Bourne Fine Art
Scottishness in Art: 1750-1980
5 July – 31 August 2013
William Hamilton RA, Mary, Queen of Scots
In ten works, this exhibition concisely explores the competing romanticism, rationalism and realism of Scottish art from 1750 – 1970. If Walter Scott created a literary idea of Scotland as the site of the romantic 'other', painters sought the images that would do the same for visual art.
The exhibition begins with William Hamilton’s c.1780 portrait of Mary, Queen of Scots, the archetype of the Scottish heroine-victim. This idea of the sensuous doomed queen was latched onto by many European painters of the Romantic period - the cult of Mary Stuart even predating Scott - helping to insinuate a particular perception of Scottishness into the artistic consciousness of Europe.
An alternative idea can be seen emerging in the depictions of Scotland pioneered by Alexander Nasmyth, who adopted the Italianate style he had seen in works by Claude and applied this to the wilds of Scottish landscapes. A very different national visual lexicon extends through the anti-romantic realities expressed in the work of painters from Sir David Wilkie to the Glasgow Boys, and from Arthur Melville to John Bellany, whilst the Enlightenment portraiture of Allan Ramsay and Sir Henry Raeburn offers a pantheon of the Scottish character.
Mon–Fri, 10am–6pm
Sat, 11am–2pm (4pm during August)
Free admission