I. Lord Newton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Frontispiece
(National Gallery of Scotland)
II. Children of Mr and the Hon. Mrs Paterson of Castle Huntly
(In the possession of Chas. J. G. Paterson, Esq.)
III. Mrs Lauzun
(National Gallery, London)
IV. Mrs Campbell of Balliemore
(National Gallery of Scotland)
V. Professor Robison
(University of Edinburgh)
VI. John Tait of Harvieston and his Grandson
(In the possession of Mrs Pitman)
VII. Miss de Vismes
(In the possession of the Earl of Mansfield)
VIII. Mrs Scott Moncrieff
(National Gallery of Scotland)
[Illustration: Raeburn]
When in 1810, Henry Raeburn, then at the height of his powers, proposed
to settle in London, Lawrence dissuaded him. It is unnecessary, as it
would be unjust, to insinuate that the future President of the Royal
Academy had ulterior and personal motives in urging him to rest content
with his supremacy in the North. Raeburn was fifty-five at the time,
and, after his undisputed reign at home, even his generous nature might
have taken ill with the competition inseparable from such a venture.
Lawrence's advice was wise in many ways, and Raeburn, secure in the
admiration and constant patronage of his countrymen, lived his life to
the end unvexed by the petty jealousy of inferior rivals. Nor was
recognition confined to Scotland. Ultimately he was elected a member
of the Royal Academy, an honour all the more valued because
unsolicited. Yet, had the courtly Lawrence but known, acceptance of
his advice kept a greater than himself from London, and, it may be,
prevented the perpetuation and further development of that tradition of
noble portraiture of which Raeburn, with personal modifications, was
such a master. For long also it confined the Scottish painter's
reputation to his own country. Forty years after his death, his art
was so little known in England that the Redgraves, in their admirable
history of English painting, relegated him to a chapter headed "The
Contemporaries of Lawrence." Time brings its revenges, however, and of
late years Raeburn has taken a place in the very front rank of British
painters. And, if this recognition has been given tardily by English
critics, the reason is to be found in want of acquaintance with his
work. He had lived and painted solely in Scotland, and Scottish art,
like foreign art, so long as it remains at home, has little interest
for London, which, sure of its attractive power, sits arrogantly still
till art is brought to it. But Raeburn's work possesses that inherent
power, which, seen by comprehending eyes, compels admiration. The
Raeburn exhibition held in Edinburgh in 1876 was quite local in its
influence, but from time to time since then, at "The Old Masters" and
elsewhere, admirable examples have been shown in London; and recent
loan collections in Glasgow and Edinburgh, wherein his achievement was
very fully illustrated, were seen by large and cosmopolitan audiences.
And the better his work has become known, the more has it been
appreciated. Collectors and galleries at home and abroad are now
anxious to secure examples; dealers are as alert to buy as they are
keen to sell; prices have risen steadily from the very modest sums of
twenty years ago until fine pictures by him fetch as much as
representative specimens of Reynolds and Gainsborough. Fashion has had
much to do with this greatly enhanced reputation, but another, and more
commendable cause of the appreciation, not of the commercial value but
of the artistic merit of his work, lies in the fact that the qualities
which dominate it are those now held in highest esteem by artists and
lovers of art. Isolated though he was, Raeburn expressed himself in a
manner and achieved pictorial results which make his achievement
somewhat similar in kind to that of Velasquez and Hals.
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PLATE II.--CHILDREN OF MR AND THE HON. MRS PATERSON OF CASTLE HUNTLY.
(Charles J. G. Paterson, Esq.)
Painted within a year or two of Raeburn's return from Italy, some
critics have seen, or thought they saw, in this picture the influence
of Michael Angelo. Be this as it may, the handling, lighting, and tone
and disposition of the colour are eminently characteristic of much of
the work done by Raeburn about 1790.
[Illustration: Plate II.]
