THIS exhibition vividly celebrates the unique work of Caithness based artist Neil Macpherson.

Infused with Northern light and infinite skies, the beauty of MacPherson’s work lies in its inherent mystery; the powerful subtlety of colour and paint handling that transports the viewer to their own waking world of dreams. The artist’s treatment of the figure is characteristically compassionate throughout, his visual language distilled in poetic abstraction and a luminous, resoundingly optimistic palette.

Neil MacPherson - A Voice in the Wilderness (Oil on canvas)

Steeped in the artist’s personal iconography, Macpherson’s paintings are ultimately invitations to the viewer’s own imagination. His abstract narratives hinge on a surreal juxtaposition of elements, combining the fluidity of collage with the tangible solidity of sculpture. Human form feels monumental and timeless, almost mythological in stature, yet carries an emotional weight that is intensely intimate, tempered by the natural environment.

A Voice in the Wilderness is a beautiful example; the placement of hands between man, woman and child on horseback cementing their relationship, heads rested together, occupying a landscape dwarfed and engulfed by human presence and memory. Behind the female figure shifting cloud in a myriad of pink, blue and yellow mirrors the dream-like state of her opaque eyes, a domestic structure within the cloud morphs like a fragile, trembling vision, akin to the hue of a spirit bird hovering over the man’s left shoulder.

She appears as an iconic mother figure, respectably dressed in a green white collared dress and apron, a sheath of golden harvest under her arm, woman, Goddess and Seer. The father figure holds the child in the tender tracery of his hand, his shoulder cross hatched in a solid form of white, bisecting his blue suit and the child’s body. The interplay of light and hue from the low horizon into bands of sky, shape-shifting and golden, add to the enigmatic interior life of the image.

Like the more consciously contained and stylised Friday Night, the blending of colour is masterful; the full scope of the palette visible within the figures themselves, particularly in the modelling of their faces. Use of colour conveys a certain serenity and oneness with the landscape that in Friday Night extends to the darkened descent of cloud which dominates the background. The gaze of both figures extends beyond the space in which the viewer stands, visible constraint in their pose- reminiscent of American Gothic, but strangely liberated by the nuanced treatment of colour and fluid mindscape which surround them.

A Nostalgic Love Scene extends the emotional range of MacPherson’s palette in an earthy combination of colours like ripened fruit in rich cadmium red, orange, yellow and green. Aloft on a horse, the male figure is balanced on the shoulders of a woman, a white bird perched delicately on his hand while its shadow self sits perched upon his shoulder. The double track on which they are travelling is earthen red/ brown, mirroring the cut of his clothing and giving an autumnal turn to an idealised vision of a past relationship, surrounded in a cloud of brilliant cerulean blue. The totemic assemblage of figures stand between two way markers, one in the form of a bird house, the other marked with nails, the ground corrugated like the folds of their clothing. The horse with its mask, adorned in what feels like medieval jousting dress, suggests nostalgia in terms of past origins of romance and chivalry.

Neil MacPherson - While The World Sleeps (Oil on canvas)

MacPherson’s command of composition is clearly displayed in The Window of Dreams, where human presence is represented in absence by the cut out male and female silhouettes in two yellow and orange chairs. Temperature of colour is finely balanced in a composition boldly divided in triptych by the green wall, open window and dark receding corner space. In the foreground a red table, with a green and yellow seed seemingly aligned with each phantom sitter, completes the view.

A large jug upon the table holds one of the artist’s recurrent visual tropes: a loch or pool of water from which exotic hybrid blooms emerge, an amalgamation of sculptural, architectural and organic forms. This enigmatic and fertile pool of the imagination containing the emotional conductor of water is often supported by a solid sculptural base, a visual metaphor for the way in which the artist successfully suspends disbelief. Form and colour are so solid in terms of the composition, so beguiling and lovingly painted, that abstraction and narrative/figurative traditions coexist harmoniously satisfying eye, heart and mind.

One of the most beautiful and lyrical works in the show, While the World Sleeps, visualises a couple on horseback, their world turned upside down above their heads, floating on an ocean of sky. The golden curve of the horizon meets their eye line as they gaze beyond us in a frozen embrace, triangular clouds suggestive of beasts freed by the imagination and miniature horses hovering around them. Equally lyrical and meditative, one of the smaller works in the show, Pearls of Wisdom, depicting a famer in the landscape, is an absolute gem, tempered with a more subdued palette.

