Robert Colquhoun

Both studied with James Cowie at Hospitalfield House in Arbroath. In the summer of 1938 Colquhoun and MacBryde set off on a travelling scholarship to France and Italy. Whilst in Paris they met up with their friend from Arbroath, the Irish realist painter Patrick Hennessy also on a similar scholorship. The three travelling south together that autumn slowly by train to Marseille and some months later to Genoa and Rome. Colquhoun served as an ambulance driver in the Royal Army Medical Corps during the Second World War. After being injured, he returned to London in 1941 where he shared studio space with MacBryde. The pair shared a house with John Minton and, from 1943, Jankel Adler. Colquhoun's early works of agricultural labourers and workmen were strongly influenced by the colours and light of rural Ayrshire. His work developed into a more austere, Expressionist style, heavily influenced by Picasso, and concentrated on the theme of the isolated, agonised figure. From the mid-1940s to the early 1950s he was considered one of the leading artists of his generation. Along with that of MacBryde, the work of Colquhoun was regularly shown at the Lefevre Gallery in London. At the height of their acclaim they courted a large circle of friends – including Michael Ayrton, Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud and John Minton as well as the writers Fred Urquhart, George Barker, Elizabeth Smart and Dylan Thomas – and were known for their parties at their studio (77 Bedford Gardens). Colquhoun was also a printmaker, producing a large number of lithographs and monotypes throughout his career. During and after the Second World War he worked with MacBryde on several set designs. These included sets for Gielgud's Macbeth, King Lear at Stratford and Massine's Scottish ballet Donald of the Burthens, produced by the Sadler's Wells Ballet at Covent Garden in 1951. During the 1950s their artistic reputation went into serious decline, and their heavy drinking made any serious effort to paint impossible. According to their friend Anthony Cronin they were often close to destitution. In May 1958, his work was shown in a solo exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery in London, England. Colquhoun died, an alcoholic, in relative obscurity in London in 1962. MacBryde moved to Dublin, where he was killed in a traffic accident in 1966. Their friend Anthony Cronin describes them with respect and affection in his memoir Dead as Doornails.

Robert Colquhoun studied at Glasgow School of Art and Kilmarnock Academy. The recorded working language is English. Residence is recorded at Kilmarnock. Work by Robert Colquhoun is recorded in the collections of Auckland Art Gallery, Museum of Modern Art, Tate, National Gallery of Canada and National Gallery of Victoria.

• Name — Robert Colquhoun • Born — 20 December 1914 • Birthplace — Kilmarnock, Scotland • Died — 20 September 1962 • Place of death — London, England, UK

• Mysterious Figures (1960) • Woman with Leaping Cat (1945)

* * • Brown, Andrew (1981), Spiritual and Temporal Hazards: The Art of Robert Colquhoun, in Murray, Glen (ed.) Cencrastus No. 6, Autumn 1981, pp. 14–17 • Elliot, Patrick (2017), Robert Colquhoun 1914–1962 in Strang, Alice (ed.) (2017), A New Era: Scottish Modern Art 1900 - 1950, National Galleries of Scotland, pp. 38 & 39, • Biography at the Tate Gallery • Robert Colquhoun on the Gazetteer for Scotland • The Roberts at the Scottish National Gallery (exhibition catalogue)

Robert Colquhoun is recorded as painter, scenographer, engraver, draftsperson and theatre designer.