adam bruce thomson the pastels
adam bruce thomson the pastels 7-31 october 2015
16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh EH3 6HZ tel 0131 558 1200 email mail@scottish-gallery.co.uk www.scottish-gallery.co.uk
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the good habit
The curriculum on offer at the new Edinburgh College of Art which opened in 1909 was a combination of many academic disciplines as well as painting and drawing instruction. The art school had developed from the boards of manufacture, educational initiatives which derived from a requirement from manufacturing industry to provide technical draughtsmen. The history can be traced back to 1760 and the early industrial revolution when the Board of Trustees for Fisheries, Manufactures and Improvements in Scotland set up an academy with rooms in Picardy Place which became known as the Trustees Academy. The Academy moved to the new Royal Institution, now the home of the RSA, in 1826. The Master of the School was by tradition a painter. In 1907 the Scottish Education Department took over the running from the direct control of Westminster which had persisted since the 1850’s under what was known as the South Kensington System. We should not be surprised that graduates in the early decades acquired a great range of skills in different disciplines: mural painting, drawing from life and the antique, calligraphy, technical drawing, etching, engraving and lithography, copying the old masters (sometimes from memory) and the many techniques and media of drawing and painting: pastel, stump drawing, watercolour, gouache, tempera and oil paint. Adam Bruce Thomson was in the first cadre of students to arrive at the brand
new building on Lauriston Place in an era full of energy and possibility with an enthusiastic teaching staff and wonderful facilities which included the copies of the Elgin Marbles which were transferred from the Institution building. The great irony was of course the impending cataclysm of the First World War which would engulf and decimate this gilded generation, inflicting damage and guilt on the survivors. Bruce Thomson was one of the survivors and paid a heavy toll in lost friends and family but like many he was able to dedicate his life thereafter to a quiet, productive life where the discipline of work was the best carapace against the horrors and sadness he had endured. His technical mastery of the difficult medium of pastel is clearly evident in this body of work which spans the decade or so after life returned to some sort of equilibrium in 1920. He married in 1918 and the girls, Margaret and Mary arrived a few years later. The family holidayed in the south west of Scotland, in Dumfriesshire and Stewartry and later in Argyll, and there were visits to the Borders. Working on tinted paper with a strong palette and impressionist technique he could work quickly to capture a subject before it passed; changing skies and light over the landscape, horses on the road, his wife sleeping in the shade with her child. A simple world is evoked where the fields have not been blasted by shells and the heavy horses do not pull artillery. This is the world for which so many Scottish soldiers
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fought, preserved but also haunted by the absences, eventually recorded by hundreds of village memorials. The reengagement with normal life, the turning seasons and management of the land, birth and renewal and what MacTaggart called ‘the good habit’ of work was salvation for Bruce Thomson. He eschewed the antidotes of Dada, Surrealism and expressionism which emerged as the dominant tendencies of post-War modernism but he did not forget his experiences which are neither denied nor indulged in his mature work.
Today these beautiful pastels evoke nostalgia for the long summers of our own youth: endless days of sunshine and rainstorms, walks, discoveries, shade by a pool, the hot stone of a country church or a bridge over a lazy river. Their deceptive simplicity masks a sophistication which takes us straight to the place and time of their origin, makes us yearn to climb to the top of the distant hill, or hurry home for supper before dusk turns to night. Guy Peploe, the scottish gallery
William Wilson and Adam Bruce Thomson. Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, c.1966
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1 Self Portrait, 1933 pastel, 38.5 x 29.5 cms signed and dated lower right provenance Studio inventory number P49
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2 Artist’s Wife pastel, 22.5 x 28 cms signed with initials lower right provenance Studio inventory number P19
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3 Young Family pastel, 24.5 x 34 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P64
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4 Tree and Cottage pastel, 27.5 x 35.5 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P56
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5 Crossroads pastel, 28 x 31.5 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P30
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6 Haystacks, Solway Firth pastel, 26 x 36.5 cms provenance Studio inventory number P20
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7 Bridge at Kirk Yetholm pastel, 24 x 34 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P26
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8 Benderloch pastel, 28 x 38 cms provenance Studio inventory number P23
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9 Forest Track pastel, 27 x 38.5 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P34
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10 Arisaig pastel, 24.5 x 35 cms signed lower centre provenance Studio inventory number P18
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11 West Highland Loch pastel, 25 x 35 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P62
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12 Carrying Peat pastel, 26 x 34 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P27
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13 Old White Horse pastel, 27 x 30.5 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P43
