The Glasgow Boys: Scotland’s Answer to Impressionism

As the 19^th century came to a close, a group of artists from Glasgow disillusioned with Victorian traditions of romantic landscape painting, channeled European ideals and revolutionary ideas about color into their paintings of everyday rural life in Scotland to help usher in a new age of modern art with paintings about human existence and what it means to be alive. This is Scotland’s answer to Impressionism.

Drawing inspiration from French realists and impressionists, as well as Dutch and French art, The Glasgow Boys were artistic radicals. Adopting a new approach to painting, they abandoned patronizingly romantic scenes of Scottish Highland life and noble peasants that were typical of the day, in favor of showing real people in real environments.

While impressionism was predominantly a French artistic innovation defined by the likes of Edgar Degas, Édouard Manet, and Claude Monet, across the English Channel, a group of 20 or so painters were adding their own rebellious stamp to this new wave of painting. Characterized by bold brushstrokes and an emphasis on light and color, this was the beginning of modernism in Scotland.

United by their disillusionment with academic painting, the most prominent figures of the group were Sir James Guthrieand the Irish-born Sir John Lavery. Setting up their easels outdoors, they painted contemporary rural subjects, taking inspiration from naturalist paintings of Jules Bastien-Lepage and the tonal painting of the American artist, James Abbott McNeill Whistler.

This new wave of Scottish impressionists brushed Glasgow onto the artistic map in the late 19th century, as their avant-garde style rejuvenated the Scottish pictorial panorama and brought impressionism to Scotland. Hailing from different backgrounds, the group of around 20 painters didn’t share an artistic manifesto, but they were all united by a desire to rebel against strict artistic academicism and romantic, sentimental Highland views.

By the late 1880s, The Glasgow Boys’ style shared many of the cues that would come to define impressionism as an avant-garde art form. Standing out from the rigid traditional paintings of the day, a new bold use of color, pattern, and texture in their paintings would identify their approach, which also took inspiration from the flattened forms of Japanese art.

This pioneering spirit evolved from an interest in French and Dutch realism, and this was infused into their later impressionist skewed art, making their own brand of Scottish impressionism a distinct amalgamation. Yes, it shared an open air approach to art (ou ein plein air si vous parle Francais), wide brush strokes, and an interplay of light and shade on color, but did so with its own visual identity that reflected the changing social landscape in Glasgow.

Changing Landscape

The late 19th century in Glasgow was a time of great change – and not only in art. Industrial and economic expansion transformed the city, as well as the wealth of the bourgeoisie and the upper-middle class. This greatly benefited the Glasgow Boys, as the increased wealth brought with it a progressive interest in art and helped to fund the group’s activities.

Shipbuilding and industry in the city thrived before the end of the 19th century, but it was a divided city that still faced harsh living conditions for the working class in overcrowded housing with poor sanitation, and widespread poverty. And this poverty would often paint a story in the art of the Glasgow Boys, but in a more rural setting. As former editor of the Independent on Sunday, Ian Jack, said: “the Clyde stank, you couldn’t see the sunshine, and people lived in overcrowded tenements – no wonder the Glasgow Boys preferred to paint nostalgic rural scenes than the city from which they took their name.”

Flush with wealth from this economic boom, a new class of art patrons were keen to adorn the walls of their new townhouses with this new modern art. And much like the influential French realist, Jules Bastien-Lepage painted his surroundings in Damvillers, Guthrie made a small village on the Berwickshire coast called Cockburnspath his home. And from this rural enclave Guthrie painted real life, and encouraged a number of his artist friends to join him.

In large part, they were able to maintain this lifestyle with the help of these collectors, and in particular, the art dealer, Alexander Reid, who also knew Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin. Such was the demand from this new class of wealthy art patrons that James Guthrie would eventually abandon his rebellious ideals to become a successful society portrait painter, making him comparatively wealthy in the process. And while Guthrie’s ideals didn’t stand the test of time, the impact of the movement certainly did.

The Artists

Despite deciding to swap bold brushstrokes and emphatic color for traditional portraiture, James Guthrie was central to Scotland’s answer to impressionism. He was trained in the traditional and grand academic style, having also spent two years as John Pettie’s apprentice, but it was after returning from a trip to Paris in 1883 that he began to embrace impressionism.

It can be seen in the tonality and brushstrokes of his work that increasingly portrayed day-to-day matters. The impressionist influence can be seen in one of his earliest works, A Highland Funeral, which has echoes of Gustave Courbet’s, The Burial at Ornans. But it’s in A Hind’s Daughter that his artistic evolution is most evident, thanks to the everyday subject matter, the use of color, and the brushstrokes, which was repeated with In the Orchard, and its expressionist depiction of foliage, trees, and grass.

Alongside Guthrie, the other preeminent figure of the group was John Lavery. Irish born, Lavery settled in Glasgow and was a great admirer of Guthrie’s work, as well as the Dutch realists and French impressionists. And the influence of Whistler can be seen in his A Quiet Day in the Studio (1885), but after spending time in at Grez-sur-Loing, just south of Paris in 1883-84, he began painting ein plein air paintings, and this French influence is evident in the emphasized color and brushstrokes of Under the Cherry Tree (1884).

And by the late 1880s, the collective was growing, as other artists began to take an interest in impressionism with work characterized by bold, vigorous, brushstrokes, and an increasing emphasis on the decorative. George Henry, in particular, adopted this style and it can be seen in his painting of Barr, Ayrshire (1891), which is made up of jewel-like pearls of vibrant color that create a more abstract than realistic effect, and a textured surface pattern, which reflected his interest in Japanese art. While Henry’s Sundown or River Landscape by Moonlight (1887) takes its inspiration from Monet, but focuses on the River Clyde in place of La Havre.

Together the group were united by Scotland and during the summer months they could be found on sketching tours of the countryside, accompanied by Edward Arthur Walton, as well as the likes of Edward Atkinson Hornel, and James Patterson, while Arthur Melville, who is closely associated with the group, preferred the color and exoticism of Spain and north Africa. Wherever the location through, the group were drawn to everyday life and the work of the people who lived on the land, to depict the human existence.

Artistic Landscape

This was the Glasgow Boys’ most intensely creative period, as they produced some of their boldest and most invigorating paintings during the last decade of the 19^th century. And it was this rebellion against Victorian traditions of landscape paintings that would alter the course of Scottish art – ushering modern painting into Scotland.

The decorative and design elements in much of the Glasgow Boys’ art is echoed in the work of Celtic Revival artists, but perhaps their most enduring legacy was establishing Glasgow as a serious artistic hub. And their work paved the way for subsequent generations of artists to explore color and remove the shackles of their own creative heritage.

Taking influence from many quarters of modern painting across Europe and Japan, The Glasgow Boys’ embrace of a variety of movements is reflected in the variety of some of their work. But, what united this progressive group of artists was a desire to paint real life, human existence, and what it means to be alive, which has a universality that is still appreciated across the world today.