Alexander Meddowes Fine Art Broker is proud to present
“UNSEEN WORKS” by
The Scottish Colourist John Duncan Fergusson (1874 -1961)
2nd December 2013 - 10th January 2014 Monday to Friday 10am - 4pm or by appointment Works may be purchased on receipt of the catalogue and viewed on the website www.alexandermeddowes.com
39 Royal Terrace, Edinburgh, EH7 5AH Tel: 0131 558 1000 Fax: 0131 556 3682 email: am@alexandermeddowes.com www.alexandermeddowes.com
Published by © ALEXANDER MEDDOWES FINE ART BROKER ISBN: 978-0-9548392-8-4
“UNSEEN WORKS� Acknowledgements This exhibition is a collection of 134 previously unseen works by the Scottish Colourist John Duncan Fergusson, 1874-1961. The collection has an impeccable provenance, coming directly from Fergusson and his wife Meg Morris Fergusson to the current owners. The works have never been exhibited, or seen before and are a collection that spans a period of over sixty years, commencing in Edinburgh 1897 to Fergusson's time in Antibes in 1959. We are most grateful to Elizabeth S.Cumming for her tireless research and assistance in compiling the catalogue and documenting all the entries, also to Iain Gale, Author and Art Critic, for his splendid introduction.
This catalogue is kindly supported by RK Harrison Group Ltd
Catalogue reference No.38
Introduction
O
f all the four Scottish Colourists, Peploe, Cadell, Hunter and himself, John Duncan Fergusson is arguably the closest to what we might perceive today as a ‘modern’ artist. Self-consciously innovatory, keen to embrace new ideas and absorbed in a complex philosophical approach to his art, Fergusson might be seen to epitomise the ideals of that hubristic cultural golden age before the Great War. It is nine years since Alexander Meddowes showed a notable group of Fergusson drawings from a private collection to great acclaim and it is not unreasonable to suggest that this new and hitherto unseen group surpasses even that. From the magnificent sculpture Plénitude d’Olivier to the tiniest of the sketches, every one of these works offers an unique insight into Fergusson’s achievement. For all his formal considerations, Fergusson was at heart a figurative artist, concerned with depicting the observed world and its sensations on paper and canvas. The art of capturing any likeness or character lies in knowing where to stop and this ability Fergusson possessed in spades. In even the smallest stroke of the brush or pencil it is possible to see the innate verve and spark that informs his entire oeuvre. Drawing was always at the centre of Fergusson’s work. It is significant that on his return to London in 1912 he should have chosen to hold an exhibition devoted to his drawings and it is clear that he saw this often relegated medium as just as significant and expressive as painting. Whatever the notions that drove him, it was drawing that gave him a way in. Art for Fergusson was a creative reaction to the physicality and spirituality of life and the most spontaneous manifestation of that reaction was putting pencil to paper. He carried his sketchbook everywhere and didn’t miss a thing, adept at catching the sitter apparently unawares or at what might be an awkward moment. Paris in the Belle Epoque provided a rich seam of material and a half hour sitting in the Café du Dome or Café d’Harcourt might yield several different studies. The earliest works here, dating from the 1890s, are as we might expect the most formal, executed in a style of realism that owes much to the French salons and the Glasgow Boys. But they are vital to our understanding the artist’s development.
There is an extraordinary tenderness in Fergusson’s simple portraits of his family and a glimpse of the compositional and tonal values he would bring to his later work. Tellingly, a portrait of his uncle, The Gamekeeper, possesses, just in the deft swirl of smoke curling from his pipe, something of Fergusson’s later fluidity and innovation. The contrast between these early works and the group dated 1907 is no less than astonishing. Stylised and almost Byzantine in their treatment, his studies of Anne Estelle Rice demonstrate the leap that Fergusson’s style took in just a few years, clearly influenced by the work and theory of Cézanne and Matisse. By 1909 his depictions of a man ordering in a Paris café reduce the customer and waitress to a series of forms. But again it is his ability with a single stroke of the pencil to convey emotion which is most striking. Take for instance his sketch of Rice in which he catches her face half turned towards him and with just a few lines is able to make her eyes and her lips suggest a smile that speaks volumes about their relationship. In these drawings we can observe as well as in any painting the artist’s next move to an almost Vorticist angularity and primitivism. It is also possible to detect how, having met the dancer Margaret Morris in 1913, Fergusson harnesses this severity and tames it to his own more sensual aesthetic in the series of heads of Morris’s dancers, made between 1917 and 1919. This aesthetic is more fully expressed in Plénitude d’Olivier a hugely important piece, deserving a place in a public collection. A perhaps unexpected inclusion is the Portsmouth sketchbook of 1918 in which Fergusson applies his stylistic principles and a Futurist fascination with machinery to a historically significant series of drawings of the Fleet, made at the close of the Great War. Finally, in a very late group of watercolours from the 1950s, Fergusson demonstrates his abiding faith in the principles exemplified in his Rhythm of 1911 rooted in an essentially Bergsonian belief in the harmony of nature. Overall, this is a quite extraordinary private collection, the like of which appears only very rarely. As the National Galleries show Fergusson’s paintings at their very finest, here is a chance for an intimate encounter with the man himself. For how much closer can we ever come to an artist than to engage at close quarters with the product of that magical moment when pencil touches paper? Iain Gale Author and Art Critic
Catalogue Drawings Unless stated otherwise, inscriptions verso are not in the hand of the artist, but of the current owner, for many years a close friend. Illustrated drawings are marked with an asterisk (*). All sizes are approximate, as since the cataloguing the drawings have been mounted on conservation board and framed and glazed in polished oak frames.
1
3*
Portrait of a Woman, in a High Necked Dress circa 1895. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
Fergusson was the eldest of a family of four. This early drawing probably shows one of Fergusson’s two sisters, Elizabeth and Christina, at home in Edinburgh. The neat style of dress and hair is of the mid-1890s and is very different from the elegance and panache of Parisian style which the artist would celebrate in the 1900s. 2*
Christina Ferguson 1897, with inscription on reverse, Fergusson’s Mother 1897. Conté 30.9 x 22 cms
The sketch of Christina Ferguson was probably made at the same time as catalogue no.2. His mother encouraged his interest in art from an early age, taking him to Edinburgh museums, and later would persuade his father to give him the means to visit Paris. The drawing records the effect of light as it illuminates Mrs Ferguson’s face. It is also a quick study of a woman whose hat is a key part of her dress. In this, it anticipates many of the artist’s Paris studies of a decade later.
Christina Ferguson, the Artist’s Mother 1897, with inscription on reverse, Fergus’s Mother 1897, J D Fergusson. Conté 30.9 x 20.7 cms
Christina Ferguson (born1845) had married John Ferguson in 1870. They both came from Perthshire and were Gaelic speakers which would influence their son’s mature attitude to his Highland ancestry. They settled in Leith where Fergusson was born in 1874. This shadowy, semi-impressionist quick sketch is typical of his early work, using pencil shading to indicate the essentials of form. This way of working shows his awareness of Scottish artists such as James Guthrie and Robert Brough as well as French painters with their delight in atmosphere and capturing a moment in time.
4*
Catalogue reference No.2
Catalogue reference No.4
Catalogue reference No.5
Catalogue reference No.6
The Game Keeper, Perthshire circa 1899, with inscription on reverse, The Game Keeper, Perthshire Fergus’s Uncle, Edinburgh c.1899. Conté 30.9 x 25 cms
This close study of a man’s head is probably a portrait of Fergusson’s uncle whom he saw on visits to the Perthshire members of his family (see 9).
8
5*
Portrait of a Woman in a Large Hat circa 1900. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
8
An atmospheric study in summer sunshine and shade, the drawing used the quick, finer hatching typical of Fergusson’s early, more academic work. The sitter was obviously known to Fergusson but is unidentified as she does not resemble any known early Edinburgh sitter such as Jean Maconachie, Fergusson’s early partner and frequent model. 6*
Fergusson’s father, John Ferguson (1839-1906) was born in Logierait in Perthshire. He later became a wine and spirit merchant in Leith (72 Shore) and then at 73 Cockburn Street, Edinburgh. Fergusson, the eldest of the four children and elder son of John and Christina Ferguson, was born at 7 Crown Street, Leith. As the family grew the family moved to addresses in Ferry Road, East Hermitage Place and finally to 16 East Claremont Street.
