Landscape painting, however, apart from such as was utilized in decorative schemes, had little or no public appreciators. Portraits and deeds of tragedy and valour seemed to occupy the artists’ minds; yet, like the curlew’s haunting note on loch and mountain side, there was an influence astir towards more peaceful scenes, a call that knew no limited geography, no definite law. In Ayrshire, Robert Burns (1759-1796) was weaving his nature songs; while Alexander Nasmyth (1758-1840), in Midlothian, was preparing his palette to capture similar themes in paint. But perhaps the greatest impetus given to a wider public appreciation of the scenery of his own country was the publication in 1810 of Sir Walter Scott’s “Lady of the Lake,” followed in 1814 by his more distinguished “Waverley Novels.” Yet previous to that universal awakening, in 1793 Alexander Nasmyth resigned his portrait and figure work for that of landscape, and it is from that period that this branch of painting in oils most vigorously commenced; while apart from the use of water-colour by topographical artists, perhaps the first few landscapes of importance were of a slightly earlier date, by the renowned architect Robert Adam (1728-1792). Not, however, until the time of Hugh William Williams (1773-1829) did the art become more pictorially practised. As Nasmyth has been credited with being the father of Scottish landscape painting in oils, Hugh William Williams might be more universally noted as, if not the father, at least one of the principal pioneers of landscape painting in water-colours. Taking a short extract from a criticism of an exhibition of his work in that medium opened in Edinburgh in 1822, the writer states: “There is room for more unqualified praise than in the works of any single artist in landscape painting to which this country has yet given birth.” Williams, however, was of Welsh parentage and born on board his father’s ship when at sea, his early upbringing being entrusted to an Italian grandfather in Edinburgh, where his name as an exhibitor and water-colour painter became prominent in 1810. His successes at that time enabled him to undertake a long sojourn in Italy and Greece, of which he published an account in 1820 illustrated with engravings and some of his own drawings, following it up with his exhibition in 1822 almost entirely composed of work done during his continental travels. Artistically his paintings are distinctly personal, and technically they are treated with broad simple washes over delicately outlined compositions. Another artist of the period remembered for his water-colour work was Andrew Wilson, born in Edinburgh (1780-1848), who, after a varied art life in Italy and England, occupied the post of master in the Trustees Academy of his native city in 1818. It was during this year that the remarkable David Roberts, who is said to have had a week’s tuition under Wilson, started to exhibit his famed architectural subjects; while a few years later Andrew Donaldson, whose work in the style of Prout, and little known beyond Glasgow, contributed in no slight degree to the advancement of water-colour painting in that city.
It was not, however, until 1832 that the water-colour landscapes of William Leighton Leitch began to make their public appearance, and biographical records place this artist and Williams as the two most prominent water-colour painters in Scotland in those days. From a Glasgow weaver to house-painter and scene-painter, ultimately instructing the Queen and other members of the Royal Household, Leitch’s life was certainly inspiring to young enthusiasts, and his work being of rather the “pretty” order was undoubtedly popular. But England claimed the later and more important days of his life.
To revive more distinctly local Scottish memories one must turn to the name of Thomas Fairbairn (1821-1885). Originally a shop-lad with a firm of dyers in Glasgow, Fairbairn had no rose-paved road to travel to attain his desires, and it is by his sketches of old houses and localities around Glasgow that he at first became known, and latterly by his literal paintings of forest scenery. Attracted by the wealth of subject at Cadzow, in Hamilton, it was there that in 1852 he met Sam Bough, who greatly influenced his further artistic outlook, as the English borderer did that of many other painters, and who twenty-three years later was lauded as being one of the most important figures in Scottish art.
