SCOTTISH PAINTING

New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 540, 28 October 1949, Page 14

SCOTTISH PAINTING

SCOTTISH ART, by Stanley Cursiter, C.B.E., R.S.A.; Harrap. English price, 17/6. HIS handsomely-produced book provides a record of Scottish painting (but not, despite the title, of any of the’ other arts) from earliest times to the end of the 19th Century. Its author was for 18 years director of the National Gallery of Scotland. ' The 48 full-page illustrations, many of which are in colour, show a high standard of reproduction. Looking through them, I must say that my strongest impression was of the excellence of the earlier work, and of the tailing off into illustration, and occasional vulgarity, towards the end, The detail from the Trinity College Altar-piece, Hugo Van

der Goes’s "Sir Edward Boncle," was painted in the middle of the 15th Century. It is a powerful piece of painting unsentimental, well simplified, and strong and original in design. When we set it beside the work of Orchardson or Pettie, its virtues shine even more brightly. These painters of the 19th Century, for all their technical competence, have lost the substance and retained the shadow of great art. Literary or merely sentimental associations are dominant. Scotland has a remarkable tradition: of portrait painting. Once again, we must go back to earlier times to see the liveliest and best work. The Scougalls, who painted in the 17th and early 18th Centuries, are represented by several fine portraits. Allan Ramsay’s paintings of women are sheer delight, and his "Sir Peter Halket Wedderburn" and "Hew Dalrymple" show that he could paint men almost as well. Then we come to Raeburn. What sensitivity, and what charm, the man exhibits! His portrait of William Ferguson of Kilrie is surely one of the most delicate, most appealing, representations of a human being ever put on canvas. ‘The well-known portraits of Mrs. Scott Moncrieff and Miss Lamont show him at the height of his confidence. These paintings have style, and spirit: they are like thoroughbred race-horses compared with the Clydesdales of a later period. The text is very full and circumstantial, and gives us a clear picture of the background against which Scottish painting was carried on. In the choice of illustrations the emphasis is placed on portraits: there is a little landscape, and some genre painting. The book is to be strongly recommended to students, as well as to’ those whose interest in art is more relaxed. The illustrations alone justify its being given a place on the

shelf,

A.R.D.

F.