Anne Redpath Sold at Auction Prices

Painter, b. 1895 - d. 1965

Anne Redpath was born in Galashiels, Scotland, in 1895, the first daughter of a textile designer. She went on to study at the Edinburgh College of Art, where she was described as the most promising student of her year, and won a travel scholarship to Italy.

Her time in Italy was to have a profound influence on her career. Having spent her early years as an artist immersed in the respectable Calvinist tradition, the opulent sense of the divine in Roman Catholic art proved to be a revelation, with the religious tranquillity of the early Renaissance masters informing her subsequent paintings.

In 1920 she moved to France with her husband, an architect, and her art took a back seat as she focused on raising three sons. She did not revisit painting in earnest until she returned to Scotland when the relationship ended in 1934. When she did so, however, it was with renewed vigour.

From 1942 onwards, as her confidence in her abilities returned, her palette became more vibrant. She was a central figure in the group of painters known as The Edinburgh School, sometimes described as the heirs to the Scottish Colourists.

Redpath was an habitual traveller in her latter years, her journeys across Europe becoming the subject of her work; she was well-known for her landscapes, still lifes and pictures of church interiors.

Redpath was president of the Scottish Society of Women Artists from 1944-47, working tirelessly to promote the paintings of women who had been ignored by the British establishment. In 1952 she became the first woman artist to be elected to the Royal Scottish Academy as an Academician, and today her works can be found in the National Gallery of Scotland.