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14 Fir Trees and Goats pastel, 26 x 30 cms signed lower left exhibited Adam Bruce Thomson, Centenary Exhibition, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 1985, cat.72 provenance Studio inventory number P32
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15 Village Through the Trees pastel, 26 x 33.5 cms provenance Studio inventory number P60
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16 Ken Bridge, Castle Douglas pastel, 28 x 38 cms provenance Studio inventory number P39
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17 Church on River Bend pastel, 28 x 35 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P29
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18 Kelso Abbey pastel, 35 x 27 cms provenance Studio inventory number P38
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19 The Artist’s Daughter, Mary pastel, 39 x 33 cms provenance Studio inventory number P41
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20 The Artist’s Daughter, Margaret pastel, 35.5 x 27 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P52
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21 Mooring Posts, Cumberland, Solway Firth pastel, 32.5 x 24.5 cms signed lower centre provenance Studio inventory number P42
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22 Southwick Burn pastel, 28 x 38 cms provenance Studio inventory number P51
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23 Boys Playing pastel, 25 x 34 cms provenance Studio inventory number P25
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24 Solway pastel, 25 x 35.5 cms provenance Studio inventory number P50
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25 Beech Trees pastel, 38.5 x 28 cms signed lower left provenance Studio inventory number P22
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26 The Cuillins pastel, 27.5 x 38.5 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P54
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27 River and Sky pastel, 25 x 32.5 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P47
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28 Winter Loch pastel, 26 x 35 cms provenance Studio inventory number P63
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29 Threave Castle, Dumfries and Galloway pastel, 28 x 35.5 cms provenance Studio inventory number P28
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30 Graveyard pastel, 37 x 30 cms provenance Studio inventory number P35
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31 Fishing Boats pastel, 24 x 29 cms signed lower right provenance Studio inventory number P33
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Adam Bruce Thomson OBE, RSA, PPRSW (1885-1976) 1885 1905 1908-09
Born Edinburgh Studied at Royal Institution School of Art and RSA Life School Studied at Edinburgh College of Art with Diplomas in Architecture, Drawing and Painting 1910 Travelled to Spain, Holland and Paris on various scholarships c.1912 Joined Staff at Edinburgh College of Art 1915-18 Served in World War I, Royal Engineers 1918 Married Jessie I. Hislop 1919-50 Resumed staff position at Edinburgh College of Art 1936 Elected President of Society of Scottish Artists (SSA ) 1937 Elected as Associate, Royal Scottish Academy (ARSA ) 1946 Elected to the Royal Scottish Academy (RSA) 1947 Elected to the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW) 1949-56 Treasurer of the RSA 1956-63 President of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW) 1963 Awarded OBE 1971 Awarded first May Marshall Brown Memorial Award of the Royal Society of Painters in Watercolour 1971 At own request, became Honorary Retired Member of the Royal Scottish Academy to make way for younger members 1976 Awarded the new William J Macaulay Memorial Award of the Royal Scottish Academy 1976 Death age 91 Selected Exhibitions Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, annually 1909-1977 Scottish Society of Artists, Edinburgh, regularly Royal Glasgow Institute, Glasgow, regularly
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The Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour, regularly Aberdeen Artists Society, Aberdeen Solo exhibition, Aitken Dott & Son (The Scottish Gallery), Edinburgh, 1946 Solo exhibition, Douglas and Foulis Gallery and Scottish Arts Club, 1967 Centenary Exhibition, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 1985 Exhibition of Scottish Watercolours, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 1989 Adam Bruce Thomson, Oils and Works on Paper, The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, 2003 Adam Bruce Thomson, Painting the Century, The Scottish Gallery, 2013 Adam Bruce Thomson, The Pastels, The Scottish Gallery, 2015 Work in Public Collections Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museums Bradford Museums and Galleries City Arts Centre (including Jean F Watson and Scottish Modern Arts Association Collections) City of Edinburgh Council Clydesdale Bank Dundee Art Gallery Fleming-Wyfold Collection Glasgow Museums HM The Queen’s Private Collection Heriot-Watt Art Collection Inverclyde Council McLean Museum and Art Gallery National Library of Scotland National Trust for Scotland Paisley Art Gallery Royal Scottish Academy University of Edinburgh Fine Art Collection University of St. Andrews
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Published by The Scottish Gallery to coincide with the exhibition ADAM BRUCE THOMSON: THE PASTELS 7 - 31 October 2015 Exhibition can be viewed online at www.scottish-gallery.co.uk/adambrucethomson ISBN: 978 1 910267 25 7 Designed by www.kennethgray.co.uk Photography by William Van Esland Printed by Barr Colour Printers All rights reserved. No part of this catalogue may be reproduced in any form by print, photocopy or by any other means, without the permission of the copyright holders and of the publishers. Acknowledgements The Scottish Gallery would like to thank Elizabeth and Andrew Hall for their help with this exhibition.
16 Dundas Street, Edinburgh EH3 6HZ Tel 0131 558 1200 Email mail@scottish-gallery.co.uk www.scottish-gallery.co.uk