Raymond McIntyre
Aotearoa New Zealand, b.1879, d.1933
Ruth
- c. 1913
- Oil on wood panel
- Presented by the McIntyre Family through Miss F. M. McIntyre, 1938
- 380 x 295mm
- 69/96
Tags: actors (performing artists), hair, monograms, people (agents), performing artists, portraits, women (female humans)
In 1911, two years after arriving in London, Raymond McIntyre began his long association with the Goupil Gallery, the city’s leading international contemporary art dealer, and exhibited for the first time with the prestigious New English Art Club. McIntyre built his reputation on small, pared-back landscapes and stylised heads depicting young women. The influence of Japanese woodblock prints is evident, as is the work of William Nicholson, from whom he briefly took lessons. McIntyre became an established figure in London art circles, thanks also to his role as art critic for the Architectural Review.
(The Moon and the Manor House, 12 November 2021 – 1 May 2022)
Exhibition History
Treasury: A Generous Legacy, 18 December 2015 – 27 November 2016
Arriving in London in 1909, the Christchurch-born and trained Raymond McIntyre soon gained a reputation there for his small, pared-back landscapes and studies of female heads, painted in an elegant, simplified, Japanese woodblock inspired style. This painting was modelled on an actor and dancer who became his principal muse from 1912, sometimes mentioned in his letters home: “The girl who is sitting for me a lot now, Sylvia Constance Cavendish… has a very refined interesting pale face… I have done some very good work from her… she is quite a find.”
McIntyre died in London in 1933. Seven of his works were given by his family between 1938 and 1991.
(Treasury: A Generous Legacy, 18 December 2015 – 27 November 2016)
Ruth is one of a series of woman's heads painted in the period just prior to World War One. Strongly influenced by the works of Whistler and Toulouse Lautrec, whose works he would have seen during a visit to France and by the Japanese woodblock print, this painting has a rigorous design. The model's features are modified and the forms reduced to an elegant simplicity. The sitter was probably a young actress, Phyllis Cavendish, who was his favourite model at this time and who was persuaded to coil her long hair on either side of her face like the Breton women McIntyre had observed on a trip to France. His aim was for elegance, balance, harmony and simplicity. McIntyre's signature has been reduced to a decorative monogram similar to the chop mark used on many Japanese prints at this time. It is placed as a decorative element within this small and balanced composition.
(Label date unknown)
Related reading: Treasury: a generous legacy
Notes
Study (Woman in a wide black hat) by Raymond McIntyre
This article first appeared as 'The Muse' in The Press on 25 August 2015.
Notes
Still life with flowers in a basket by Pieter Hardimé
This article first appeared as 'Allegory of life's beauty, brevity and fragility' in The Press on 15 August 2014.
Notes
Untitled by Meindert Hobbema
This article first appeared as 'Dutch treat' in The Press on 12 April 2013.
Notes
Angels and Aristocrats
Blair Jackson and I attended the opening of Angels & Aristocrats at Dunedin Public Art Gallery on Friday 27 April. It's spectacular.
Notes
Taking Stock
It's hard to believe, but only eighteen collection works were damaged as a result of all earthquakes, with fourteen damaged on the 22 February 2011.
Notes
Belgian Refugees by Frances Hodgkins
This article first appeared in The Press on 28 February 2007
Belgian Refugees is one of the first oil paintings that Frances Hodgkins ever exhibited, although at the time she was already well accustomed to showing her watercolours. Working in oils and tempera on canvas, she used an experimental technique in this work that gained much from her experience with watercolour. Believed to have been first shown as Unshatterable, in October 1916 at the International Society's Autumn Exhibition in London, the choice of title would suggest a greater sense of resilience than is actually conveyed by this family group. Here only the baby is oblivious to trouble, while his nursing mother seems devoid of expression, and the older children tense with anxiety or fear. Behind the group, a gap in the swirling grey suggests the fact of a missing father, and this steam and smoke speaks of displacement, the atmospheric backdrop of a train station or the symbolic clouds of war. Within the wall of monochrome, intense colour is reserved for mother and child, who also remind of one of Hodgkins' favourite early choices of subject matter in watercolour.
Article
Trove
Recounting the untold stories behind some of the works in the exhibition Treasury: A Generous Legacy, curator Ken Hall also underlines the value of art philanthropy.
Commentary
The wisdom of crowds
In recent years, crowdfunding and crowdsourcing have become big news in the arts. By providing a funding model that enables would-be-investors to become involved in the production of new works, they have altered traditional models of patronage. Musicians, designers, dancers and visual artists are inviting the public to finance their projects via the internet. The public are also being asked to provide wealth in the form of cultural capital through crowdsourcing projects. The Gallery has been involved in two online crowdfunding ventures – a project with a public art focus around our 10th birthday celebrations, and the purchase of a major sculpture for the city. But, although these projects have been made possible by the internet, the concept behind the funding model is certainly not new. The rise of online crowdfunding platforms also raises important questions about the role of the state in the funding and generation of artwork, and the democratisation of tastemaking. How are models of supply and demand affected? Does the freedom from more traditional funding models allow greater innovation? Do 'serious' artists even ask for money? It's a big topic, and one that is undoubtedly shaping up in PhD theses around the world already. Bulletin asked a few commentators for their thoughts on the matter.
Article
The East India Company man: Brigadier-General Alexander Walker
Getting to know people can take time. While preparing for a future exhibition of early portraits from the collection, I'm becoming acquainted with Alexander Walker, and finding him a rewarding subject. Painted in 1819 by the leading Scottish portraitist of his day, Sir Henry Raeburn, Walker's portrait is wrought with Raeburn's characteristic blend of painterly vigour and attentive care and conveys the impression of a well-captured likeness.