Samuel John Peploe, R.S.A.

J. W. Blyth Esq.;
Duncan R. Miller Fine Arts, London;
Private Collection

Edinburgh, Aitken Dott & Son, Peploe Exhitbition, August -  September 1947, no. 67;
London, Duncan R. Miller Fine Arts, S J Peploe Exhibition: Paintings and Drawings, 19 November - 12 December 1993, no. 42

The board is sound. The work is in good original condition, clean and ready to hang. Ultraviolet light reveals no sign of retouching. Held in a decorative gold painted frame in fair condition.
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In 1910 Samuel John Peploe, having met and married Margaret Mackay, moved from Edinburgh and took a studio-apartment at 278 Boulevard Raspail in Paris. Peploe's desire to live and work in Paris, immersing himself fully in the beating heart of the modernist art world, greatly informed his work and the present painting demonstrates his confident command of subject and style during this highly significant period. The present work is directly comparable with some of Peploe's finest paintings of the period such as Park Scene, 1910 (Kircaldy Museum and Art Gallery, Fife), The Luxembourg Gardens, c.1910 (Robert Fleming Holdings Ltd., London) and Veules les Roses, c.1911 (Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh).

The Luxembourg Gardens and its habitués provided popular subjects for both Peploe and Fergusson who lived nearby. Both artists produced many oil and pencil sketches of children with their nannies, couples strolling and single figures relaxing which were often made during afternoon visits. He had been studying the works of Van Gogh and Othon Friesz, both of whom he knew in Paris, gaining an integral insight into their brushwork and use of colour. As Philip Long observes in his book on The Scottish Colourists, "Peploe's move to Paris and exposure to Fauve painting meant he soon followed Fergusson in developing a more expressionist manner. The small panels which he executed out-of-doors became more densely worked and richer in colour. These gave way to paintings with a more balanced synthesis of colour and design."