John Blair (c. 1849 – 13 October 1934) was a Scottish painter, predominantly of watercolour landscapes.[1] Of humble beginnings in Berwickshire, he moved to Edinburgh to study and spent the rest of his life there. His paintings mainly reflect the landscapes around him, both of urban settings and also of the castles, sea and lochs of the Borders, although he also painted figures and still lifes. As well as his original work, his paintings were viewed by a wide audience in the form of picture postcards, book endpapers and illustrations.

John Blair
Bornc.1849
Died13 October 1934
Resting placeLiberton Cemetery, Edinburgh
NationalityScottish
EducationTrustees' Academy
Known forPainting

Life and career

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Blair was born in the Berwickshire village of Hutton, in about 1849.[2] His family background would not seem to have favoured his choice of career, which suggests a certain degree of ability in order to make it succeed, nor perhaps predicted him leaving an estate of £3418 4s 6d on his death in 1934.[3] His father's occupation is listed on various census records/official documents as "agricultural labourer", "salmon fisher" and "gardener".[2][4][5] His parents Alexander and Elisabeth Blair (née Allan), together with their family of 5 children, moved around the area; the census recorded them in Hutton in 1851 and in Coldstream in 1861.[2][4]

Somewhere in this period, Blair attended the nearby Sunnyside school at Milne Graden, and it is there that local landowner David Milne-Home befriended him.[6] This resulted in Milne-Home arranging for Blair to train at the Trustees Academy School of Art (a forerunner of Edinburgh College of Art), where Blair studied under Charles Hodder.[1]

By 1871 Blair had left home for South Leith, where he lodged with Francis and Clementina Brown at 8 Primrose Street, giving his occupation as "art student".[7]

He first exhibited in the Annual Exhibition of the Royal Scottish Academy in 1870, with paintings entitled "Newhaven", "Fawside Castle, Edinburgh" and "Bait gatherers". He went on to exhibit some 83 paintings in the RSA Annual Exhibitions until 1920.[8]

He is also said to have exhibited at the Dudley Gallery (London), Glasgow Institute of Fine Art, Walker Art Gallery, Manchester City Art Gallery, Royal Hiberian Academy, The Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours and the Berwick Arts Club, and was a member of the Society of Scottish Artists.[9]

Whilst a student, Blair was awarded several medals of national standing – in 1870 The Scotsman referred to “the silver medal, gained by Mr John Blair in the male school” as one of the 20 silver medals awarded that year across the 103 Government schools.[10] Then in 1872 the Berwickshire News reported that Blair had been awarded both a gold and a silver medal: "We understand that the Edinburgh Schools of Arts for young men has this year been successful….. in the national competition of students recently held at London.  The gold medal was awarded to John Blair, a native of Paxton, for the best shaded study of an antique figure, also a silver medal for a study in water colour.  This is the third silver medal taken by him, and the only instance in the Edinburgh School in which a student has carried off a gold and silver medal in the same year."[11]

By the 1881 census he titled himself "artist landscape" and was living in Leith.[12]

Blair married his wife Margaret Hume in 1899, with their respective ages 48 and 39.[5] They lived for some time at 37 Argyle Place, Morningside where Blair stated his profession as "landscape artist" and "Painter (artist)".[13][14] His obituary in the Berwickshire News[15] stated that his "failing health in late years prevented him using the brush" and this may well explain why he no longer has any paintings exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy after 1920.

He died on 13 October 1934 at his home, 121 Dalkeith Road, Edinburgh, of "Cerebral haemorrhage 2 days" and "Senility", at the age of 84 years.[16] His funeral, according to The Berwickshire News, was conducted by the Rev. W. Roy Sanderson, St Giles Cathedral, and he was buried in Liberton Cemetery, Edinburgh.[1] In addition to family members, one of his pall-bearers was the artist Hector Chalmers RSA.