Portrait of a Man in Top Hat and Ulster Coat circa 1900-03. Conté 31 x 25 cms
This study of a man resting captures the atmosphere of turn-of-the-century Edinburgh. There is some ambiguity about the social class of the sitter who may be a coachman or a gentleman: that would never be a concern of the artist. 7*
Full Length Portrait of John Ferguson, John Duncan Fergusson’s Father, in a Cape, Top Hat and leaning on a Stick circa 1900. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
9*
The Gamekeeper in Perthshire, Portrait of Fergus’s Uncle in an Ulster Coat circa 1900. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
Catalogue reference No.3
Catalogue reference No.13
Fergusson’s uncle remained in his native Perthshire where he was employed as an estate gamekeeper. This is one of two drawings of him in the exhibition. Fergusson was attracted by the sculptural form of the Ulster which he would also have associated with illustrations to Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories of Sherlock Holmes published in The Strand magazine. (see 4)
Edinburgh in the Snow circa 1900-03. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
This evocative vignette captures a quiet corner on the edge of Edinburgh’s New Town after a snowfall. The tall format of the composition is chosen to emphasise the buildings and contrast the tenement block to the left with the church. Fergusson firmly draws a rectangular outline to frame his composition in the manner of a modern print. This device would be used for many of his future landscape compositions (including the Portsmouth series of 1918) as can be seen elsewhere in this exhibition.
10
Catalogue reference No.11
Catalogue reference No.9
10
Study of an Actor, Full Length in Frock Coat, Knee Breeches circa 1900. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
13* The Last Portrait of the Artist’s Father 1905, with inscription on reverse, The Last Portrait of his Father 1905. Conté 30.9 x 25 cms
Like many artists Fergusson was attracted to the theatre and performance. He often visited Edinburgh music halls such as Old Moss’s Music Hall. This seems rather to show a character costumed for a theatrical performance. Although less clearly defined, the actor on stage is the same figure as that of two head studies also shown in the exhibition (11, 12).
In 1905 Fergusson had yet to settle in France, which he would only do in 1907, the year following his father’s death. The move was supported financially by his inheritance and by the sale of a small sailing boat. 14* Le Touquet Paris-Plage 1907, with annotations and inscription on reverse, Le Touquet Paris Plage 1907, J D Fergusson. Conté 12.5 x 20.5 cms
11* Study of an Actor circa 1895-1900. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
In the mid-1900s Fergusson spent some weeks each summer in the resorts on the northern French coastal resorts where he was regularly joined by his friend S J Peploe. They relaxed and sketched holidaymakers as part of their recording of local atmosphere. This delightfully free drawing captures a real sense of place as two women pause on a walk with their children and a dog. Fergusson had come to appreciate all aspects of French culture from an early age, thanks to his French master at his boarding school, Blair Lodge near Linlithgow. This would henceforth be central to his outlook on life.
Fergusson is known to have made three drawings of this striking actor and was obviously attracted by his strong and expressive facial features matched by the man’s unruly hair. This is the most animated of the group of studies. 12
Profile of an Actor circa 1900. Conté 31.2 x 25 cms
This third study of the actor concentrates on his face and expression which is again sharpened by placing him against a dark background, as he would appear on stage. Edinburgh at this time had a number of popular theatres and music halls including the Royal Lyceum theatre where famous actors such as Sir Henry Irving to whom this actor, although younger, bears a degree of resemblance, are known to have played.
Catalogue reference No.34
Catalogue reference No.35
12
Catalogue reference No.7
Paris and Anne Estelle Rice Anne Estelle Rice (1877-1959) met Fergusson in the summer of 1907 at the resort in north-east France. The earliest drawings of her are from Paris-Plage and therefore it seems likely this was their meeting place. Meeting Rice was clearly a factor which, with his father’s inheritance, helped determine Fergusson’s decision to live for his art in Paris. Rice was an artist-illustrator based in Philadelphia who had been sent to Paris in the autumn of 1905 to cover the couture collections for the Wanamaker store magazine. From 1909 she would also work on mural panels for the store. Her relationship with Fergusson, both personal and artistic, was extremely close and lasted until 1913. Following the start of Fergusson’s relationship with Margaret Morris, Rice married the writer and critic Raymond Drey and settled in London. As Rice’s biographer Carol Nathanson has recorded, her relationship with Fergusson formed the basis for the artists Ellen Adams Wrynn and Keir McKail in fellow American writer Theodore Dreiser’s short story ‘Ellen Adams Wrynn’ in A Gallery of Women (1929) and as early as 1913 as artists ‘Miss N’ and ‘Mr McG’ in his A Traveller at Forty. Although the figures are represented as gender stereotypes, there is more than a glimpse of their characters and their lives in these two writings. In Paris both Fergusson and Rice would exhibit at the progressive Salon d’Automne and the Salon des Indépendants, a measure of their acceptance and standing in Parisian art circles. They also taught part-time at the aptly-named École de la Palette, a school which attracted many English-speaking students from Britain, America and Canada including Jessica Dismorr, William Zorach and Emily Carr. For a period between about 1909 and 1912 the drawings of Rice and Fergusson were similar – expressive outlining and hatched shading using conté, a stick combination of graphite and clay which gave versatility in linear values and contour shading. Many of the drawings in this exhibition use this medium.
Catalogue reference No.16
Catalogue reference No.15
In addition, their painting technique in this period was to be also related – bold blue or red outlining of form and hatched vibrant colour combined with the vigour of a Fauvist technique – whether painting still life, city life, landscape or more academic subjects. This ‘rhythmist’ method of working concentrated on line as much as form and colour. It was decorative but equally underpinned by a desire to go beyond a simple patterning of surface to express a sense of solidity and communicate a wholeness of life. Looking, understanding, feeling and drawing were thus of equal and essential value to them. Understandably, Rice provided a ready model for Fergusson throughout the years 1907 to 1913. Many of his drawings and paintings of her, as might be expected, are from the first year of their relationship.
14
Catalogue reference No.17
Catalogue reference No.22
15* Anne Estelle Rice Paris 1907, with inscription on reverse, Anne Estelle Rice Paris 1907, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.2 x 10.6 cms
18* Portrait of Anne Estelle Rice, Paris 1907. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
The model here is the same as in the previous drawing. Fergusson creates his composition from the partially undone hair and the buttons of the girl’s blouse which together perfectly frame the face.
Fergusson and Rice’s relationship would last from their meeting in 1907 until late 1913, the year he met the London dancer Margaret Morris who was then visiting Paris with her young dance troupe. Some of the drawings shown here are intimate sketches – Rice does not wear a hat or seek to present an elegant figure. Rather she is simply herself in the company of an artist friend and lover whom she trusts implicitly.
19
Portrait of Anne Estelle Rice, Paris 1907. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
A less glamorous drawing, perhaps, than some others displayed here, but this study of Fergusson’s partner captures something of her intelligence and lively character and the typical smile which is found in most portraits of her.
16* Anne Estelle Rice Paris 1907, with inscription on reverse, Anne Estelle Rice Paris 1907, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.2 x 10.5 cms
20
Fergusson’s friend and partner was often sketched as they relaxed in the cafés of Montparnasse. She wears her hair pinned up using what were known as ‘rats’, pads made of horsehair or a similar natural material. This hairstyle complemented the high neck of a dress or coat and the increasingly slim silhouette of the late 1900s. Above all, this informal drawing simply captures Rice’s beauty.
Catalogue reference No.24
Portrait of a Woman in a Hat, Paris 1907. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
This drawing may be a study of Rice’s colleague Elizabeth Dryden (see cat. 22). She wears her relatively small hat at a jaunty angle which has intrigued the artist. This is one of Fergusson’s quick sketches of hats – and their wearers – in Paris. 21* Still Life, Paris 1907. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
17* Portrait of a Woman, Paris 1907. Conté 20.1 x 10.4 cms
Catalogue reference No.39
A simple sketch of a typical café scene: a drink has been consumed, the glass is now more than half empty, the soda siphon ditto, and a half-read newspaper has been laid aside on the table.
From her relaxed expression and half-undone hair the woman represented here is probably Anne Estelle Rice.
16
Catalogue reference No.14
22* Profile of a Woman in a Hat, Paris 1907. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
24* In a Paris Café 1907, with inscription on reverse, In Paris Café 1907, J D Fergusson. Pencil 11.5 x 13.3 cms
The hat comes into its own to complete this elegant profile study of a woman. Fergusson’s interest in the hat as a key form of feminine attire in these years reflected the professional interest of Rice and her style of commercial fashion drawing. The hat is worn with the elegance associated with Elizabeth Dryden (?-1932), a fashion writer originally from Baltimore, Maryland, whose family had moved to Philadelphia in the 1890s. She had been commissioned in 1905 by the Philadelphia newspaper The North American to go to Paris to send in fashion articles with illustrations by Rice. The two Americans settled in the French capital that year, two years before either met Fergusson. Portraits of Dryden by Fergusson include The Hat with the Pink Scarf (1907) and Portrait of Miss D. (circa 1907-08, both Fergusson Gallery, Perth) and The Red Shawl (1908, University of Stirling).
