ART fans have canvassed enough support to spruce up an eye-catching tribute to late Gourock-based artist George Wyllie.

A chain of giant question mark sculptures along the shoreline from Port Glasgow to Langbank have become a much-loved local landmark since popping up in 2012 thanks to Greenock-born artist Alec Galloway.

But a combination of bad weather and vandalism left them damaged and in need of urgent attention.

Now they have been given a bit of TLC by their creator thanks to a crowdfunding campaign by the newly-established George Wyllie Foundation.

Alec, left, has been able to restore the colourful question marks to their former glory after public donations of more than £400.

The symbols — a famous feature of Wyllie’s work — were put in as a tribute to the late artist, who lived in Gourock for over 50 years.

Alec, who is now based in Skelmorlie, is thrilled with the support.

He told the Tele: “The idea was that we would put the question marks into the world and then they would gradually disintegrate and be reclaimed by the river.

“I think that idea would have appealed to George, who once told me that ‘the river always wins in the end’.

“But people have taken these big question marks to their hearts and folk kept asking me if we were going to fix them up, so we thought a makeover was long overdue.” The structures were inspired by Wyllie, who called himself a ‘scul?tor’, because he said the question mark should always be at the centre of things.

He died two years ago at the age of 90 and is internationally-renowned for his work including the giant Paper Boat and a Straw Locomotive.

The question marks were put up following his death and were created with help from Inverclyde schools and community groups.

The artist’s daughter, Louise Wyllie, says her dad would have been thrilled with the tribute and is delighted people have dug deep to fund their restoration.

Louise said: “My father placed the question mark at the centre of everything he created and people seem to respond to Alec’s sculptures very positively.

“It’s like they’ve become a talisman for people. You can spot them from the train and from the road and there’s something quite reassuring about them being there – like a wee reminder to keep asking questions!

“Our curator, Lynne Mackenzie, came up with idea of running a week-long online campaign to secure some funds to fix them up and in just a few days we raised £425, which was just enough to spruce them up.”