Works

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Illustrations and picture postcards

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Postcard painting of Melrose morning 1905 by John Blair

There are numerous works by Blair which continue to come up in auction sales. In addition, his works were used to illustrate a number of publications, and over 80 of them[17] appear as Tuck's Post Cards (Raphael Tuck & Sons). Known publications in which Blair's illustrations were used:

Museum collections

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A few of his works are to be found in museum collections, as follows:

In addition, Edinburgh Libraries mounted an exhibition in February 2020 of 13 lithographs of Edinburgh and Midlothian taken from watercolours of John Blair. The original exhibition of watercolours was held in 1892 at the gallery of Aitken, Dott and Sons in Castle Street, Edinburgh. The Berwickshire News carried a review which noted that "Mr Blair’s work is really most successful; a labour of love, its results are as valuable from the purely artistic as from the historical point of view; and the care which he has taken to select typical and striking points of view renders the value of the collection to the future historian of Edinburgh very great".[27]

Royal Scottish Academy Annual Exhibitions

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The following works by Blair were exhibited at Annual Exhibitions of the Royal Scottish Academy between 1870 and 1920.[8]

Year RSA Catalogue Number Description
1870 177 Newhaven
181 Fawside Castle, Edinburgh in the distance
242 Bait gatherers
1871 941 Peace and plenty
944 The Calton Hill from Lochend Road, Leith
1006 Study from still life, fruit, etc.
1051 A dead sparrow
1093 Study of a bird's nest, etc. – from nature
1872 775 Old shed at Cramond – sketch
846 On the Esk at Dalkeith
875 Still life – study
121 Princes St, Edinburgh
1873 761 Village of Old Ladykirk, Berwickshire
926 A quiet nook near Ladykirk, Berwickshire
980 Study in still life
1874 771 Old bridge, Berwick-on-Tweed
934 Melrose Abbey
948 Greens Harbour, Berwick-on-Tweed
993 On the Tweed, near Melrose
1875 802 Melrose Abbey from the east
988 Archway in Melrose Abbey
1876 64 A country byre
174 Taking a rest
528 After dinner
1877 737 Tibbie's Bible
796 A country burnside
893 The reaper's dinner
1878 149 The sculptor
330 A November morning
534 The ploughman's bairns
1879 37 Preparing for sport
302 A turnip field
356 Early winter
562 Reapers at work
1880 274 Summer
444 Autumn morning – after rain
544 Breakfast time
636 Tyne
756 The country postman
1881 363 Honeysuckle
393 A quiet nook
1882 80 Study of cattle
143 The mother's lesson
636 Grandfather's pet
775 Edge of the wood
1883 92 A deaf old man
210 The old fiddler
1029 Salmon fishers mending nets, on the Tweed
1077 The ploughman's orra time
1884 915 A visit to the henhouse
917 A country cobbler
929 Village of Heul, near Rotterdam
1885 112 "The rain it raineth every day With heigh ho the wind and the rain"
123 The quiet of evening
289 The old fiddler
387 The Sunday reading
439 Sorting the hooks
588 The village of Horndean – rainy effect
621 Gathering brushwood
752 Resting in the shade
798 The Pease Glen – moonlight
890 Playmates
1885 689 Snow in autumn
924 The little boat builders
995 The Bible lesson
1886 689 His morning chapter
1025 The bramble gatherer
1141 Dinner time
1887 637 "I've seen Tweed's silver streams glittering in the sunny beams..."
110 Waiting to be shod
190 Noonday
275 Jubilee illuminations – Edinburgh from the Calton Hill
620 Jubilee bonfire on Arthur's Seat
713 Pen & ink drawings for vignettes to Birds of Berwickshire by George Muirhead
801 Pen & ink drawings for vignettes to Birds of Berwickshire by George Muirhead
1888 695 The Tweed at Fishwick
910 The heat of the day
1889 394 The Tweed
835 Wind and rain
960 Grannie's lesson
1890 412 The pedlar
472 At Brig o' Turk
560 In Glenfinlas
1892 662 St Abbs village, Berwickshire coast
1893 ? Interior at Lauder – study
1894 457 On the canal at Aston, Staffordshire
1895 519 Gipsies – bird catching
1896 597 East coast fisherman
1897 579 On the Fife coast
605 Stormy weather, St Monance
660 The Ochils, near Dollar
1898 648 St Monance
786 At Brig o' Turk
1899 608 Sunday by the sea – St Monance
1900 742 Stormy weather, Crail
1901 2 On the Tweed near Norham
692 The coming storm, St Abbs
1903 116 Eyemouth – squally weather
1904 125 The South Queich, Kinross
134 Loch Leven
1905 113 In Strathearn
1907 24 On the Fife coast
54 Kinnoul Hill
1908 38 The boats at Ferryden
49 The Grampians from Seck Bridge
1909 20 Largo Bay
94 Lundin Links
1910 83 Near Montrose
88 Flodden Field
1912 395 At Drommochty
1913 295 Changing pasture
298 Haymaking, Brig o' Turk
1915 471 The Pentlands from Duddingstone
1916 503 Milne's Court, Lawnmarket
1917 467 Valley of the Tay, near Dunkeld
1918 497 On the Fife coast
621 Harvesting on the Borders
1919 616 On the Whitadder
695 Near Berwick
1920 665 At Whitsome, Berwickshire

