Download PDF: SJ Peploe - The Scottish Gallery

Landscape in the Hebrides, c.1903Signed verso and titled on fragmentary labelOil on panel, 15 x 23 cmsProvenance: Fine Art Society, London, 1958 & 1977; PrivateCollectionThough not specified and the exact location unlikely to bediscovered the subject of Landscape in the Hebrides is withoutdoubt Barra. Peploe is strongly associated with Iona where hevisited annually from 1919 until 1934 but he did visit other islandsin the Hebrides, most significantly Barra. The first visit was in 1894when he and his older brother Willie sailed with their friend thepainter RC Robertson in his ketch Nell. It was on this trip that hemet his future wife Margaret Mackay. She was from Loch Boisdalein South Uist but was working in the Post Office in Castlebay,Barra. They began a correspondence and she eventually followedher heart to Edinburgh, courtesy of a transfer to the Post Officein Frederick Street!Peploe’s landscape studies are always true to the momentand his technical approach an instinctive response to his subject:here the generous, painterly strokes evoke a beautiful Hebrideanday. In the only known painting from his first visit to Barra nineyears before, Peploe depicted a milkmaid and cow. The cow ishere, but no milkmaid perhaps demonstrating how the artisthas little interest in genre; his subject now is pure landscapeimpressionism.12