Fergusson enjoyed relaxing in café society. In Paris poets, writers and artists spent their evenings – and days – discussing ideas and life. Popular café restaurants included L’Avenue on the Boulevard Raspail (a thoroughfare where Fergusson’s friend S J Peploe would take a studio when he too settled in Paris in 1910) and the Dôme on the corner with the Boulevard Montparnasse. In these a coffee or, as here, a carafe of wine could last hours without pressure from the proprietor. La Rotonde, established in 1911 by Victor Libion on the corner directly opposite the Dôme, would become particularly famous for this. Of all cafés, L’Avenue is known to have been one where Fergusson often relaxed of an evening. 25
23
Une Petite Menthe Sucrée a l’Ecu, Paris 1907, with inscription on reverse, Une Petite Menthe Sucree a l’ecu Paris 1907. Pencil with cut corners 13.2 x 11.5 cms
Catalogue reference No.21
Catalogue reference No.27
Catalogue reference No.45
Catalogue reference No.26
Friendly Group, Paris-Plage 1907, with inscription on reverse, Friendly Group Paris Plage 1907, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 12.9 cms
Fergusson captures a moment in time. Has he called out to these people – or are they simply waiting for him? They turn to greet the artist in a quick sketch of holidaymakers in the resort of Paris-Plage. The drawing emphasises how Fergusson always had a pocket sketchbook to hand for recording places and people.
This beautifully delicate drawing shows an occupied table by the window of a café. As well as recording the moment it is a study of a variety of forms and femininity of the neck, profile and hat as the unknown Parisienne, perhaps a milliner who frequented the Café d’Harcourt, enjoys her petite menthe, a sweet crème de menthe drink.
18
26* The Orchestra, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x13.4 cms
28
Fergusson enjoyed theatre and musical entertainment and is famously known to have seen stage productions of the Ballets Russes. However he also often attended concerts and the theatre. The Opéra in Paris provided a range of potential subjects in its audience – several drawings of whom are also exhibited - but also in the performing members of the orchestra in the pit. In drawing the latter, Fergusson was engaging with his wide interest in the arts and following in the footsteps of such French artists as Degas. Here, as Fergusson waits for an orchestra to perform, he captures the violin section poised to play. The conductor is seen in the background as he walks through the orchestra to take his place on the podium.
Portrait of a Woman in a Brimmed Hat, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x 13.4 cms
By late 1907 Fergusson’s fascination with hats was fixed, and he enjoyed their sheer variety and individuality. 29* Woman in a Feathered Large Hat, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x 13.4 cms
The stylish sitter may again be fashion writer Elizabeth Dryden (20, 22). During the mid1900s hats became extremely exotic, and were often elaborately decirated with large feathers, and at times even a small stuffed bird such as a hummingbird. Two of Fergusson’s well-known oil portraits of Rice from this period, Hat with Bird (Glasgow Life (Museums)) and The Green Hat (Duncan R. Miller Fine Arts, London) also delight in the texture and form of a hat flamboyantly topped by feathers. This study though not of Rice nonetheless illustrates the elegance of Paris fashion, here set off by the artist’s hatched shading behind the head and shoulders.
27* Waiter serving in a Café, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x13.4 cms
A waiter pausing during service here provides a model for a quick sketch. Fergusson is known to have regularly dined in several Left Bank cafés close to his apartment at 83 rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs. Most often, according to his sculptor friend Jo Davidson, they ate at Boudet’s on the Boulevard Raspail. There they usually took the corner table where, in Fergusson’s words, they were ‘mothered by the waitress Augustine, a wonderful young woman from the Côte-d’Or, very good-looking with calm, live, dark eyes and crisp, curly, black hair - very strong and well made, a character as generous as the finest Burgundy: a perfect type of that great woman, the French paysanne’. If the artists arrived late, tired and hungry, Augustine would even go to the butcher’s to buy a good chateaubriand, cook and present it ‘as if you had a perfect right to be an artist’.
Catalogue reference No.29
Catalogue reference No.33
Catalogue reference No.30
Catalogue reference No.42
30* Woman in a Bonnet with Flowers, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x 13.4 cms
This delightful study of a decorated hat shows how such apparel could perfectly frame a girl’s face. Fergusson turns it into a study in line and pattern, drawing the girl’s haircurls, brooch and blouse edging with the same swift marks as he applies to the flowers on her bonnet.
20
31* Portrait of a Woman, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x 13.4 cms
34* A Paris Street, 1907-10. Conté 21.6 x 16.9 cms
The face is drawn swiftly, the hat indicated with minimal application of the conté crayon in this café sketch. The face with its strong eyebrows has obviously fascinated Fergusson.
Fergusson, with his keen interest in both places and people and delight in form, here drew a busy corner where streets meet. The main attraction here was the building which speaks of French design, a traditional townhouse with its high-pitched roof and shuttered windows.
32
Elderly Gentleman with a Bowler Hat in his right Hand, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x 13.4 cms
35* Paris-Plage Le Touquet 1907, with inscription on reverse, Paris Plage Le Touquet 1907, J D Fergusson. Conté 21.6 x 17.1 cms
If not joining friends in a café of an evening Fergusson often sketched couples and single men arriving at the theatre, a concert or a ballet. A number of such drawings in ink or conté crayon are in many museum collections including the Hunterian Art Gallery at the University of Glasgow and the Fergusson Gallery in Perth. This effective conté sketch is a study in the form of an elderly man arriving at a performance – the black form of his suit indicating his generous frame.
The sketch would have been made when Fergusson was painting with Peploe in northern France in the summer of 1907 and met Anne Estelle Rice and Elizabeth Dryden, both to be the subjects for a number of subsequent paintings. This quick, loose sketch, with his trademark outline is a simple recording of the town, its buildings and people.
33* Portrait of a Woman, Paris 1907. Conté 21 x 13.4 cms
Catalogue reference No.31
Catalogue reference No.44
36* Café, Paris 1908-09. Conté 16 x 9.3 cms
This is probably a study of Anne Estelle Rice, seated opposite Fergusson in a café or a restaurant. She would not have gone out in Paris without a hat, those drawings where she does not wear one would have been made at a later stage of the afternoon or evening. Although a number of drawings shown here present her without one, the shapes and styles of a hat were of much interest to Rice. From her first visit to Paris she had sent illustrations of such fashions home to Philadelphia’s Wanamaker magazine The North American. Their design evolved from season to season but at the same time expressed a wearer’s character. The styles of hats worn by Rice herself (and the way they were worn) were equally varied.
In this typically atmospheric café sketch a single man orders food or a drink from a waitress, observed by Fergusson. The waitress wears the white cap and apron which were standard at the time. The café, or restaurant may well be Boudet’s on the Boulevard Raspail where Fergusson ate most nights, His friend the sculptor Jo Davidson, writing in his autobiography, recalled the Scot’s usual meal of a ‘Chateaubriand garni, à 90 centimes, et gateau de riz’ (steak with vegetables, for 90 centimes, and rice pudding).
22
Catalogue reference No.43
Catalogue reference No.38
37
Waiting, Paris 1908-09. Conté 16.3 x 9.7 cms
41* Man in a Hat Paris 1908-09. Conté 13 x 11.8 cms
The exact location is unknown as a woman relaxes in obvious anticipation of something. Is she seated on a bed or a couch, who or what is she expecting? These unknown aspects only add to the delicacy of this charming drawing.
The figure is relaxing in a cafe, possibly one of five near Fergusson’s Montparnasse studio, L’Avenue, the Closerie des Lilas, the Dôme or the Hole in the Wall. His circle included the Irish writer and poet Hall Ruffy whom this drawing may well represent.
38* J D Fergusson and Anne Estelle Rice, Paris 1908-09. Conté 17.3 x 10.8 cms
42* Woman’s Portrait in a Hat, Paris 1907-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
This relaxed portrait of a couple may possibly represent Fergusson and Rice as he saw themselves although they may simply be a couple observed one evening in a café or theatre. The image is simply one of relaxation.
It is again likely that the woman represented here may be Rice but there is no proof of her identity. 43* Tying the Tie Paris 1909, with inscription on reverse, Tying the Tie Paris 1909. Conté 20.8 x 12 cms
39* Figures Promenading, Paris 1909. Conté and pencil with annotations 13 x 11.5 cms
Catalogue reference No.49
This private moment was overseen perhaps in a café or restaurant. Fergusson was always interested in observing the niceties of relationships around him as he observed society at play.