Neil MacPherson - Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (Oil on canvas)

The contrast in handling in a mixed media work such as The Harvest Thanksgiving and Chronicles of the Little Bird with the intensity of mark concentrated in the corner of a white room are also a joy to behold. This element of movement in the drawn or brush mark animates the pigment and some of the best technical handling in the show employs this to great effect, together with the more formal blocking of colour in many of the larger scale works. Bolder still is From this Day Forward the Road Will Be Long and Winding, a much darker work of human and beastly form in high contrast.

Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow perhaps epitomises the artist’s strength of vision in a large portrait head flanked by parent figures on either shoulder, a farmer’s rake – an emblem of labour – over the shoulder, a mountain pyramid, home and cross in the background. In the abstracted eyes of the central protagonist we see our origins in landscape and memory encapsulated in MacPherson’s singular vision. This is an important and inspirational show highlighting one of the North’s most enigmatic and accomplished artists.

© Georgina Coburn, 2011

Links

Browns Gallery

Ian Westacott grew up in Myrtleford, Victoria, where he has a property and where his parents still live. Influenced by the interior of his parents’ dry cleaning factory and the industrial landscape of Melbourne where he studied, Westacott‘s previous subjects have been dominated by factories, mills and townscapes, and his work has been typically large-scale and structural. His latest exhibition (which draws on the Scottish landscape for its subjects) is very different, but as he explains, it grew out of his Myrtleford childhood and reflects the pull of his Australian home.

Ian Westacott's etching Cairn of the Wolf

“There was a clump of box willows near the courts where my mum played tennis. Once when I was little I was playing in the branches and I fell off right into the tree – the branches curved inwards and the tree caught and held me like this.” He cradles his arms. “When I was a bit older I played cricket with men who worked the land or in the forests. They were naturally athletic sportsmen – tall, fit and muscled. To me they were like the trees they worked with, all bones and sinews.“

Years later, as an art teacher in the rural primary schools near his Scottish home and with two small boys of his own, Westacott unexpectedly found himself returning to these memories.

“It all started a few years ago with a tree near here. It was perfect for climbing – low limbs and on the edge of a hill so you could practically walk into it. There were bits of a tree house in it and the scarring from generations of other structures. The mums and dads of the village had had tree houses there as well as today’s kids.”

For nearly a year Westacott drew this tree again and again, fascinated by the way generations of children’s games had bruised and shaped it. One day he arrived with his etching plates and it had been cut into logs, cleared to make an access road for a new property.

Ian Westacott's etching Belfron Punishment Oak

The experience compelled him to seek out and draw other trees in Scotland that were ‘on the edge’. Trees like the Cadzow oaks, a forest of 300 giant crumbling oak trees thought to have been planted in the 12th century. Or the Glen Loyne pinewood; a remnant of the great Caledonian Forest now accessible only by a rough mountain path. The fifty or so survivors in Glen Loyne have an average age of 450 years and were considered too small or too twisted to be worth logging when the great forests were cut down.

Westacott carries his etching plates to the trees and works up close. This first half hour or so is when the seeds of the image are planted. “Trees are pivotal things in our lives and people and stories spin off them” he says. “When I draw, everything is silent but my mind is racing, full of ideas and thoughts. It’s a ‘peaceful race’.

“It’s been a way of starting again for me. A lot of my previous subjects have been structural and large scale where speed is everything and accidents happen all the time. In contrast these trees are very stark and reduced and quite small. I’ve had to slow down and focus right in.

“I’m working on the surface very carefully. Everything is linear. It’s challenging for me to work like this and I risk being conservative and constrained. But I’ve discovered that the slow process of etching brings out aspects that resonate with me, things that have significance. The slow building-up of lines on the plate and then the careful inking and wiping helps me know and understand the tree.“

Westacott adds with a smile: “Some years ago I wouldn’t have been able to draw them, but working with a mate of mine I discovered the confidence to have a go at anything.” That mate was Tasmanian artist Raymond Arnold and their decade-long collaboration resulted in their joint exhibitions, Double Vision, which toured Scotland, Paris, Albury and Melbourne in 2005-7.

Westacott believes working with Arnold allowed him to find a new direction and to become more ambitious in his subject matter. He explains that when he was a student he was inspired by the starkness and humility of Alberto Giacometti’s work. The influence has remained with him and is one of the forces pushing him forward. “Giacometti was fascinated by the human figure and I think that drawing trees rather than factories has been a secret way for me to get closer to drawing people.“

Ian Westacott's etching Cromwell's Chestnut

Over the last three years Westacott has been seeking out and drawing special heritage trees. Some have very particular historical associations – the Cromwell tree is said to have been planted in 1651 on the day that the city of Perth fell to Cromwell’s troops – others are simply very old. What they all have in common is relative obscurity, for apart from a handful of enthusiasts, nobody pays them much attention.