References

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  1. ^ a b c "Scottish Artist". The Scotsman. 15 October 1934.
  2. ^ a b c "1851 census". 30 March 1851.
  3. ^ "Scotland National Probate Index". 17 November 1934.
  4. ^ a b "1861 census". 7 April 1861.
  5. ^ a b "Marriage Certificate". 27 June 1899.
  6. ^ "Art Exhibition". Berwick Advertiser. 14 November 1873.
  7. ^ "1871 census". 2 April 1871.
  8. ^ a b Baile de la Perriere, Charles (1991). The Royal Scottish Academy Exhibitors 1826-1990 Volume 1. Hilmarton Manor Press. pp. 135–137.
  9. ^ "The Society of Scottish Artists". The Edinburgh News. 30 September 1905.
  10. ^ "The Edinburgh School of Art; Distribution of Prizes". The Scotsman. 14 February 1870.
  11. ^ "Paxton". Berwickshire News. 30 July 1872.
  12. ^ "1881 census". 3 April 1881.
  13. ^ "1901 census". 31 March 1901.
  14. ^ "1911 census". 2 April 1911.
  15. ^ "Funeral of Mr J Blair". The Berwickshire News. 23 October 1934.
  16. ^ "Death Certificate". 13 October 1934.
  17. ^ "Postcard Search - TuckDB Postcards". tuckdbpostcards.org. Retrieved 23 January 2021.
  18. ^ Muirhead, George (1889). The Birds of Berwickshire: With Remarks on Their Local Distribution Migration, and Habits, and Also on the Folk-lore, Proverbs, Popular Rhymes and Sayings Connected with Them. D. Douglas.
  19. ^ Muirhead, George (1895). The Birds of Berwickshire Volume 2. Edinburgh: David Douglas.
  20. ^ Smith, Alexander (1912). A Summer in Skye. Edinburgh: W P Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell.
  21. ^ Wordsworth, William (c. 1911). Poems of Wordsworth, Nimmo's Clyde Classics. Edinburgh: Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell.
  22. ^ Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Favourite Essays of Emerson. Edinburgh: W P Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell Ltd.
  23. ^ Wheeler Wilcox, Ella (1915). Poems of Love. Edinburgh: Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell.
  24. ^ Arnold, Matthew (1911). Poems of Matthew Arnold. Edinburgh: Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell.
  25. ^ Burns, Robert (1930). Selected poems and songs of Burns. Edinburgh: Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell.
  26. ^ Scott, Walter (1911). Songs and ballads of Scott. Edinburgh: Nimmo, Hay & Mitchell.
  27. ^ "A Borderer's Success in Edinburgh". The Berwickshire News. 24 May 1892.

Further reading

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  • Peter J. M. McEwan, Dictionary of Scottish Art and Architecture, Glengarden Press, Ballater, 2004.[1]
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