Portrait of a Gallery - The Scottish Gallery

Barbara Rae CBE, RA, RSA, RSW (b.1943)Spanish Landscape, Torre Viecha c.1989 mixed media and collage 80 x 110 cmsRae had her first solo exhibition with The Scottish Gallery in 1979. She developed in the 80s and early90s into a brilliant colourist using the mediums of monoprint, etching and screenprinting to advance hertechnical range and add new palettes to her repertoire. In the Alpujarras mountains of southern Spain,often working roadside in the heat of the day, she found dramatic subject matter and used paper collage,chalks and water-based paint to capture the texture and glowing colour of her landscape. This paintingdates from 1989, one of a series, many of which were exhibited with great success at ARCO Madrid withthe gallery in February 1990.James Morrison RSA, RSW (b.1932)Sea Loch, 11.xi 2006 oil on board 34.5 x 50 cmsNo other painter has been as closely associated with the gallery as James Morrison. His quiet championingof the value of landscape painting within modernism, his huge ability allied to a rigorous self criticismand his quest for new subject matter while keeping the faith in the limitless possibility contained in theapparently familiar, have assured him a prominent position within post-war Scottish art. From the hauntingtenement paintings of the late 50s, exhibited with the New 57 Gallery and Glasgow Group, to his Catterlinework and then the full maturity of his landscape practice exercised in Angus, Assynt, the Arctic, Alps,Botswana and Fen Country, a huge audience has met and become devoted to his skies and way of seeingthe landscape. For our part we have managed his ‘career’ so that he can concentrate on what reallymatters: painting.42 43