“Despite the historic and cultural significance of these trees, they are not generally held high in the public consciousness. Someone can drive a bulldozer over a tree and get away with a relatively small fine or kill it slowly over time with no penalty at all. Trees have to be mythologised before they become part of our internal imagination – had Turner painted any of these trees they would get a lot more protection than they do.”

His exhibition features 22 subjects from all parts of Scotland. Many have jagged broken crowns from ancient injuries and trunks that are twisted beyond belief by wind and weather. Some have been worn away by human or animal activity, their bark has been chewed, nails driven into them, stones piled high upon their roots – and yet they have survived.

Westacott winces as he describes what he found in his search, as if he feels the trees’ pain as his own. “A tree shows its scars and knocks but keeps on living and enduring. As people we carry around injuries we had as children and the scars of our emotional lives. We keep them locked away in our personalities and under our clothes, but with a tree it’s all out there on view. In a way these pictures reflect my state of mind over the last few years. The trees are very like bodies for me and I’m living out myself in them. Take the Cromwell tree for instance, it’s twisted and contorted and clearly not comfortable with itself. I drew that in the year before and after my hernia operation and that’s exactly how I felt!”

“Many of the subjects I drew in the past have gone. The factories in Melbourne have closed and been demolished, a tree that I was drawing last summer in Victoria burned down in the bushfires. Even while I was drawing I knew they were frail and that I had to catch a memory of them for myself, before they fell.

“All the trees here are on the edge, some right on the edge. History says that they can’t live much longer. The Cadzow oaks are defying time: they shouldn’t have survived the industrial age. Scientifically they’ve gone beyond their natural range and it’s incongruous that they’re still hanging in there. Maybe they’ve survived because they’re in a big group of trees – they’re a tribe.”

He opens the stove door and carefully feeds in two pieces of birch wood. Out of the window I catch a single blue gum swaying in the darkening afternoon sky, a little piece of home in a foreign landscape.

He sees me looking and adds, “Most of the trees I’ve drawn are isolated and alone. We all know how it feels to be like that. As we get older we identify more with the frailty of situations and bodies. It grows in our consciousness with age.”

Ian Westacott's etching Gearrchoille Wood Don't Worry Tree

Venerable Trees – Etchings by Ian Westacott, is at the John Hope Gateway Gallery, Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh, until 6 March 2011.

Alison Munro is a freelance writer based in Dornoch.

© Alison Munro, 2011

Links

• Royal Botanics Edinburgh
• Australian Galleries, Melbourne
• Brown’s Gallery, Tain

Brown's Gallery Installation view of 'Trees on the Edge' (photo - Giles Sutherland)

THE DEPICTION of trees in the history of art has a long tradition, but careful studies of individual trees are much rarer. Dürer, Rembrandt and Van Gogh were sufficiently skilled and interested to focus on trees as subject matter – but rarely exclusively so.

Rembrandt’s ‘The Three Trees’ from 1643, for example, shows the trees in considerable detail but only as part of a wider landscape including various human activities, with the outskirts of a large town in the background. It is difficult, if not impossible, to discern the exact species which Rembrandt is depicting.

Van Gogh’s drawing ‘Knotberken’ (Pollarded Birches) from March 1884 shows the trees in great detail, with much arboricultural accuracy. But even here van Gogh’s focus is on scene as a whole – on the right a shepherd guides his flock, while on the left of the pollarded stand, a women walks away, her back towards the viewer.

It is much rarer for an artist to focus exclusively on the tree as an object – and a subject – in itself. But this is the approach that the Dornoch-based printmaker Ian Westacott has taken. Using the recently published Heritage Trees of Scotland (Roger, Stokes and Ogilvie, The Tree Council, 2006) as a guide, Westacott has traveled the length and breadth of the county in search of unusual trees. These trees have a history – often difficult – and are usually associated with humanity in some way or another.

Westacott says: “A tree shows its scars and knocks but keeps on living and enduring. I see in them accumulations of experience. As people we carry around injuries we had as children and the scars of our emotional lives; we keep scars locked away in our personalities and under our clothes, but with a tree it’s all out there on view.”

Westacott, therefore, clearly identifies with the trees he seeks to depict. Although his style is apparently mimetic, representational and ‘objective’, it contains aspects of expressive intent. The history and experience of these trees is therefore the history of both humanity and the artist. The trees’ scarring, altering, wounding and cutting are felt and not simply observed.

