Portrait of a Gallery - The Scottish Gallery

Stanley Cursiter CBE, RSA, PRSW (1887-1976)
Winter Stromness 1950 oil on canvas board, signed and dated 40.5 x 45.5 cms
Cursiter was one of the most influential figures in 20th century Scottish art. As a painter he is known
chiefly today for his commitment to the landscape of his native Orkney: the cliffs and boiling seas of
Yesnaby, Birsay and Westray. He also had an important portrait practice and was King’s Limner from
1949. His female portraits of the 20s, picking up his professional life after a distinguished war, are some
of the most elegant and evocative works of the era: sumptuous interiors often featuring a favourite model,
Poppy Low, who was also painted by his friend SJ Peploe. Before this in 1913 he produced several startling
subject pictures in a Futurist style, which are now considered serious modernist British paintings despite
the artist turning his back on this way of painting (he could never have subscribed to the political credo in
the manifestos of futurism). One of these, The Sensation of Crossing the Street was exhibited in the Society
of Scottish Artists in 1913 alongside the loan of twenty post-impressionist works which included Severini’s
Boulevard (1909). From 1930-1948 he was Director of The National Galleries of Scotland, overseeing the
difficult period of Wartime evacuation and adding major works to the collection through skilled diplomacy
and management of his limited funds. During these years he was a consistent, eloquent advocate for a
Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. He wrote extensively, including books on Scottish Art, Henry
Raeburn and the first monograph on SJ Peploe (1947). A major retrospective exhibition was held with
The Scottish Gallery as a Memorial show in 1979.
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