Norah Neilson Gray

Norah Neilson Gray studied at Glasgow School of Art. The recorded working language is English. Work by Norah Neilson Gray is recorded in the collections of National Galleries Scotland, Imperial War Museum London, Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum and Glasgow Museums Resource Centre.

• Name — Norah Neilson Gray • Born — 16 June 1882 • Birthplace — Helensburgh, Scotland • Died — 27 May 1931 • Place of death — Glasgow, Scotland • Known for — portraits • Education — Glasgow School of Art • Occupation — artist, portrait painter

Gray was born at Carisbrook, West King Street in Helensburgh in 1882 to Norah Neilson, who was from a Falkirk auctioneering family, and George Gray, a Glasgow ship owner. She was first privately taught by two local art teachers, Misses Park and Ross, at a studio at Craigendoran, outside Helensburgh. Then in 1901, Gray moved with her family to Glasgow so that she could attend Glasgow School of Art (GSA) which she did until 1906. She trained under the Belgian artist Jean Delville and the Scottish painter Fra Newbery. In 1905, while still a student, Gray had her portrait of her sister Gerty accepted for display at the Royal Academy in London. She taught fashion-plate drawing at GSA from 1906. Gray also taught at St Columba's School, Kilmacolm which at the time was a girls' school. Gray was said to have been nicknamed "Purple Patch", because of her insistence that colours could be seen in shadows if you looked correctly. By 1910, Gray was regularly exhibiting portraits at the Royal Academy, the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts and at the Paris Salon. She had her own studio at Bath Street in Glasgow and held her first solo exhibition at Warneuke's Gallery in Glasgow. In 1914, Gray was elected a member of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour and illustrated a volume of work by Wordsworth. Gray adopted a pointillist technique for her 1914 painting, The Missing Trawler now in the collection of Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum. • Illustration — Mother and Child

• Illustration — The Belgian in Exile During World War I Gray produce some of her most notable work. The Country's Charge, from 1915, depicts a woman and child wrapped in a shawl. The painting was shown at the Royal Academy and sold for the benefit of the Red Cross and then donated to the Royal Free Hospital. Her painting The Belgian in Exile, which was completed in 1915, shows a Belgian refugee from Liège who had fled to Scotland after his country was invaded. The painting was shown in Glasgow in 1916, at the Royal Academy in 1917 and at the Paris Salon in 1921 where it was awarded the bronze medal. During the War, Gray volunteered as a nurse with the Scottish Women's Hospitals and was sent to France where she also found time to paint and sketch. A painting Hôpital Auxilaire 1918 from that time was offered to the Imperial War Museum but the Women's Work Sub-committee of the Museum refused to accept it and requested a painting showing Miss Frances Ivens and other women involved in the care of wounded French soldiers. Hôpital Auxilaire 1918 shows the vaulted 13th-century Royaumont Abbaye, near Paris, where women had organised a hospital to treat the casualties of the war. The hospital was staffed by Scottish Women's Hospitals, under the direction of the French Red Cross. Her second painting of Royaumont Abbaye, entitled The Scottish Women's Hospital In The Cloister of the Abbaye at Royaumont. Dr Frances Ivens inspecting a French patient was accepted by the IWM in 1920.

After World War I, Gray returned to her work as a portraitist, most commonly painting young women and children. In 1923, Gray won the silver medal at the Paris Salon for her painting Le Jeune Fille. Gray was chosen to be the first woman to join the influential hanging committee of the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts. On 27 May 1931, Gray died of cancer in Glasgow, aged 48.