An evening in Paris. A couple stroll past a corner café which, judging by the visible awning, may well be the Café d’Harcourt. A horse and cart are about to appear into view from the left. The scene captures the sight and almost the sound of the French capital at night. 40
Catalogue reference No.48
44* Man socialising with a Woman in a Hat, Paris 1907-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
Café, Paris 1908-09. Pencil with annotations 13.2 x 11.5 cms
In this atmospheric sketch a couple dance at a café, the woman talking animatedly as she is swept around the floor.
The seated woman wears a decorated hat. The scene is possibly the Café d’Harcourt which was frequented by milliners who wore their own creations and were painted from the late 1890s by a number of artists. Fergusson painted it in oils twice for exhibition at the Salon d’Automne. Balloons and a fountain are noted here.
24
Catalogue reference No.41
Catalogue reference No.46
45* Café Scene, Paris circa 1908. Conté with annotations 20.9 x 13.3 cms
48* Portrait of a Woman in a Hat, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
The drawing has an unusual composition but one which again lends atmosphere to the scene. In this particular café a violinist plays for the customers. The elaborate hats – especially one dominating the lower foreground – and the musician beyond her may identify it as the Café d’Harcourt, well known for its noisy Hungarian musicians. The Café d’Harcourt (famously captured in Fergusson’s oil painting La Terrasse, Café d’Harcourt ) on the Boulevard Saint Michel was one frequented by the young local milliners who designed and made their own (and usually very elaborately decorated) hats, giving the place a quite unique atmosphere. The sketch captures the busy atmosphere of just such a place.
At times a hat might be a trifle large to serve as an effective frame for the face, but fashion dictated what was worn. Some of his drawings as here show Fergusson’s interest in shadow cast by a hat. 49* Studies of Women, Three seen in Profile, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
As Fergusson influenced Anne Estelle Rice’s palette of painting in oils, so her style in fashion illustration impacted on his own graphic work, as here. Indeed, although rough (yet highly effective), the quickness of this drawing approaches a fashion sketch for a magazine.
46* Le Kepi, Paris 1908, with inscription on reverse, Le Kepi Paris 1908, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.8 x 12 cms
Catalogue reference No.36
50* Portrait of a Woman in a Hat, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
The form of the kepi, a military hat, obviously attracted Fergusson. Throughout this exhibition many shapes and types of headwear may be noted which all in their way appealed to him for their three-dimensional qualities as well as often defining the wearer and their aesthetic sense. As part of a uniform this cap is unusual among his sketches. 47
Catalogue reference No.55
This stunning drawing may be another of Anne Estelle Rice, with its main emphasis on the face, not the hat which serves neatly to complete the compositional design. 51* Portrait of a Woman in a Hat with Feathers, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
Study of Women in Hats, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
In contrast to the previous drawing, the focus in this plain drawing is on the massive hat. By 1909 some of these were becoming more theatrical with taller crowns. The sitter may well be Rice once more.
At this period women’s hats in Paris, then capital of the fashion world, became wide to balance an increasingly slim silhouette. Often they were simply and effectively decorated with flowers or ribbons in place of birds’ feathers. 26
Catalogue reference No.51
Catalogue reference No.50
52
Woman in a Bonnet Hat, seen in profile, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
56* Portrait of a Woman in a large Hat with Feathers, Paris circa 1909-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
Simple in form, the profile drawing swiftly captures a more modest form of head attire, neat and decorated with real or artificial flowers.
57* Portrait of a Woman in a Cocked Hat, Paris circa 1909-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
Surely this also is a drawing of Rice here wearing a milliner’s mighty creation which almost swamps her head – but was deeply fashionable towards 1910. Such a hat gave both drama and a degree of privacy to the wearer whose face could only be viewed from directly in front.
53* Studies of Women, one seen in profile, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
The lower drawing is a sketch of Rice, recognisable from her smile to the artist. The upper figure is not identified.
58* Profile of a Woman, Paris circa 1907-10. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms 54
La Cocarde, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
This delightfully simple, neat drawing records a young Parisian seen by the artist, perhaps a young milliner in the Café d’Harcourt.
The cockade is the plumed hat decoration barely indicated in the drawing but which were fashionable among those who could afford them. In 1910 Fergusson would paint a portrait of Elizabeth Dryden called simply La Cocarde where he developed the idea fully. But his fascination with the whole idea of decoration was established long before this date.
Catalogue reference No.57
Catalogue reference No.53
Catalogue reference No.62
Catalogue reference No.56
59* Woman Reading, Paris 1907-10. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
This study is of someone whom the artist knows well and is comfortable in his company. It may well therefore show Anne Estelle Rice.
55* Portrait of a Woman in a large Hat with Roses, Paris circa 1908-10. Conté 20.9 x 13.3 cms
60
Reclining Woman, Paris 1907-10. Conté 20.2 x 11 cms
In this intimate sketch the identity of the woman here is unknown. She is shown relaxing on the couch in Fergusson’s studio. Made specifically for him, it had originally been in his Edinburgh studio in Picardy Place, moving with him to Paris in 1907. Recently restored, the couch is on display at the Fergusson Gallery in Perth.
An extraordinarily richly decorated hat is the subject here and in the following drawing. Particularly from 1908 Fergusson made innumerable sketches of women in dramatic or simple hats, of which there seemed then to be an almost infinite variety.
28
61
65
Café, Paris 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
Self Portrait circa 1909-11. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
Fergusson enjoyed sketching his own features – an ever ready model – into his late thirties (the date of this sketch) but rarely did so later on. The variety of these sketches is wide. This one has a whimsical touch in its simple notations of features but nonetheless indicates his concentrated, expression as he draws himself – as well as his permanently tidy personal dress.
The real charm of Paris café life is drawn here as a couple share an evening bottle of wine. Both wear hats in public, their widely differing forms complementing one another. 62* Woman in a large Hat, 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
66
Some of the most attractive sketches of women were made with an economy of line. A quick circle to indicate a hat decoration, a curl of hair. Profiles, particularly of the women he observed, were part of Fergusson’s stock in trade and illustrate his interest in all he saw around him.
Profile of a Woman in a Pill Box Hat 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
Normally the more flamboyant shape of hats held more appeal but the economy of this pill box style, matched by the rounded facial features seen in profile, but this one has provided a useful and distinctive study in form.
63* Portrait of a Woman 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
67
Her face half in shadow, the girl in this drawing seems to be known to the artist. Slightly self-absorbed, she seems to sit close to the artist rather than be seen amongst a crowd.
Catalogue reference No.63
Catalogue reference No.58
Woman in a Hat with Flowers 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
A minimalist essay in form: the hat is seen again as part of the human outline. 68
64* In a Café, Paris 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
Portrait of a Gentleman in a Panama Hat 1909. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
This is a good traditional study of a distinguished and neatly attired gentleman in Paris.
A quiet moment in the corner of a café as a group of friends share a conversation and a glass or two of chilled wine.
30
Catalogue reference No.70
Catalogue reference No.75
69
Profile of a Woman 1909, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
70* Half Portrait of a Woman seen in a Café, with inscription Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
In this keenly observed, comical (and slightly cruel) caricature of a middle-aged Parisian violinist caught sight of at a concert Fergusson draws her concentration as well as her slightly passé 1890s hairstyle and dress.
Here Fergusson presents another caricature of a woman, this time probably observed in a Paris café. Her ample form is outlined quickly and lightly as a series of semi-spherical curves, and perhaps with not a lack of affection. It comes from a period when Fergusson was fascinated by the role and exaggerated forms of satirical images in French popular culture. He made several studies of beach scenes along the lines of the satirical journal L’Assiette au Beurre, and enjoyed sketching caricatures of couples on their way to the theatre. The woman represented may have been seen at such a place.
Catalogue reference No.64
32
Catalogue reference No.78
Catalogue reference No.82
Catalogue reference No.80
Paintings and the west coast from Aberdour and Crail to Troon and Islay. In 1905 some had titles such as ‘A Grey Morning’ or ‘A Cloudy Day’ or, more simply, ‘Cloud Effect’ which show his interest in ever-changing weather conditions. In the summer of 1905 he famously wrote for his first London exhibition catalogue that the artist tries ‘for truth, for reality, through light’ and this study of clouds after a shower of rain over the hills of Peeblesshire beautifully and vividly captures such a moment of ‘reality’ in the Scottish Borders. For such sketches he used oils rather than watercolour as he felt they gave a strength and vivid solidity to the picture.
71* Sky after Rain, Peebles circa 1905. Inscribed on original label on reverse in Fergusson’s hand, also inscribed on the reverse ‘I certify that this painting is a genuine Fergusson, Margaret Morris Fergusson’. Oil on panel 19 x 24 cms.
