RSA Scottish Art
Harbour Scene, St Monans
 | Artist: William George Gillies |
| Title: Harbour Scene, St Monans | |
| Year: c. 1935 | |
| Medium: oil on canvas | |
| Dimensions: | |
| Suggested topic: | |
| Source: RSA | |
| View full screen image of this work | |
| Open print version of this work | |
| © the RSA | |
| Description: William George Gillies was strongly attached to Scotland and almost all his landscape paintings depict views of his native country. Some of his favourite locations were the fishing villages of Fife. This painting shows one of them, the Harbour Scene at St Monans. Here, Gillies has turned a landscape into an almost abstract arrangement of shapes. The simplified forms of boats resting on the harbour mud lie in front of a row of houses which are no more than blocks of colour. If we look at the vertical masts of the boats and the arrangement of the blocks of colour between them, we might have difficulty in recognising the scene if it were not for the hulls of the boats below. This lack of detail is characteristic of a lot of Gillies's work. He wants us to concentrate on the forms. Although there are no people visible in the painting, the scene suggests activity. The angles of the boats and the restless sky in the background suggest bustle and movement. Colour and texture are also dominant features of the painting. To some, it may be surprising that Gillies has used a warm palette of reds, oranges and browns to describe a Scottish landscape, but in Fife traditional fishermen's cottages are whitewashed, reflecting the weather; and red terracotta tiles are used on the roofs. The texture of the surface of the painting can be seen and felt. Oil paint has been used very thickly; in fact in some places it is almost like icing rippling across the surface. This adds character to the colourful patchwork effect he has created. | |
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