‘Balfron Punishment Oak’, depicting the tree also known as the Clachan Oak, for example, shows an ancient mutilated specimen of quercus robur, bound together by three iron bands and patched with planks. It appears more as a stump than as a tree and human comparison is easy and almost unavoidable: a wounded veteran with a long and perhaps ignominious history; someone who has stood the test of time and is still standing… The tree has supposed historical links with William Wallace and ‘Rob Roy’ MacGregor but was also used as a site of punishment where wrong-doers were chained and vilified.

Westacott’s technique involves working in situ and etching his small copper plate with sufficient detail for the composition to be finished in the studio. This is an approach he shares with friend, collaborator and fellow artist, Frances Walker. This painstaking technique, by necessity, takes hours of careful and patient crafting – often in winter – as Westacott prefers the stark outline of bare branches to summer foliage.

As an artist, one would expect Westacott to be sensitive to his surroundings in terms of aesthetics and nature. But it is clear that this sensitivity – and joy – is more akin to reverence for the sheer evolutionary elegance of the tree as dominant life-form on our planet.

While studying the diverse forms of these amazing organisms, and celebrating humanity’s relationship with them he also, one suspects, despairs at the increasing distance between many people and the natural world. Indeed, this exhibition can be seen as a form of plea which urges the viewer to seek out what Westacott so obviously cherishes.

© Giles Sutherland, 2010

Johny Bellany - Waiting For The Tide (image courtesy of Brown's Gallery)

THIS LATEST solo show at Browns Gallery provides a unique opportunity to view work by one of Scotland’s most influential artists. John Bellany has long established an international reputation, represented in major collections including the Museum of Modern Art and the Metropolitan Museum, New York, The National Galleries of Scotland and the Tate Gallery, London. An Honorary Member of The Royal Scottish Academy (1986), a member of the Royal Academy (1991) and awarded a CBE in 1994, Bellany’s place in our cultural history is well documented.

However for me, Bellany’s work resonates most strongly in his lifelong devotion to the art of painting, a great example of an artist whose art is defined resoundingly by his craft. Born in the fishing community of Port Seton in 1942, Bellany studied at the Edinburgh College of Art and Royal College of Art, London, in the 1960’s, developing his own inimitable style and iconography.

Works such as the triptych ‘Allegory’ (1964) and ‘Kinlochbervie’ (1966) remain defining images of Scottish and international art history. For five decades Bellany has worked prolifically, currently residing between Edinburgh, Cambridge and Barga in Italy. His work is both earthly and highly symbolic, influenced by masters such as Brugel, Bosch and Rembrandt. In Modern terms his intense palette, heightened perspective and stylisation of the figure are strongly akin to the lineage of Northern Expressionism.

The skewed angular composition of works such as ‘Waiting for the Tide’ beautifully express the precariousness of life at sea and recall German Expressionists works by artists such as Beckmann and Dix. Life and death are equally present. Three female figures waiting by a window are flanked by two skeletons compressed to the edge of the picture plane.

This is an interior space on multiple levels, heightened by Bellany’s vivid use of yellow, red, orange, green, cerulean and black. The starkness of skull white permeates even the decorative details of the furnishings. In the women’s lap two hybrid cats stare out of the picture, their mask-like faces and almond eyes mirroring that of their mistresses. The boat seen through the open window beyond has the eerie presence of a ghost ship, drifting on its own glassy reflection of millpond stillness.

This is an image of spatial and psychological depth. Framed perspective and colour balance the energy of the work, a pregnant pause tense with the dynamics of colour and the human ache of waiting for death. The image suggests this state as a devotional act of faith, living at the edge of one of nature’s great malevolent forces. The Christian associations with fishing and fishermen are tempered by the hard edged stylisation of the figure in many of Bellany’s seaside and harbour images, influenced no doubt by his Calvinist roots.

In ‘Star of Hope’ Bellany presents an arrangement of objects or effigies akin to the work of the Belgian artist James Ensor. The mask as a symbol of humanity is a strong element in the work and the grotesque and somewhat surreal juxtaposition of objects living and dead; a black lobster, accordion, fish head and totem-like puffin mask present a bleak twist on the still life genre. Here there is a collection of objects which in spite of the sea blue background, distant expansive horizon and suggestion of life through music are also infused with the smell of salt and decay.

‘The Wayfarer’ is one of the finest of Bellany’s boat and harbour scenes on show, a scene of turbulence overhead in perfect counterpoint to the inner calm of a safe mooring. The brushwork in the sky is wonderfully gestural and fluid, with rich use of cadmium red, crimson, aqua, green and black, animated with pure white. This is a superb work of expressive paint handling, of raw energy and repose. ‘The Wayfarer’ feels like it has the experience of a lifetime in its making, a mature work of reflection and painterly vigour.

