ANNE REDPATH
OBE, RSA, ARA, RWA (1865-1965)
A DOZEN PAINTINGS
2 - 26 November 2016
16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh EH3 6HZ
TEL 0131 558 1200 EMAIL [email protected]
www.scottish-gallery.co.uk
Introduction
The modern artist is the model of independence, free
from academic pressure, at liberty to address any
subject, answerable only to their own inspiration and
what William McTaggart called “the good habit.” Two
of the finest of the last century were William Gillies
and Anne Redpath. Neither had entirely conventional
lives (conventionality being hardly a prerequisite for
the life artistic) but both respected and nurtured their
considerable talents through hard work and cussed
determination. Gillies had a close relationship with
his parents and sisters and a happy childhood in
Haddington. He went through the First War and
emerged with a quiet, steely resolve to look after his
own, to set aside the horrors he had witnessed but
to dance to no tune but his own instinct. His subject
was the landscape of Scotland, his home patch of
Midlothian and the Border country and that which he
saw from a tent door in the Highlands and West coast.
In the studio he could look out behind his cottage in
Temple or set up a still life that always owed much
to Georges Braque. His vast output but disinterest in
the wider art world, beyond its impact on his beloved
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Art College, means that there is still a strong case for
reassessment, for his work to be read alongside the
senior figures of the Modern British School where it
belongs. The recent show at the Edinburgh City Art
Centre looked at his work alongside his friend and
colleague Johnny Maxwell whose introspection and
tiny surviving oeuvre could not be more different. But
Gillies saw his value and admired the very particularity
about his vision. The whimsy in Maxwell’s subject work
is in contrast with the rigour evident in Gillies’ still
life but what is shared between all three (as well as
McTaggart, Philipson and indeed the next generation
of the Edinburgh School: Blackadder, Houston and
Michie) is the emphasis on surface quality, strong
drawing, harmonious colour and the freedom to
embrace any subject matter. We are delighted to be
able to include significant consignments from private
collections, including from the late Roger Lloyd Pack,
whose stunning still life, Christmas Paper, 1967, is
one of the artist’s most successful watercolour still life
subjects and surely an influence on contemporary
work by Elizabeth Blackadder.
Anne Redpath was more outward in her gaze,
partly because of the necessity to make her way
as a professional artist and mother of three young
boys through the difficult War years, living back in
the Borders after more than ten years in France. In
its aftermath her star rose rapidly; the beginning of
the Edinburgh International Festival and the wealth
of exhibiting opportunities that emerged in the fifties
in Edinburgh, London, and Bristol, as well as with
the Arts Council of Great Britain, saw Redpath in
the vanguard. She was the direct descendent of
the Scottish Colourists, Peploe in particular, as she
demonstrated her extraordinary facility, colour sense
and unerring choice of subject. Latterly, her curiosity
and adventure found painterly fulfilment in long trips
to continental Europe, initially back to the France she
knew so well from the twenties but then on to Spain,
Venice, Portugal and the Canaries. These adventures
were always put to good use with sketchbooks filled,
objects found and brought back to the studio to enrich
her iconography. In the later years she was able to
respond to developments in international painting by
moving towards an undefined picture space in which
her flowers and vases merge into backgrounds built
up with the vigour and élan of Nicolas de Stael or
Antoni Tapies. In this exhibition we are able to include
a group of newly discovered paintings from the studio
of her son David Michie OBE, RSA and are grateful
to the family for their support and kind assistance.
Both painters were nurtured by a consistent
relationship with The Scottish Gallery, the reputation
of artists and Gallery, intimately intertwined. Gillies
and Redpath have rightly been understood to form
the twin pillars of the Edinburgh School, friends to so
many talents in the next generation, artist exemplars
of how anything was possible, that art mattered, that
painting was far from dead and that the pursuit of
beauty and significance was a worthwhile calling in
a rapidly changing world.
THE SCOTTISH GALLERY
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The sitter in this portrait is thought to be Dr Elsie
Bain, a friend who Redpath met while studying
in Edinburgh. Elsie Bain later became the
headmistress of Withington School in Manchester,
where Redpath made a number of portraits of
pupils. Elsie Bain is also the subject of the portrait
of Girl in a Red Cloak, now in the collection of
National Galleries of Scotland.