Fergusson’s parents gave him his first set of oil paints when he was only nine years old. As a child he was often taken to see the collections of the National Gallery on the Mound and the Museum of Science and Art in Chambers Street. These would both contribute to his awareness of the range of artists’ work. Having apparently started and given up on a medical training he started a traditional art training at the Trustees’ Academy, the forerunner of the College of Art, but, as this involved mechanical copying from casts of antique sculpture, he also abandoned that and became self taught. Despite his giving up a formal art training Fergusson’s father did recognise his commitment to art and gave him the means to visit Paris each May, probably from 1897. The Caillebotte Bequest of Impressionist paintings had gone on show at Paris’s Luxembourg gallery that spring and was much in the news. Fergusson also visited dealerships such as Durand-Ruel where Impressionist paintings were on view. Inspired also by Glasgow ‘Boys’ Alexander Roche and Arthur Melville, at the turn of the century Fergusson also visited Morocco and Spain where he explored the effect of different lights on local colour. By now Fergusson was constantly observing his surroundings, making quick notations in oil on the spot, and, once settled in Paris in 1907, would turn to working far more instantly (and prolifically) using conté crayon to record what he witnessed. The exhibition catalogues of the early to mid-1900s record people and places, what he saw in Paris, on the north French coast – and Edinburgh plus Fife
72* Scotch Mist, Peebles circa 1905. Inscribed on original label on reverse in Fergusson’s hand, also inscribed on the reverse ‘I certify that this painting bought is a genuine Fergusson, Margaret Morris Fergusson’. Oil on panel 19 x 24 cms.
Catalogue reference No.71
Using the muted, subtle palette favoured by Whistler and dictated by atmospheric conditions, Fergusson recorded the relationship between light and the landscape below. Like Constable, his main focus however was on the clouds themselves as they changed form and colour according to precise atmospheric conditions. Such remarkably fresh and often beautiful small sketches are important in their own right, freely and honestly painted in a search for the essence of natural phenomena. Fergusson enjoyed the solidity and permanence of oil paint. Art historian Sheila McGregor has noted that Fergusson often carried with him not only a ready notebook but a box specifically made to contain his paints plus two such thick cardboard panels which could be used for oil sketches.
34
Catalogue reference No.72
Drawings and rather reflects Fergusson’s interest in the ethnographical collections he found in Paris. If the date on the later inscription is correct (and inscriptions even in Fergusson’s own hand are often unreliable), it makes this a remarkable drawing and shows him to be in touch with not only museum collections and artistic developments in Paris and London. Fergusson had admired Benin bronzes seen on exhibition in Edinburgh before he settled in Paris, and non-European sculpture had led Picasso to appreciate and extend the idea of ‘the primitive’. The orientalised features of this drawing anticipate Fergusson’s innovative stone sculpture of the 1910s but also in its raw, brave angularity the work of the artists he knew in Paris and then London such as Jacob Epstein and Percy Wyndham Lewis. The bold hatching was also used in several drawings of 1910 and 1911. Whenever it was made, and whether or not it is a half-imaginary self portrait, it remains a vivid and modernist piece of work.
73* Self Portrait circa 1909-11. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
This traditional ‘self portrait’ is nothing more than a tongue-in-cheek caricature. In all he filled sketchbooks with several thousand drawings among which may be numbered a good dozen or more of himself. Some are simple and direct, others more quizzical or using Celticised pattern to interpret his features. 74* Study of a Man, possibly a Self Portrait Paris 1909, with inscription on the reverse, Self Portrait Paris 1909, J D Fergusson. Brush, black ink and watercolour on buff paper 28.5 x 19.5 cms
In 1909 Fergusson made several drawings of a ‘poet’ with long hair, two of which were included in ‘A Tribute to Fergus’ in this gallery in 2004. The most celebrated of these poets was Paul Fort who, with André Salmon, launched the literary magazine Vers et Prose in Montparnasse. Fort was one of most celebrated habitués of the café La Closerie des Lilas, a café at the Observatoire crossroads frequented by Fergusson, Rice and their Anglo-American circle, and whose exterior and interior appears in several of his works, from Anne Estelle Rice, La Closerie des Lilas (1907, Hunterian Art Gallery) to The Blue Hat (1909, City Art Centre, Edinburgh). Other poets known personally to Fergusson included the American Horace Holley who would run the Ashnur Gallery, a Montparnasse gallery of the fine and decorative arts in 1912-14, and Hall Ruffy, the Irish writer and poet. This ambitious study of a man, possibly himself (although in life he would never wear his hair as long), goes a step beyond caricature
Catalogue reference No.73
Catalogue reference No.81
75* Double Exposure, Paris 1910, with inscription on reverse, Double Exposure Paris 1910 J D Fergusson. Pen and ink on paper laid down on card 18.3 x 14.4 cms
As an artist, Fergusson’s enjoyment of the human form was seen not only in his figurative paintings but in sketches and in his later sculpture. These female figures would be sketched from life or simply his imagination in the studio, their classical outlines complemented by shading to make an academic study.
36
Catalogue reference No.79
Catalogue reference No.84
Catalogue reference No.83
Catalogue reference No.74
76* Near Royan 1910, with inscription on reverse, Near Royan 1910. Conté 10.4 x 17.4 cms
79* Profile of a Woman in a large Hat with Feathers and Ribbons circa 1910-14. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
The woman depicted here is not particularly young and wears a relatively modestly trimmed hat with ribbon and feather to complete her dress.
In the summers of 1909 and 1910 Fergusson, S J Peploe and Anne Estelle Rice spent time drawing and painting in Royan and Saintonge near the mouth of the Gironde. Here he painted buildings, harbour and sailing craft and applied the strict and formal definition he was by now using for his Paris studio pieces to outline the built structures he saw in front of him. 77
80* Portrait of a Woman in a large Hat circa 1910-14. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
Catalogue reference No.59
Concentrating on line not blocks of shading to define shape the artist establishes swiftly a recognisable face topped by a dramatic hat.
Near Royan 1910, with inscription on reverse, Near Royan 1910, J D Fergusson. Conté 10.3x17.7 cms
81* Portrait of a Woman circa 1910-14. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
Fergusson again outlines the buildings in front of him to simplify their structure. The building may have served as a mill.
The wide-brimmed hat seen here was extremely fashionable in Paris where it balanced a slim silhouette and could be worn with or without a veil for privacy or to keep the sun at bay.
78* Chapeau Melon, Paris circa 1910, with inscription on reverse, Chapeau Melon Paris 1909-1910, J D Fergusson. Conté and ink 21 x 12 cms
82* Café Paris circa 1910-14. Conté 20.9 x 13.4 cms
This is a remarkable and powerful drawing of an unnamed man. His features are abstracted in a series of strong lines and hatching which makes the most of the materials. The man’s right cheek is defined by a vigorous semicrazed ink line which courses down the entire side of his face. Ink is applied to accentuate the outline of hat, eyes, jaw and collar as well as giving additional Modernist emphasis to the hatching technique. In 1912 Fergusson, as art editor of the London journal Rhythm, used such a strong linear approach in a drawing which illustrated a short story ‘The Major’ by his friend, the art critic Haldane McFall.
Catalogue reference No.76
Elegance and relaxation are the welcome qualities found in this image of a table of a Paris café.
Catalogue reference No.85
40
84* H. H. McColl, Paris 1912, with inscription on reverse, H. H. McColl Paris 1912, J D Fergusson. Conté 21 x 12.3 cms
83* Flowers and Fruit 1911, signed and inscribed on the reverse J D Fergusson 1 Glebe Place SW3, and with inscription ‘not to be worked on line block ‘Flowers and Fruit, 1911’ size of letter press opposite (not half tone) line block’ on original label attached to the reverse. Conté 14.5 x 12.5 cms
Harry McColl (died 1957) was a businessman based in Paris, a generous man and one of Fergusson’s best friends. Margaret Morris recalled that McColl once took him to the horse races at Chantilly and ‘on to a smart café afterwards, where he might make sketches’. Fergusson may have painted McColl in oil but, if so, then such a portrait is unknown. However, his wife Grace did sit, and successfully, to Fergusson in 1930.
From 1910 to 1912 Fergusson made a series of academic still life oils in which flowers and fruit and other objects were marked out in clearly defined blue or red outlines. Their composition depended on rhythmic line as well as bold colour for their success. This related drawing was made for publication, probably in the new journal Rhythm although it seems never to have been sent to the printer. A label in Fergusson’s hand applied to the support reads ‘Not to be worked on / line block / “Flowers and Fruit 1911” / (scored out words) size of letterpress opposite (not half tone) line block’. Fergusson was art editor of Rhythm (1911-13) which was edited by his friend John Middleton Murry. During the First World War Margaret Morris lived with her mother and aunt at 1 Glebe Place, Chelsea.
