish art gallery ditches Baillie Gifford as £25,000 sponsor after being targeted by activists

One of Scotland's leading art galleries has revealed it has dropped Baillie Gifford as a sponsor after six years – after being targeted by activists over the company's links with Israel.

The Fruitmarket, in Edinburgh city centre, has confirmed it is no longer in partnership with the company, days after it emerged the Edinburgh International Book Festival was parting company with the firm after 20 years.

The company, which has backed the Fruitmarket with £25,000 in annual sponsorship for the past six years, has been dropped in the midst of the 50th anniversary season at the gallery – one of the Edinburgh Art Festival’s main partner venues.

Work by the artist Martin Boyce has been showcased at the Fruitmarket gallery in Edinburgh in recent months.

The Fruitmarket has previously showcased work by Richard Hamilton, Eduardo Paolozzi, Henri Cartier-Bresson, David Hockney, Steven Campbell, Yoko Ono, Jeff Koons, Christine Borland, Nathan Coley, Jacqueline Donachie, Louise Hopkins, Callum Innes, Toby Paterson and Lucy Skaer.

It is the second visual art institution in the city to part company with Baillie Gifford in recent months.

The Collective Gallery on Calton Hill announced it was dropping Baillie Gifford as a sponsor in March, weeks after the launch of a campaign by Arts Workers for Palestine Scotland, which threatened to "disrupt" Scottish cultural institutions with links to Baillie Gifford.

The group said at the time: "Art organisations and cultural spaces are not politically neutral. We cannot prioritise the financial security of our sector over the survival of the Palestinian people.

The Fruitmarket gallery in Edinburgh is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. Picture: Neil Hanna

A separate campaign group, Fossil Free Books, announced the escalation of its campaigning last month when it warned nine UK book festivals to expect boycotts and “increased disruption” unless it ended their relationships with Baillie Gifford over its links with the fossil fuel industries, as well as Israel’s defence, tech and cybersecurity industries.

The Hay Festival in Wales suspended its partnership with Baillie Gifford, citing the “intense pressure” on authors to withdraw from the event. This came shortly before the Edinburgh International Book Festival said it had “collectively agreed” with the company to end its partnership, claiming the event could not have been delivered safely if it was “under the constant threat of disruption from activists.”

Baillie Gifford has described claims that it has nearly £10 billion invested in companies with direct or indirect links to Israel's defence, tech and cybersecurity industries as “seriously misleading”.

However, a spokeswoman for the Fruitmarket said the gallery had decided to end its relationship with the company “in light of recent discussions of Baillie Gifford's support of culture in Scotland”.

The Fruitmaket also highlighted its “values, ethics and funding policy”. The policy also states: “We seek to hold Fruitmarket open as a space for artistic expression and peaceful dialogue, discussion and dissent; a place for encounter and exchange that might contribute to mutual understanding.

"As a cultural institution, we understand and support the need for people – artists, audiences, staff – to hold, express and act on political views.

"We provide a platform for events that raise awareness and understanding of international situations as they become important to our community and the communities we reach.”

A statement from Arts Workers For Palestine Scotland said: “Our primary demand has always been for Baillie Gifford to divest of its holdings in companies violating international law through their actions in Palestine.

"We’ve continually called on arts organisations in Scotland to use their long-standing relationships with Baillie Gifford to urge the firm to divest. Given its refusal to do so, we commend cultural institutions for taking the difficult decision to sever ties.”