Another prominent artist at the time was J. Crawford Wintour (1825-1882) who, though chiefly concerned with oil painting, showed his rarest artistic achievements in water-colour landscapes. To him and Bough the credit is due for creating a greater interest in that medium and branch of art than it had hitherto enjoyed. Nevertheless the various exhibitions gave but scanty appreciation to the water-colour painters. In their organizers’ minds the medium employed seemed to be rated higher than a work of art, despite water-colour being the one almost entirely employed by the supreme artists of China and Japan. Works in it were exhibitionally a little less than ignored, with the result that in Glasgow on December 21, 1877, ten enthusiasts held the first preliminary meeting of the now important Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Water-Colours. The only member of that faithful gathering now living is the Society’s present Vice-President, A. K. Brown, R.S.A. It was not, however, until two months later that the Society was definitely formed, due to the proposition of Sir Francis Powell and seconded by William McTaggart, Powell being elected its first president and the virile Sam Bough vice-president on March 4, 1878. In November of the same year the new Society held its first exhibition in which 172 pictures were shown; and in February 1888, as the only representative art body of its kind in Scotland, it was empowered to use the prefix “Royal.” Its present membership numbers seventy-nine, of which eight are honorary, under the presidency of E. A. Walton, R.S.A. That the Society has been the means of promoting a wider public interest in water-colour painting in Scotland has been clearly evinced, and of recent years its exhibitions (now and again not entirely confined to the work of its members) have unquestionably stimulated a general interest in the art. Yet the day seems still far off when a more united appreciation will be based on a picture as a work of art, regardless of the value placed upon the medium in which it is produced.
In comparison with the old water-colourists’ slightly tinted drawings, p the chief elements most markedly notable in the modern development are the more extensively varied methods employed, aided considerably by the scientifically discovered greater range and assured permanency of pigments and materials. Technically, I think, the art of painting is closely allied to the art of acting; the actor utilizes voice and make-up according to the emotions and character he wishes to express, in the same way that the painter’s subject and thought to be fully indicated call for a process and technique affinitive with them. Within recent years it became the fashion amongst water-colour artists to strain the medium beyond its limited powers, the result being heavily framed works competing in a feeble way with oils, and subjects that would certainly have been better rendered artistically had this medium been employed.
With the exception of the work of De Wint and Cox, the greatest influence recognizable in the work of many of the Scottish water-colourists is of Dutch origin and easily traced to such masters as Anton Mauve, Josef Israëls, Bosboom and the Maris brothers; so much so in fact that with certain artists it has been difficult to discern the difference between many of their own paintings and those of the men by whom they were so obviously inspired. The method employed was as follows: after the drawing had been roughly suggested, the paper was submitted to a tubbing and scrubbing, so that the colour ate its way in until finally more direct and stronger touches were applied, desired lighter portions being wiped out while wet, or slicked up with a little body-colour. The method, though losing much that is inherently beautiful in water-colour, is nevertheless one which most aptly suggests certain phases of landscape dealing with poetic sentiment and mystery.
The one perfect artist in Scotland who most originally adopted the process was Arthur Melville (1855-1904). What good there was in it he certainly extracted; Melville, too, seldom resorted to the aid of body-colour. I have known him, if unsatisfied with any portion of his painting, to deliberately cut it out and dexterously insert a fresh piece of paper, and much trouble and experience went to bring about the apparent ease with which his work appears to have been done.
Another method extremely popular with some artists, though perhaps practised more on the Continent, was the almost entire use of body-colour on a tinted ground, a method which brings water-colour painting into a closer relation to that of oils. In other than capable hands it has a tendency to lack freshness, giving an opaque and chalky quality to the work. But when used by a few artists in this country who have fully realized its possibilities and limitations, some excellent results have been achieved, pre-eminent amongst them being those by the Newcastle artist, Joseph Crawhall, by whom his many Scottish associates were inspired to a remarkable degree. His paintings, principally of birds and animal life, in the various exhibitions were always outstanding, and to-day there is little if any work of this character being done that can surpass it.
Water-colour, however, used direct without the assistance of scrubbing, scraping and body-colour shows without question the medium at its best. As a process used in what is termed the purist’s method, there certainly is no other that can compete with it for affinitive landscapes, and what has been done even experimentally in it, by other than water-colour artists, represents, perhaps, the finest examples of genuine art they have left us. With the exception of the short-lived George Manson (1850-1876), Tom Scott, R.S.A., R. B. Nisbet, R.S.A., and Ewen Geddes, R.S.W., one might safely say that all the Scottish water-colourists are equally conversant with oils, though in recent years Nisbet has been devoting much of his time to the latter medium.
Perhaps the first artist in Scotland to realize the brilliancy of Nature in water-colour was the late William McTaggart (1835-1910); his landscapes are all veritably untricked effects of the land’s and sea’s sunlit and wind-swept moods in which his spontaneous and untrammelled method aided to a considerable extent his ability to maintain the high artistic quality of his pictures in oils.