Of the Tuscan works on display, ‘Barga’, a large scale view of the mountain village is the finest. The brushwork is supremely beautiful with rich hues of deep green, browns, red and sienna. Man-made structures are as much a part of the whole tapestry of the scene as the trees and mountains, pulsing with an earthy sense of life. The treatment of the mountains, abstraction of the scene, its essential rhythm and sense of movement reminded me a great deal of Kandinsky.

Another view of ‘Barga’ with white washed walls and a lone silhouetted figure compressed into the narrow perspective of the street is starkly illuminated by light. Less successful are images such as ‘Neath The Tuscan Sky’, an insipid image, lacking in depth, and testimony that even great masters of painting sometimes miss their own mark.

For me the resounding strength in this exhibition is in the figurative works, an enduring statement by an artist who has unequivocally walked his own path. The artist’s life and work are defined by extremes – the “sacred and profane” permeate his work in equal measure. His tenacity and sheer will with a brush never fail to inspire and once seen, his uncompromising vision of humanity is never forgotten.

There are some excellent examples of his paintings in oils and watercolour on show, with large scale works in the newly renovated gallery space creating an impressive display. Once again it is the vision of a private gallery rather than a public one providing access to works of international stature in the region. Being able to see work of this calibre locally is a true gift and I hope that younger art students in particular take the opportunity to discover Bellany’s work.

© Georgina Coburn, 2008

Links

• Browns Gallery

Neil MacPherson: People Who Knew How To Let The World Pass Them By

IT IS always a pleasure to see contemporary Scottish Art well presented in a space that allows it to breathe. Browns recently extended gallery is an excellent space flooded with natural light encouraging close and contemplative viewing of the work.

There is an impressive range on show as part of the 2008 summer exhibition including featured artists John Bellany, John Byrne, Neil MacPherson, Calum Colvin, Colin Brown, Jennifer Houliston, Allan MacDonald, Marion Notman, Wendy Sutherland, Peter White, Alex Main, Alan MacDonald , Fin Macrae, Lucy Woodley, Linda Soos and Kate Downie.

Neil MacPherson’s ‘People Who Knew When To Let The World Pass Them By’ reads like an ironic rural idyll. MacPherson’s characteristic handling of the figure is robust, sculptural and reminiscent of Picasso. Human forms are finely rendered in rainbow shades of colour. They are still, timeless and monumental. Hues are as perfectly balanced as the intertwined reclining male and female figures that dominate the painting.

His series of thirty smaller panels, ‘A Month September 2007′, is an intriguing metamorphosis of style, technique and ideas displayed in the manner of a visual diary. ‘Spring’, with its surreal upturned land and sky is instantly appealing, with a dream-like circle of white sheep suspended around the central figure. The heightened surreal quality of MacPherson’s work coupled with his paint handling make his vision strong, tangible and unexpectedly emotive.

‘Silence’, a darker work in a palette of green and red opposites, is a good example. Here the eye is drawn to a central patch of light within the aerial view that fills the heart like a void, a feeling echoed in the mute cry of the bird flying above. A comparatively small work, it is one of the most affecting on display.

Colin Brown’s works in mixed media such as ‘Horace Andy’ and ‘Rise’ are a fascinating blend of pseudo-chaos and absolute control. His densely packed compositions of found images, attention grabbing headlines, advertising logos and paint splatter are so finely tuned that they managed to achieve something truly miraculous. Rather than a surface bombardment of imagery and text the mind actually slows down and moves into the work. The fluid process of collage has actually allowed the artist the highest degree of structure in the composition.

The overall balance in the work encourages the viewer to be still and consider each element, colour, form or word association as the eye is lead into the layered surface. The “busy” facade is deceptive and insightful, displaying a greater understanding of the dynamics of Pop Art and Dada than simple imitation or repetition.

Brown’s work offers an alternative to the multitude of images and text that demand our attention on a daily basis, reinventing them as a mechanism for thought rather than consumption. Viewing this artist’s work feels like a journey rather than instant gratification which is the real source of its potency.

In addition to a selection of jewellery inspired by organic forms from land and sea, the introduction of glass to Lucy Woodley’s silver work is a brilliant combination. The heavy cut vessels in dark green and blue glass compliment the delicacy of the outer silver work perfectly.