85* Margaret Peploe Reading, Cassis 1913, with inscription on reverse, Cassis 1913 Margaret Peploe Reading, J D Fergusson. Conté 12.1 x 20.9 cms
Samuel Peploe, his wife Margaret and son Willy had returned to Edinburgh in 1912 after two years in Paris. In the late summer of 1913 they rejoined Fergusson and Anne Estelle Rice for some weeks in Cassis. Here she is shown relaxing with a book. The woman’s head seen top left may represent Rice seated nearby.
42
Catalogue reference No.86a
Catalogue reference No.86d
Catalogue reference No.86k
Catalogue reference No.86j
Catalogue reference No.86e
Catalogue reference No.86f
Catalogue reference No.86h
Catalogue reference No.86l
Catalogue reference No.86b
Catalogue reference No.86i
86
86 (a)* Sailors, Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 18.5 x 12.2 cms
Portsmouth Double Sketchbook 1918 - (33)
Fergusson was primarily interested in the dynamic forms and energy of the heavy engineering he found in Portsmouth. However, he did paint one work, The Liberty Men, in which sailors formed a core part of the composition and reflected this type of drawing. The sailors in the docks, with their blue and white uniform, were in clear colour contrast to the battleship greys, red lead paint (as used on the Forth Bridge) of the cranes and more elaborate camouflage colours devised by other artists. Here their uniformed anonymity allowed them to become as much abstract forms as their surroundings, and their facial features, as in The Liberty Men, were reduced to simply moving parts of the dockland scenery. (The Liberty Men (1918, Ulster Museum, Belfast))
When Fergusson left France in 1914 he resided first in Paulton Square, Chelsea, before taking a studio at 14 Redcliffe Road where he remained throughout the war. His friend the civil servant and critic P G Konody (the secretary of the Venice Biennale to whose British Pavilion Fergusson had contributed in 1909 and 1912) got him an interview at the War Office but he was never made an official war artist. Instead, he was asked by the British War Memorials Committee to paint a series of studies of Portsmouth docks which gave him the opportunity to pursue ideas of complex forms, colour and camouflage pattern. When young, Fergusson had toyed with the idea of becoming a naval surgeon: he had long had a passion for water, boats and sailing, and we know he had even sold a small sailing boat to help finance his move to pre-war Paris. The sea also had been an essential part of his attraction to northern French resorts and to Royan and the far south. Now the modernity and muscular power of shipping and its unique colours gave him a completely new subject to investigate. These drawings are some of those made during his weeks in Portsmouth in the late summer of 1918. Often annotated with details of colours, they show his deep interest in the moving colours and rhythms of heavy engineering and at times his translation of these into more abstract forms.
Catalogue reference No.88
Catalogue reference No.90
86 (b)* Shipping in Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
This is a general study of the busy wartime docks, filled with destroyer shipping. The forms of the warships were sometimes drawn to indicate their vast mass. The ships were also used as a key element within the composite painting, The Liberty Men. 86 (c) Portsmouth Docks sketch 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
86 (d) * Portsmouth Docks sketch. 1918 Conté with annotations 18.5 x 12.2
This double sketchbook of 33 sketches, is being offered in its entirety, as we feel that such an important document should be kept together, however, individual drawings may be reserved and notification of purchase will be given at the end of the exhibition.
The sheer scale and powerful forms of red-painted dockyard cranes and destroyers inspired Fergusson. Here, the powerful vertical structures dominate as they do in one of his major oil paintings resulting from these sketches. (Dockyard, Portsmouth (1918, University of Stirling)) 46
Catalogue reference No.95
Catalogue reference No.89
86 (e)* Ship in Dock, Portsmouth 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
86 (j)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 18.5 x 12.2 cms
Fergusson’s recording of specific details provided him with the rich resources to create elaborate semi-abstract compositions, heightened by a balanced palette of reds, blacks, creams and blues. This particular drawing provided him with the raw elements for the foreground in one of his most lyrical and iconic war paintings, Dockyard, Portsmouth. (Dockyard, Portsmouth (1918, Imperial War Museum, London))
The colours of camouflage were noted in some of Fergusson’s Portsmouth drawings. Like other war artists he was fascinated by patterning which could be vivid. The composition is complex, indicative of the busyness of the dockyard. 86 (f)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
86 (k)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 18.5 x 12.2 cms
In this semi-abstracted drawing the colours of many of the heavy engineering sections of shipping and dock cranes are noted. Fergusson is already considering how best these may be turned into truly Modernist painting, as he notes ‘mauve’ for the sky area. The curved and straight sections were to be included as components of the most abstracted of his wartime paintings, Damaged Destroyer. (Damaged Destroyer (1918, Glasgow Life (Museums)).
The interest of this drawing lies in the viewpoint of the destroyer which is seen facing the bow. Colours are indicated as an aid to working on the final composition of which this would serve as an element. As with the previous sketch, this drawing was used, tilted at an angle, to compose his major painting, Dockyard, Portsmouth.
Catalogue reference No.102
Catalogue reference No.92
86 (l)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms 86 (g)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
86 (h)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
86 (i)* Portsmouth Docks 1918. Conté with annotations 12.2 x 18.5 cms
Catalogue reference No.98
48
Catalogue reference No.103
Sculpture Art Gallery, University of Glasgow). The title was not accidental but reflected Fergusson and Morris’s shared interest in the idea of the tree spirit. In fact, her summer schools in Wales and France sometimes danced in natural wooded landscapes and she herself performed a dance simply called ‘dryad’. A second 1924 piece, Oak Rhythm (Tate Britain), was also worked in London from a found branch, this time found during the summer school at Cap d’Antibes. When exhibited in Paris in 1931 Oak Rhythm was catalogued as L’âme du chêne (the spirit of the oak) which reflected the interest of both Fergusson and Morris in the idea of the dryad, or tree spirit. Plénitude d’Olivier is a title which approximates to the ‘richness’ or ‘strength’ of the olive tree and maintains Fergusson’s interest in the dryad. Worked in the half-round, the figure emerges from the olive, a personification of its spirit. The composition of the figure was again shaped by the choice and form of the (French) wood and the placing of knots. Fergusson here again presented the female form as an essential vessel of creation, an idea first seen in paintings including At my Studio Window (1910, Fergusson Gallery, Perth) and Rhythm (1911, University of Stirling). As fashioned out of wood, this unique version of Plénitude d’Olivier vividly presents the nude as symbolic of nature’s life force. Fergusson also worked the figure in plaster to be cast in brass, the casting traditionally has been dated to 1919 but at that period Fergusson’s sculpture was considerably less static or smoothly streamlined in form. It seems more likely that the cast version followed the original olive wood piece. As a further postscript to the series, in 1931 he used the pose in a painting of Morris which was given the punning title of Megalithic (private collection). This sculpture is thought to have been publicly exhibited only once, when it was included with L’âme du chêne and Philosophy in Les Peintres Ecossais, the celebrated 1931 exhibition of work by the Scottish Colourists at the Galleries Georges Petit in Paris. It may have been signed and dated underneath when new or else prior to the base being applied for the exhibition. Seen alongside L’âme du chêne it was then simply called L’Olivier, the olive tree.