1 Portrait of a Woman, Knitting, c.1945-50
oil on board, 60.8 x 50.9 cms
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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5
2 Still Life with White Flowers and Fruit, c.1950
oil on board, 31.3 x 37.6 cms
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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7
3 Portrait of a Woman, c.1950
oil on board, 59 x 44 cms
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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4 Still Life with Patterns, c.1950
oil on board, 46.8 x 38 cms
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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A similar painting Pink House in Corsica is
illustrated in Patrick Bourne’s monograph on
the artist.
5 The Pink House, Corsica, c.1954
oil on board, 50.6 x 61 cms
signed lower left
provenance
Melrose’s Tea, c.1990; The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh
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6 Canaries, c.1960
oil on board, 36 x 45 cms
signed lower right
exhibited
Anne Redpath, Fifty, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 2015, cat. 24
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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7 Landscape in Canary Islands, c.1960
oil on board, 40 x 49 cms
signed lower right
exhibited
Anne Redpath, Worthing Art Gallery, Worthing, 1969, cat. 25
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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8 Anemones, c.1962
oil on panel, 38 x 51 cms
signed lower left
exhibited
Modern Masters I, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, July 2013, illus. p.55; Anne Redpath, Fifty, The
Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 2015, cat. 27
provenance
Dr Robert A. Lillie Collection, cat. 165; Private Collection, Toronto
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9 Still Life, Abstract, c.1962
oil on board, 41 x 51 cms
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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10Vase with Mixed Flowers, c.1962
oil on board, 35.6 x 28.5 cms
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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11The White Azalea, c.1963
oil on canvas, 51 x 61 cms
titled on label verso
exhibited
Anne Redpath, Fifty, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 2015, cat. 32
provenance
The Artist’s Family
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This painting embodies the best qualities of her
late period. A brilliant manipulation of paint,
the palette limited, with pale greens and blue
enlivening the dark and white composition.
12Royananthus and Honesty, c.1964
oil on canvas, 50.8 x 50.8 cms
signed lower left
exhibited
Christmas Exhibition, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 1964
provenance
Private Collection, London
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Anne Redpath
OBE, RSA, ARA, RWA
SELECTED BIOGRAPHY
1895
1913 1919
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1925
1928 1934
1939
1944
1946
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1965
Born in Galasheils. Daughter of Thomas Redpath & Agnes Milne. Thomas was a Tweed designer.
Enrols in Edinburgh College of Art.
Exhibited with the Edinburgh Group.
Travelling scholarship to Bruges, Paris, Florence and Siena.
Married James Michie a young architect and moved to St-Omer, France. Her sons Alistair and
Lindsay were both born in St-Omer.
Moved with family to Cap Ferrat.
Birth of third son David.
During her years in France she returned periodically with her sons to her parent’s home in Hawick.
Paintings exhibited at Hawick Arts Club, the RGI and the SSA.
The Michies returned to Scotland following the bankruptcy of Jim’s employer.
Elected a Professional Member of the SSA.
Moved to Beaconsfield Terrace following death of her father.
Elected President of the Scottish Society of Women Artists.
Visit to Skye with her friend the potter Katie Horsman.
Began to exhibit in London at the Royal Academy and the Royal Society of British Artists.
Moved to Mayfield Gardens, Edinburgh.
First solo exhibition with The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh.
Painting in Spain.
First woman painter elected to the Royal Scottish Academy.
Moved to London Road, Edinburgh.
Painting in Brittany, France (Concarneau and Treboul).
Painting in Corsica.
Awarded an OBE and Doctor of Law by Edinburgh University.
Painting in the Canary Islands.
Elected an Associate of the Royal Academy in London.
Painting in Portugal.
Painting in Venice.
Died in Edinburgh.
Right: Anne Redpath at her London Street studio, c.1960
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Published by The Scottish Gallery to coincide with the exhibition
Anne Redpath: A Dozen Paintings
2 - 26 November 2016
Exhibition can be viewed online at
www.scottish-gallery.co.uk/gilliesredpath
ISBN: 978-1-910264-46-2
Designed by www.kennethgray.co.uk
Photography by John McKenzie
Printed by J Thomson Colour Printers
All rights reserved. No part of this catalogue may be reproduced
in any form by print, photocopy or by any other means, without
the permission of the copyright holders and of the publishers
16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh EH3 6HZ
TEL 0131 558 1200 EMAIL [email protected]
www.scottish-gallery.co.uk
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