‘Rowan Salt Dish and Spoon’ and ‘Glass Olive Dish and Spoon’ are superbly crafted objects that allow the qualities of each material to resonate. Detail from the natural world which we may not pause to contemplate in daily life is brought into focus in objects which are unique, beautiful and functional.

It is refreshing to see a selection of photography represented in the gallery including works by Craig MacKay, Fin Macrae and David Eustace. With a lack of focus in the UK on photography as a creative discipline work such as this argues a strong case for greater prominence and awareness of the art form.

Whilst digital technology has seemingly made everyone a photographer, there is a profound difference between hundreds of random pictures and an eye that can mentally compose a shot prior to the shutter going off. This is a tantalising selection of what could be a much larger showcase of the photographer’s art.

David Eustace’s ‘Untitled’ interior photograph introduces painterly tones of gold and sepia, highlighting beautifully the rich textures of wood, fabric and contours of flesh. Fin Macrae’s ‘Bridge Dornoch’ and ‘Algondones Dunes II, CA US’ are wonderfully composed studies of light, tone, natural and man-made structures. Macrae captures the subject but also explores the formal elements of composition with great skill. Figurative work by Craig MacKay is darker, playing with the subtlety of shadow with more highly contrasted landscapes in black and white.

There are many highlights in the exhibition to be savoured; Alex Main’s bronze heads of John Byrne and John The Bapist, the new found broad expressionistic sweep of Alan MacDonald’s ‘Black Cuillins’ and the ethereal ‘Flight’ by Linda Soos, vibrating with Chagall-like colour.

Self-portraits by John Byrne make a fascinating study all of their own. “Checked Shirt” is a particularly vulnerable examination of the man and artist on a large scale. The juxtaposition of two self portraits; a self conscious, sideways glancing Byrne in designer specs and the smaller study ‘Here We Go Again’ hung beneath it create an extremely interesting dialogue. The artist’s direct gaze is assured and uncompromising; a single drawn line defines the back of the head which is modelled in block tones of grey and gold. There is a measure of John Byrne the man in this small scale work in sharp contrast to the stylised persona above.

Time spent in this exhibition will reward the viewer. It is easy to become absorbed in the work of some of Scotland’s finest established and emerging artists presented in a manner which encourages appreciation of their work.

Browns Gallery, Castle Brae, Tain, 01862 893884, info@brownsart.com

© Georgina Coburn, 2008

visualarts,highland

Sir William Gillies, Border Landscape (photo - Bourne Fine Art).

THIS LATEST exhibition at Brown’s Gallery in collaboration with Bourne Fine Art, Edinburgh, provides a great opportunity to view historical works by Scottish artists and adjacent contemporary works by Highland-based artists within the newly renovated space.

That such an exhibition should be presented by a commercial gallery is admirable, however it again underlines the lack of public provision for Visual Arts and the significant contribution of private sector galleries to cultural access in the Highlands.

The way in which artists influence each other over the centuries is always of interest, and seeing contemporary work as part of a continuum of visual investigation, and as part of a national and world stage is often overlooked.

As an audience we are not given the opportunity to make that connection through lack of public exhibition space and access to national collections in the Highlands. From a private curatorial point of view Browns and Bourne Fine Art have made that connection visible and it is an exciting development which I hope will lead to regular exchanges between the Highlands and Central Belt by both commercial and public galleries in the future.

For local collectors this show broadens the spectrum of artworks for consideration. Specialising in Scottish Art from the 17th century to the present day, Bourne Fine Art have contributed works from artists such as Waller Hugh Paton, Sir David Young Cameron, George Houston, J.D. Fergusson, Sir William Gillies, William Wilson, Alberto Morocco and Elizabeth Blackadder.

For the general public this is a rare opportunity to see work by artists who are part of the canon of art history and of national and international importance. For artists or students the exhibition is an excellent opportunity for direct observation.

What I enjoyed most about this show was how certain works focused my attention so acutely on technique, palette and paint handling. What fascinates me most about art history is what that visual history reveals about human experience and how technical problems are resolved, particularly in painting.

A still life by John Bulloch Souter (1890- 1971) was a supreme example of the latter. Framed in a texture of beaten silver his “Still Life with Plate” is an elegant lesson in observation, simplicity and design. There are no screaming colours or frenzied clutter of marks to attract your immediate (but all too fleeting) attention but a subdued palette of grey, pinkish browns and opaque lustre that absorbs you in the composition.

The lighting in the piece subtly guides the eye to contemplate each object in a way that draws you back to it time and again. It is a lesson in seeing and how to be still within a work of art.

Sir William Gillies (1898-1973) large work “Spinningdale” (oil on canvas) with its loose post impressionistic brushwork is outshone by a smaller work “Border Landscape” (oil on board).