87* Plénitude d’Olivier circa 1926 Inscribed on the reverse JDF and the base J D Fergusson 1926 Olive wood 44.4 (height) 55.8 (overall height including base) cms
This is one of a small number of important wooden sculptures made by Fergusson in the mid-1920s. His first sculpture, a 1908 self portrait in bronze, had been inspired by his American friend Jo Davidson’s recent head of him. In London during the First World War Fergusson handcarved sandstone pieces which show his wide interests in oriental and Celtic art as well as pre-war work by Constantin Brancusi and Jacob Epstein. They also began to reflect the exotic choreography created by his partner, the dancer Margaret Morris. Fergusson returned to cast bronze pieces in the years 1918-1920. Torse de Femme (1918, Fergusson Gallery, Perth) is both classical and modernist, and anticipates the angular, cubist form of his 1919 drawing Harlech Scissors shown in this exhibition. Sculpture from this period includes the bronzes The Basket Woman, Gloxinia, Souplesse, and Philosophy (or Meg with Dove), again inspired by Morris and dance positions. However, the mid-1920s saw Fergusson move towards a different kind of modernism which, like much European art of the period, united the classical with primitivism. Fergusson was now pursuing a clearer Celtic figurative identity in his work, most famously in his sculpture Eástre (1924, Fergusson Art Gallery). The wood pieces from the mid-1920s marked a return to handcarving. Wood gave an immediacy of result and had both a warmth lacking in metal castings or stone and an embedded sense of growth through time. From 1924 he made several figurative pieces in a variety of woods whose forms dictated the identity of the sculptures. According to the artist, his friend the architect and designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh had given him a twiggy plant in a pot because its forms reminded him of his friend – much as Picasso gave Fergusson a sprig of bog myrtle because he saw his character in it. Shortly afterwards, Fergusson worked a wood batten in his studio into Dryad (1924, Hunterian 50
Catalogue reference No.87
Margaret Morris’s Dancers Margaret Morris had dance lessons as a young child with John d’Auban of the Drury Lane Theatre before joining Frank Benson’s company. From Raymond Duncan, brother of Isadora, she learned Greek dance which became the natural basis of her own expressive form of dance. She arranged dances for the writer and playwright John Galsworthy’s children’s fantasy The Little Dream in return for which the Galsworthys financially supported the founding of her first dance classes. Galsworthy helped choose the girls who included Kathleen Dillon who is the later subject of three drawings shown here (88, 89, 91). Following a successful London Children’s Season in December 1912, Morris took her girls to dance at the Marigny Theatre in Paris in early 1913 when she met Fergusson. Later that summer she assisted the composer Rutland Boughton with his summer school in Bournemouth where the dancers performed in his The Birth of Arthur with music by Rameau. Anne Estelle Rice, with her fashion training, is known to have handpainted costume for Morris and Galsworthy’s late 1913 ballet Spring and the Four Winds but this was before Morris’s relationship with Fergusson was properly established. Rice, however, remained friends with them both in London where they all lived during the First World War. Morris’s own dance summer schools in Britain, France and Belgium would follow. Fergusson travelled with her and taught painting, design and sculpture at many of these. The drawings here capture the faces of a number of the dancers in Morris’s school. Richard Emerson, the biographer of two key early dancers, Loïs Hutton and Hélène Vanel, has most generously provided identification and biographical information used to discuss several drawings. However, a number of the dancers depicted here remain either unnamed or else are known only by their first names which may not have been their stage names and cannot be matched with surviving dance programmes.
88* The Tricorn Hat London 1918, with inscription Mrs Lousada, The Tricorn Hat. Conté 25.1 x 20 cms
Despite the title later applied to this drawing the sitter does not bear a facial resemblance to Mrs Julian Lousada, the wife of Fergusson’s London solicitor whom he had painted in 1915 as Complexity. However, the following year he painted one of Margaret Morris’s dancers, Kathleen Dillon (1898-1990), as Rose Rhythm where the hat was the dominant feature and seen as a decorative extension of her character. This study shows a very similar if not the same hat. Kathleen Dillon was recorded by Morris as ‘quite the loveliest and the most talented of all that first group’ of child dancers and the inspiration for Galsworthy’s Spring and the Four Winds, performed in Manchester in late 1913. She began to help Morris with teaching in 1914 and was her leading dancer by 1917. She left in 1919 following marriage earlier that year. Fergusson’s earlier delight in this form of hat was recorded in Morris’s ‘biased’ biography of him, ‘it was just a rose, going from the centre convolution and continuing the ‘Rhythm’ idea developed in Paris and still with me. Looking at K I soon saw that the hat was not merely a hat but a continuation of the girl’s character – (feeling of her) like Burns’ ‘love is like a red red rose’. So, she like Burns again, lighted up my jingle and I painted ‘Rose Rhythm’ ...’ However, in this drawing made two years later Fergusson is less concerned with recording a rhythmic composition of lines and curves, ‘a thing thoroughly Celtic’, but rather in making a simple statement of face neatly topped by an interesting head piece.
Catalogue reference No.111
Catalogue reference No.108
52
Catalogue reference No.110
Catalogue reference No.101
89* Kathleen Dillon in a Beret circa 1918. Conté and pencil 21.4 x 16.5 cms
92* Barbara, London 1918, with inscription on reverse, Barbara London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 25.1 x 19.9 cms
The sitter, again Kathleen Dillon, sports a different sort of hat, a beret which is still stylish while less flamboyant. This form of casual and functional headwear would become widely popularised in the 1920s and 1930s. Perhaps Fergusson admired it for its resemblance to the Scottish ‘tammy’. Dillon’s career remained in dance after she stopped performing with Morris. A highly artistic person, she always created all her own hats and probably her entire wardrobe. Richard Emerson has noted that between 1925 and 1928 she designed costume for (Dame) Ninette de Valois, and she danced with former Morris teacher and dancers Loïs Hutton and Hélène Vanel in Paris in the winter of 1926-27. A twoyear affair with the painter Edward Wadsworth (probably met at the Margaret Morris Club), during which she divorced her husband, ended in 1931. Shortly afterwards she married the pianist Angus Morrison, also a member of the Morris Club, and known since childhood. She remained a close friend of Morris and Fergusson.
A number of drawings shown here have been given later inscriptions dictated by Margaret Morris but often the names do not tally with those on any known Morris School programme. Some of the girls of course may simply have attended classes rather than ever taught for Morris. To add to the problem of identification, some dance assistants also used stage names. Either a hat or a face was important to the artist – sometimes both. This panama hat worn here at an angle was a perfect elliptical form for the artist to work on. 93
Catalogue reference No.100
Fergusson was struck by the perfection of this dancer’s rounded face, her full mouth and the curls of her fringe. His drawing is of the individual features which together compose the head. This kind of balanced beauty was for him sculptural and an ideal used in his famous sculpture of 1924, Eástre, which in fact was an idealised head of Morris.
90* Chapeau Cloche, London 1918 (1), with inscription on reverse, Chapeau Cloche London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 26.1 x 20.1
91
Janice, London 1918 (1), with inscription on reverse, Janice London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 25.5 x 20.2 cms
Chapeau Cloche, London 1918 (2), with inscription on reverse, Chapeau Cloche London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 21.4 x 16.2 cms
94
The girl is again the dancer Kathleen Dillon wearing another of the hats she herself designed and made. For Fergusson such a creative dresser had immense appeal with their apparel an essential part of their personality. Her style of dressing may well have inspired Loïs Hutton in costume designs for her own dance both with Morris and when she started her own school.
Janice, London 1918 (2), with inscription on reverse, Janice London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 25.5 x 20.2 cms
This second drawing of the same girl shows Fergusson’s fascination with Janice’s rounded head and smoothed hair with ‘bangs’.
54
Catalogue reference No.99
95* Janice, London 1918 (3), with inscription on reverse, Janice London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 25.5 x 20.2 cms
99* Dancers, London 1919, with inscription on reverse, Dancers London 1919, J D Fergusson. Conté 20 x 25.5 cms
Here Fergusson uses a broader conté crayon to place more emphasis on the surfaces and planes of the head and face.
Dance fascinated Fergusson, ever since he had seen performances by Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes in pre-war Paris – and long before when he frequented music halls in Edinburgh. Meeting Margaret Morris had served to strengthen his interest in dance as free expression. However, this dance records an evening at the informal club started by the two. This met weekly and was for their many London friends including Augustus John, Jacob Epstein, Edward Wadsworth, Ezra Pound, Wyndham Lewis, Arnold Bax, Eugène Goossens, Gordon Craig, Charles Rennie Mackintosh and his wife Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh, John Middleton Murry and Katherine Mansfield. One evening, usually the 21th of each month, was a social gathering with dancing and a buffet supper.
96
Jennifer, London 1918 (1), with inscription on reverse, Jennifer London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 25.5 x 20.2 cms
Jennifer, like Janice probably an assistant in Morris’s Chelsea School, was a second girl whom Fergusson enjoyed drawing – making no fewer than three sketches of her modern hairstyle and attractive neat face with its retroussé nose and full mouth. 97
Jennifer, London 1918 (2), with inscription on reverse, Jennifer London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 26 x 20.1 cms
Catalogue reference No.119
Catalogue reference No.118
100* Dancing in Harlech – George Davison’s Hall at Wern Fawr, Harlech 1919, with inscription on reverse, Dancing in Harlech G Davison’s Hall in Wernfawr Hall, Harlech 1919, J D Fergusson. Pencil and conté 20 x 25.5 cms
The second drawing of Jennifer catches her face full on. The neatness of her features and particularly the eyes were unusual and distinctive.
A retired businessman and philanthropist George Davison whom Fergusson and Morris had met in London during the First World War invited Morris to bring her dance summer school to his estate in 1919. The house, Wern Fawr, and its surrounding landscape provided accommodation and space for performance and formed the start of Davison’s long-term support of the couple. In the 1920s they were invited to his homes in the south of France which gave ample scope for healthy, open air performance. This simple line drawing records a party held in the gardens at Wern Fawr.
