William McTaggart, R.S.A., R.S.W.

Edmiston, Glasgow, 30 November 1916

James L. Caw, William McTaggart, 1917, p.147, 270

STRUCTURE The canvas appears to be original. There are a few scattered surface spots otherwise the work appears in good original condition. ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT Under UV light there appear to be three small spots of retouching near the lower right corner. FRAME Held in a gilt-wood frame.
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'Beneath a clump of trees, which, just breaking into vivid green, throw wavering shadows interspersed with sunny blinks upon them, a group of country children play in a sandy roadway which, bordering an unfenced field of bright green winter wheat, leads the eye towards the middle distance, where from amongst trees cottage roofs peep out. Farther off a rolling distance of cultivated hillside lies under a uncertain but brilliant sky, whose soaring white clouds, gleaming bright against the clear rain-washed blue, shine through the thin leafage and the traceried boughs of the tall foreground trees.' (James L. Caw, William McTaggart, 1917, p.147)

William McTaggart was probably the most innovative landscape painter that Scotland has produced, and an important influence on successive generations of Scottish painters. In a career spanning over half a century he displayed an exceptional pattern of consistent development. He painted with a technique unlike any of his contemporaries, with loose brushwork and bright colour and with a vigour that captures the bluster of Scottish weather and its clear, gleaming light. He favoured working outdoors where he would paint small oil studies en plein-air, which would later be used as the basis for larger compositions in the studio. His early work was influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites, but he gradually absorbed Impressionist principles. Unlike most of his contemporaries McTaggart did not move to London but spent his entire working life painting in Scotland. He lived and worked in Edinburgh until 1889, when he moved to Broomielaw, then in the countryside to the south of the city.

McTaggart was born in Aros, Kintyre, the son of an impoverished crofter. When he was twelve he was apprenticed to a Campbeltown apothecary, who recognised his natural talent for drawing and introduced him to the Glasgow painter Daniel MacNee. The latter advised McTaggart to enrol at the Trustees' Academy in Edinburgh, which had just been appointed Robert Scott Lauder as its co-director, where his fellow students included Hugh Cameron, George Chalmers, Tom Graham and John Pettie. At the academy McTaggart won several prizes for drawing . Although classes were free he supported himself by accepting portrait commissions, both while a student and later when he married and had a large family. However, as soon as he felt financially secure he concentrated on landscape and seascape, limiting portraiture as much as he could to family and friends.

The rustic children that inhabit McTaggart's landscapes and coastal scenes have a direct and immediate contact with the natural environment. They roll around on the grass and swing from the gate, absorbed by their enjoyment of being in the countryside and free from care. With The Uncertain Glory of an April Day McTaggart painted children as a metaphor for spring, the month of rebirth. The seasons were of great inspiration to McTaggart, as Caw explained; 'The whole round of the rural year is depicted in his later landscapes. The seasons pass across them: spring, with its reawakening stir and hopeful anticipation; summer, with its full life reaching forward to maturity; autumn, with its crowning harvest and its falling leaves; winter, with its bare woodlands and its snow-shrouded fields.' (ibid Caw, p.145)