With a high horizon and blocks of warm peach, cool green and lines of purple-grey, your eye travels beyond the dry stone wall into the undulating landscape. This is a warm, lyrical view articulated by the brushwork and a piece that – like Souter’s still life – I felt compelled to return to.

J.D. Fergusson’s two figure studies in chalk present a vision of femininity that is strong, lithe and rhythmic, a treatment of line and of the figure that is pure Art Deco. The seated figure holding what is presumably an apple reads like a question mark and this seductiveness is at the heart of Fergusson’s drawings from life.

His distinct stylistic treatment of the female figure is unique among the Scottish Colourists and owes much to his lifelong relationship with choreographer Margaret Morris. Though I am not a great fan of Fergusson’s paintings these are fantastic examples of his distinct style and of pure draughtsmanship based on his ideal of the feminine.

Two works by Waller Hugh Paton (1828-1895) present a romantic view of nature reminiscent of Caspar David Friedrich. The small watercolour “After the Storm” depicting moonlight breaking through cloud illuminating the wreck of a ship is a fine example.

“Dawn”, a larger painting in which the sky and emerging light are contrasted with foreground foliage in umber silhouette, places contemplation of nature at the centre of the work. The human scale in this landscape is small with a female figure drawing water just visible in the foreground.

Although romanticised, Thomas Duncan’s “Milkmaid” (oil on board) is an interesting work. An idealisation of honest labour, the figure’s bare feet, rosy cheeks and pure complexion give a wholesome view of the life we see defined by the low whitewashed croft in the background.

The young girl is still a child and details in the painting such as the treatment of her opaque milk-like apron contribute to the picture of innocence and virtue. Though this is a typically sentimentalised 19th century view of rural life, the moral associations of the work, like so many other paintings of this period, make it worth revisiting.

In the original rooms of Browns Gallery, now the lower level, works by artists such as Neil MacPherson, John Byrne, Alan Macdonald and Alex Main feature alongside work by David McClure, Alberto Morrocco and Elizabeth Blackadder.

The exhibition flows quite naturally into this space despite having travelled several centuries. Neil MacPherson’s “Flowers by the Sea”, “The Troubadour” , “The Music Makers” and a particularly fascinating piece entitled “The New World” are beautiful examples of his surreal vision.

John Byrne’s “Dessie Outside the Brickhouse” and “Evening–Ferguslie Park” (recalling the “Slab Boys” era) are superbly drawn, with thin layers of paint in ochre, umber and sienna, details scratched into the surface.

There is an energy in these pieces exemplified by the scratched concentrated marks that make up the glowing end of a cigarette, the drawing itself is infused with light and energy. The elongated figures, huge teddy boy hair and decorated frames place the work in a specific age, but the life in this work and Byrne’s technique as an artist makes it timeless.

Alex Main’s “Untitled” oil, a wonderfully open abstracted landscape in clear blocks of colour echoes the work of Kandinsky. “Untitled” drawing, a superb abstract composition of striated and varied marks in black and white has an almost etched quality and is beautifully balanced. Though these are small works in comparison to many of the other pieces on show they sing off the wall.

You would expect to be able to see a permanent representation of Scottish Art in any city in Scotland, the presence of this temporary exhibition in Tain heightens my sense of that absence in the Highland capital.

The excellence of presentation and the ease with which national historical works are presented in the same gallery as contemporary works from artists based in the Highlands sends a clear message about the value of both. Seeing work within Brown’s new gallery space is a joy, with the light and space to appreciate work and a standard of presentation that equals the quality of the artworks on display.

(Brown’s Gallery, Castle Brae, Tain, Mon-Sat,10-5.30 or by appointment 01862 893884)

© Georgina Coburn, 2007

Links

• Bourne Fine Art

Moon River, Melvich by Allan MacDonald.

ALTHOUGH identified primarily with the depiction of Northern landscape, Alan MacDonald’s latest solo show reveals a range not seen in previous exhibitions, especially in relation to human subject matter. There are interesting seeds being sown within the landscape work also which suggest greater depth of exploration and maturity in the artist’s practice.

Two large oil paintings of the artist’s parents “Dad” and “Mum Reluctant” are positive signs of evolution in MacDonald’s treatment of the human form. “Dad” is a beautifully realised portrait, a combination of loose layered brushstrokes in cool blues and warm flesh tones which dull none of the complexity of the subject.

Previous figurative and portrait work seem flat in comparison, smooth and flawless in approach, containing surface emotion but unable to penetrate fully the nature of the subject. The key to this change is his ability to handle paint and explore a range of mark with passion and verve regardless of the subject matter.