98* Jennifer, London 1918 (3), with inscription on reverse, Jennifer London 1918, J D Fergusson. Conté 25.2 x 20.2 cms
The third drawing of Jennifer shows her seen from slightly above: perhaps she was seated while Fergusson drew her. In some respects this is the most finished of all her drawings in showing her neck and indicating her torso. 56
Catalogue reference No.122
Catalogue reference No.123
101* Harlech Scissors 1919, with inscription on reverse, Harlech Scissors, J D Fergusson. Conté 21 x 12 cms
103* Study of a Dancer, seen in Profile circa 1919-20. Conté 25.3 x 20 cms
Published photographs by Fred Daniels of Morris’s Summer Schools in Britain and France show the dancers in simple, short ‘classical’ tunics which promoted comfort and ease for exercising and more formal dance routines. As well as loose tunics which gave grace to the body and allowed ease of movement, a dancer kept her hair neatly in place with a Greek fillet or band, as seen in this drawing and the previous one of Blanche Ostrehan. Many of these drawings may have been made during Morris’s Summer Schools which were held in Harlech, Wales, in 1919 and 1922, Dinard in 1920, Pourville in 1921 and regularly in Antibes from 1923.
This abstract drawing of a figure in motion reflects the artist’s interest in Vorticism, the English cubistic art movement developed by Percy Wyndham Lewis who, with others of his circle, frequented the Margaret Morris Club started by her and Fergusson in 1915. The ‘scissor’ action expresses movement and perhaps relates to a particular dance devised by Margaret. 102* Blanche Ostrehan circa 1919-20. Conté 25.5 x 20.5 cms
Blanche Ostrehan (born 1898) was the daughter of two London artists. She joined the Margaret Morris School in Chelsea in 1919 and worked on and off with the School until her retirement. Ostrehan participated in the Summer School held first in Harlech in 1919 and the following year was sent to New York to start a short-lived School there. She danced again in New York at the Hippodrome in 1922, and the following year in Delius’s opera Hassan, conducted by Eugène Goossens with choreography by Fokine. Working with Morris until retirement, she developed maternity exercises for classes until the late 1940s.
104 Study of a Woman, seen in Profile circa 1919-20. Conté 25.5 x 20.3 cms
Catalogue reference No.114
Catalogue reference No.120
The identity of this member of the Morris School in not known. She wears her hair in a chignon which was a hair style often then used by dancers. 105 Study of a Dancer, seen in Profile, circa 1919-20. Conté 25.5 x 20.3 cms
This study of a dancer of the Morris School may possibly depict Blanche Ostrehan. See catalogue 102. 106 Study of a Dancer circa 1919-20. Conté 25.5 x 20.4 cms
A particularly strong and clear drawing of a member of Morris’s School. Catalogue reference No.121
58
Catalogue reference No.115
107 Study of a Dancer circa 1919-20. Conté 25 x 20.3 cms
113* How to Draw a Rose 1929. Conté with annotations 21.5 x 16.3 cms
The diagrammatic drawing concentrates of the relation of the petals to each other with colours and shade clearly indicated. The rhythmic patterning of the forms is accentuated by the additional ‘Celtic’ line annotation top left. It recalls Fergusson’s fascination with the form of a hat worn in 1916 by Kathleen Dillon, one of Morris’s dance pupils, which like a rose went ‘from the centre convolution’ and continued ‘the “Rhythm” idea developed in Paris and still with me’ (Fergusson Gallery archive, see also 88).
The subject is the same as catalogue number 104. 108* Study of a Dancer circa 1919-20. Conté 25.5 x 20.3 cms
109 Study of a Dancer circa 1919-20. Conté 25 x 20.3 cms
The girl shown here is the same person as that depicted in the following two drawings. She has a distinctive round and slightly stout face.
114* The Entrance Hall, Le Château des Enfants, Cap d’Antibes July 1929. Watercolour 19 x 15 cms
110* Study of a Dancer seen in Profile circa 1919-20. Conté 25 x 20.3 cms
From 1923 Margaret Morris’s summer school regularly performed in Antibes at the invitation of George Davison. The house he restored as his new home, Le Château des Enfants, was called after the nine children he and his second wife adopted: it was his second house in the area. Fergusson here records the space within the building with simplicity.
111* Study of a Dancer seen in Profile circa 1919-20. Conté 25 x 20.3 cms
112 Woman’s Portrait circa 1920. Conté 25 x 20.3 cms
115* Bathers, Antibes circa 1930. Watercolour 27 x 18.8 cm
Based on drawing from life, this head becomes in Fergusson’s hands an essay in light, rhythmic curls and lines, almost an abstracted linear definition of a girl’s face.
Antibes proved to be an essential venue for Morris’s dance summer school where they could perform within completely natural surroundings and also enjoy the sunshine and climate. As a place to relax it would later also provide Morris and Fergusson with a place in which to holiday, right up to the summer before Fergusson’s death in early 1961.
60
Catalogue reference No.113
116* Christmas Card with a Watercolour Drawing by J D Fergusson inscribed to Wilma and George with much love Margaret Morris Fergusson and with title by Margaret Morris Fergusson on the reverse. Conté and watercolour 12.5 x 15.7 cms
118* Le Panier Blue circa 1958-59. Watercolour and Conté with annotations 15.9 x 11.4 cms
In his French summer sketches from this time Fergusson recorded the simple pleasures of women relaxing on the beach. Here he notes the blue basket, the beach sandals among other essential sunbathing items.
The sketch of handsomely buxom pears and other fruit was sent to friends as a card after Fergusson’s death in 1961.
119* Blonde Salis Beach, July 15 1959, with inscription on reverse Chez Ardisson, Villa la Folette, Rue de L’Orangerie, Antibes A.M., 1959. Watercolour and conté 10.9 x 17 cms
117* Study for Magnolias circa 1955. Conté 23 x 17.1 cms
From the late 1940s Fergusson and Morris spent many late summers, August and September, in the south of France in Antibes or Golfe Juan in the Alpes Maritimes. His drawings from these visits are carefree and celebrate women without any academic pretension. Fergusson made several paintings of flowers such as gloxinia. At times, as here, his ambition was to balance the female form with that of luxuriant nature. Drawn in the south of France and probably at Antibes, he celebrates the good life, setting nude studies bathed in a background of magnolias in blossom. This first drawing preceded a study in pencil, watercolour and gouache which clarified this relationship of women to flowers and was itself intended to be further worked up in oils. A small (height 17.7 cms) sculpture with the title Magnolia was made at the same date for casting in brass.
Villa la Folette was the guesthouse to which Fergusson and Morris would return the following summer, Fergusson’s last. He had first discovered Antibes in 1913 when his Paris flat was about to be demolished and he decided to move south from where, as he wrote to Margaret Morris, he enjoyed ‘a new start [and] a different feeling altogether about painting’. The two had then brought Morris’s summer schools to Antibes and after the Second World War they regularly returned to spend the late summer months in the area. Fergusson captured the pleasures of the light, colour and warmth in a series of sketches, some of which are shown here. Catalogue reference No.116
62
120* M. Salis 59 Antibes 1959, with inscription on reverse Chez Ardisson, Villa la Folette, Rue de L’Orangerie, Antibes A.M., 1959. Watercolour and conté with annotations 10.9 x 17 cms
122* Woman in a Swimsuit, Antibes 10th Aug 1959, with inscription on reverse Villa la Folette, Rue de l’Orangerie, Antibes A.M., Aout-7-1959. Watercolour and conté with annotations 17 x 11 cms
Fergusson and Morris were naturists. Given the inscription top left, this buxom sunbather is an interpretation of Margaret Morris although in reality she was physically very slim and by this stage far from young. Although this is simply a sketch of happy times, the pose also distantly recalls Fergusson’s academic and much earlier painting, Rhythm, in which the seated figure personifies nature.
This sketch and others in this group evoke the relaxed summers in the ‘warm south’ which was home to Fergusson and Morris each summer in the 1950s. 123* Woman in a Swimsuit, Antibes 7th August 1959, with inscription on reverse Villa la Folette, Rue de l’Orangerie, Antibes A.M., Aout-7-1959. Watercolour and conté with annotations 17 x 11 cms
121* Mediterranean Curve Antibes 7th August, with inscription on reverse Villa la Folette, Rue de l’Orangerie, Antibes A.M., Aout-7-1959. Watercolour and conté with annotations 17 x 11 cms
This particular drawing is probably a study of Margaret Morris.
The attractive view of Antibes captures the warmth and atmosphere of sunshine and light in just a few simple marks and colour washes.
Catalogue reference No.117
64
Woman in Feathered Hat, Paris 1907 Catalogue reference No.29
Alexander Meddowes Fine Art Broker 39 Royal Terrace, Edinburgh, EH7 5AH Tel: 0131 558 1000 Fax: 0131 556 3682 email: am@alexandermeddowes.com www.alexandermeddowes.com