Society snubs two leading Scots painters for being 'too popular'
THEY have won acclaim for their talented brushwork, exhibited at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and been commissioned by Prince Charles and the Queen Mother.
But two artists have had their applications to join the prestigious Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW) turned down repeatedly, with one of them told he was “too popular”.
Hugh Buchanan has had his delicate, finely detailed architectural paintings commissioned by leading royalty, but the RSW, founded by Queen Victoria in 1876, has denied him membership four times. Despite the backing of leading artist Dame Elizabeth Blackadder, among others, he was quietly told his work was “too popular”, he said.
“Having painted for the Royal Family probably counts against me. Maybe it should be the Republican Watercolour Society,” he joked. His first application dates to 1986.
“I have had it from a senior member that I will never be accepted. But I care about the tradition of the Scottish watercolour painting so I want to be part of it,” said Mr Buchanan.
Portrait artist Harry More Gordon, 79, had a major exhibition at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery last year. It included his portrait of Sir Timothy Clifford, the National Galleries of Scotland’s former director, and his family. The catalogue praised “an acute eye for telling detail, earning him acclaim as a contemporary observer of modern life and manners”. But he has also been rejected several times.
The RSW president, John Inglis, said it would have been “careless” to tell Mr Buchanan he was too popular.
“What we are going on is the quality of the work,” he said.
But it emerged the RSW is looking at modernising its constitution for the first time since the 1960s. Currently, a painter must be recommended by one member, seconded by another and then submit three works for inspection. There are then three rounds of voting by members who turn up at the annual general assembly, sorting the candidates on priority and voting on them one at a time.
“We are looking at things like postal voting, but we would have to change a system of election,” Mr Inglis said.
The arts impresario and watercolourist Richard Demarco, an RSW member for four decades, put Mr Buchanan up for membership.
“I strongly recommended Hugh Buchanan because he has an international reputation as a watercolourist, which would be the envy of many watercolourists in Scotland,” he said.
“Harry More Gordon is one of the outstanding practitioners of the art of watercolour paintings and former director of illustration at the Edinburgh College of Art. You’re talking about one of the great societies in the cultural life of Scotland. It seems to be kind of an anomaly.”
In a defiant gesture, Mr Demarco said he was now proposing the two men for the Royal Watercolour Society in London, whose president he met this week.
For a painter, becoming a member of the RSW brings the respect and recognition of your peers, and the right to show works in the annual exhibition, at the Royal Scottish Academy building on the Mound.
Members run from HRH The Duchess of Gloucester, an honorary member, to the leading watercolourist and former president, Philip Reeves, Victoria Crowe, Elizabeth Blackadder, and Gordon Mitchell.
Mr Buchanan’s commissions include one of the Queen Mother lying in state.
“Whoever bothers to turn up at the meeting can vote on whether they want you in,” Mr Buchanan said. “I have been turned down four times, and after a while you don’t bother.”
The Francis Kyle Gallery in London represents both men, who met at Edinburgh College of Art. It is currently showing an exhibition of Mr Buchanan’s work.
Mr Kyle said: “Both Harry and Hugh over the years have submitted for membership and been refused. What both have been told on the grapevine is: you’re too successful, sorry, no you can’t get in.”
He said the society’s house style was “jolly abstracts in acrylic mixes”, not classic watercolours in the tradition of JMW Turner, whose works show at the National Galleries of Scotland every January. GORDON AND BUCHANAN: MEN OF VISION
HARRY MORE GORDON, born in 1928, did not take up portraiture for nearly 40 years. Trained at Edinburgh College of Art, he later taught illustration there after a career as a graphic artist. He has held 17 exhibitions in the UK, the US and Italy since 1971. The National Galleries of Scotland hold two works in their collections, including the group portrait Eight Secretaries of State for Scotland. He has held nine one-man shows since 1983 at the Francis Kyle Gallery.
HUGH BUCHANAN’s current exhibition of interiors of castles, palaces and great houses ranges from the Hermitage and Tsarskoe Selo in Russia to paintings at Hampton Court and Belvoir Castle. Born in Edinburgh in 1958 and trained at Edinburgh College of Art, he has had major commissions from the National Trust, the Prince of Wales for a series of interiors of Balmoral, and the House of Commons.