The depiction of the artist’s father is a sensitively aged face infused with respect and empathy. It is also the depiction of a life and full of this force is equal to his best landscapes. Viewed close up the control of the palette becomes apparent in counterpoint to the more gestural strokes. It is wonderful to see the energy normally invested in MacDonald’s landscapes entering his portraiture in this way.

There is a sense of compassion in MacDonald’s work which is also clearly demonstrated in “The Coming of Age”. The figure of an elderly woman sits like an apparition half masked in the green shadow of visible decay, her eyes faded, pupils ghost like in direct contrast to the ground of alizarin crimson and the chair she sits in. Another smaller square painting of the same sitter “Worry” is an excellent study of white panic and anxiety on the aged human face.

Less convincing are three large still lives in the show in vibrant colours; “Overflow”, “My Table Thou Hast Furnished” and “Abundance”. Given the strong portrait and landscape works in the exhibition these works are an uneasy fit. The garish hues, austere titles and scale of the subject matter seem forced. The palette in these still lives is an interesting development though and the portrait “Shona, Fireside Blues” gives a hint of how this might be explored in the future.

Two further still lives of silverware titled “To Whom Much is Given” exhibit a more subdued palette and the least representational of the two is the most compelling, an excellent study of light and accomplished paint handling.

“Shona, Fireside Blues” focuses on the downcast eyes and face illuminated by firelight and a vibrant colourful palette. On a red brown ground, the face emerges out of shadows of deep alizarin and purple. Lit on one side by strokes of vivid blue against the heat of cadmium red and orange the treatment of this portrait reminded me very much of German Expressionist works.

This resonance can also be seen in two fascinating and distinctive landscape works; “Moon River, Melvich” and “Moonstruck”, an oil work on paper. The stark contrast in tone and abstract nature of the landscape are another interesting departure for MacDonald and in the case of “Moon River, Melvich” reminded me of Nolde or even Beckmann.

However brooding or dark the Northern landscape may be there remains a resilient glimmer of hope in Allan MacDonald’s creative vision. “Day’s End, Winter, Glencoe” depicts the dying light as a burst of yellow setting the branches aglow in the high right hand corner of the painting against a heavily laden landscape in dark tones of raw sienna and umber.

“Atlantic Coast- Harris” is another example with its oppressive blocked in sky of tempestuous purple and angry relentless sea redeemed by the emergence of light, breaking through in cerulean blue and warm yellow in the corner. Scratched marks articulate the waves through layers of deep green, blue and white foam.

In choosing to depict the lifting of dark elements, the moment of ease after the tension of a storm, light breaking through cloud or as in the triptych “Orcadian Sea” light coming from beneath the horizon, MacDonald seems to capture a redemptive quality in nature.

“Sea Surge” visually immerses the viewer in the sound of waves against rock, the tension of paint pulled in all directions and flecks of orange and blue under painting. Natural energy translated into paint and the act of painting itself remains in a work like “Autumn Spate” depicting a cascade of water on stone.

There is resistance here where paint is pulled down by a palette knife allowing layers of colour and impasto to reveal themselves. The importance of working outside and engagement with the elements permeates the artist’s creative process. This physical quality is richly evident in the handling of paint.

“Birch Dance”, a large work which hung centrally in the new gallery space, positively sings off the wall. The subtly twisted curve of the trees read like figures defined by layers of impasto, scratched marks and gouges of bark with a complimentary palette of warm russet and ochre coupled with blues and purple.

“The Great Herdsman” with its mountainous form, swathes of blue, purple and white is highly evocative of the flow of air across the landscape. Buachaille Etive Mor has the same subtle quality registered in a lighter touch of brushstroke.
In “Mushroom Cloud, Dounreay” an ominous mass of cloud overshadows the low Caithness landscape in a wide ball of cross hatched marks. This is an interesting development in MacDonald’s work which relates not to natural elements or effects of Northern light and weather but human interaction with the landscape.

It is a pleasure to view this body of work in the newly renovated and extended gallery, flooded with natural light. A thoroughly contemporary space which draws attention to the original stonework and architectural features of the old façade, glass, wood, stone and slate has been utilised by architect Robin Webster to create an open space in which to appreciate this and future exhibitions to the full.

Browns Gallery, Castle Brae, Tain, 01862 893884, Mon- Sat, 10am-5pm; other times by appointment.

© Georgina Coburn, 2007

Links

• Allan MacDonald
• Click here to view more of Allan MacDonald’s work