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I
If, during the last century, Scotland has shown exceptional activity in
the arts, especially in painting, and has produced a succession of
artists whose work is marked by able craftsmanship and emotional and
subjective qualities, which give it a distinctive place in modern
painting, the more than two hundred years which lay between the
Reformation and the advent of Raeburn seemed to hold little promise of
artistic development. During the Middle Ages and the renaissance the
internal condition of the country was too unsettled and its resources
were too meagre to make art widely possible. Strong castles and
beautiful churches were built here and there, but intermittent war on
the borders and fear of invasion kept even the more settled central
districts in a state of unrest. Moreover, the fierce barons were at
constant feud amongst themselves, and not infrequently the more
powerful amongst them were banded against the King. Of the first five
Jameses only the last died, and that miserably, in his bed. The innate
taste of the Stewarts, no doubt, created an atmosphere of culture in
the Court, and this tendency was further strengthened by commercial
relations with the Low Countries and political associations with
France. Poetry and scholarship were encouraged, if poorly
rewarded--one remembers Dunbar's unavailing poetical pleas for a
benefice--and relics and old records show that even in those stirring
times life was not without its refinements and tasteful accessories.
Yet only in the Church or for her service was there the quietude
necessary for art work of the higher kinds. Then came the Reformation
(during which much fine ecclesiastical furniture and decoration
perished) severing the connection of art with religion and sowing
distrust of art in any form.
Had the Union of the Crowns not taken place in 1603, it is possible
that the art of painting might have developed much earlier than it did.
No doubt that event brought healing to the long open sore caused and
inflamed by kingly ambitions and national animosities, but it removed
the Court to London, and with that some of the greatest nobles, while
the change in the religion of the ruling house from Presbyterianism to
Episcopacy, which followed, led to the Covenants and the religious
persecution, and drove the iron of ascetism into the souls of those
classes from whom artists mostly spring. Yet the logical rigidity of
the Calvinistic spirit, while taking much of the joy out of life and
opposing its manifestation in art, had certain compensating advantages.
Disciplining the mind, quickening the reasoning powers, and cultivating
that grasp of essentials which makes for success in almost any pursuit,
and not least in art, it helped very largely to make the Scot what he
is.
During the peaceful years which immediately followed the Union, there
was considerable activity in the building of country residences. Now
that the country was more settled these were less castles than
mansions, and the larger and better lighted apartments possible led to
a good deal of elaborate decoration. Of this Pinkie House (1613) with
its painted gallery is perhaps the most celebrated example. It is
difficult, however, to determine how much of this kind of work was done
by foreign, how much by native craftsmen, and as it seems to have
exerted little influence upon the one or two picture-painters who
emerged during the seventeenth century, one need not discuss the
probabilities. So far as has been discovered, the only link between
this phase of art and the other consists of the fact that George
Jamesone (1598?-1644), the first clearly recognisable Scottish artist,
was apprenticed in 1612 to one John Andersone "paynter" in Edinburgh,
whose decoration in Gordon Castle is mentioned by an old chronicler.
As might be expected in the circumstances the "Scottish Van Dyck," as
he is fondly called, was a portrait-painter. He was followed by a few
others, such as the Scougall family, Aikman Marshall, Wait, and the two
Alexanders, who, although neither so accomplished nor so much
appreciated as their precursor, form a never quite broken succession of
portraitists between him and Allan Ramsay (1713-84) in whose work art
in Scotland took a great step forward.[1] A few of Ramsay's
predecessors had succeeded in supplementing the meagre instruction--if
any thing that existed could be dignified by that name--to be obtained
in Scotland by a visit to the Low Countries or Italy, but Ramsay was
the first to obtain a sound technical training. The author of "The
Gentle Shepherd," to whom Edinburgh was indebted for its first
circulating library and its first play-house, encouraged his son's bent
for art, and after some preliminary study in London, Allan _fils_ was
sent to "The seat of the Beast" beyond the Alps, where he became a
pupil of Solimena and Imperiale and of the French Academy. Formed
under these influences, his style possesses no clearly marked national
trait, except it be the feeling for character which informs his finer
work and makes it, in a way, a link between that of Jamesone and that
of Raeburn. To this he added a delicate sense of tone and a tenderness
of colour and lighting, a gracefulness of drawing and a refined
accomplishment which were new in Scottish painting. His turn for charm
of pose and grace of motive was pronounced, and his portraitures mirror
very happily the mannered yet elegant social airs of the mid-eighteenth
century. More than that of any English painter of his day, his art
possesses "French elegance."
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