JOHN MACLAUCHLAN MILNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1886-1957) §
A SQUARE IN THE SOUTH OF FRANCE
£32,700
Scottish Paintings & Sculpture
Auction: Evening Sale | Lots 103-196 | Thursday 05 December from 6pm
Description
Signed, oil on board
Dimensions
51cm x 61cm (20in x 24in)
Footnote
In her memoir Belonging (Hogarth Press, London, 1968), Willa Muir remembers learning ‘about a cheap fishing-village our artist friends had praised, in the south of France, an unspoilt village called St Tropez.’ She and her husband Edwin Muir went there in February 1926 ’before it had been transformed into a fashionable resort.’ They found that ‘more and more St Tropez was filling up with artists from every quarter, including some from Scotland.’
Maclauchlan Milne first went to St Tropez in 1924 and returned several times in following years. He showed his various Côte d’Azur pictures at the Royal Scottish Academy, Royal Glasgow Institute, Society of Scottish Artists, in his annual studio exhibitions and elsewhere. His supporters in Dundee acquired many of these works.
The precise location shown in this painting is not recorded, but it has been suggested that it could be the Boulevard Vasserot, by the Place des Lices in St Tropez, as it was 100 years ago.
We are grateful to Maurice Millar, author of The Missing Colourist: The Search for John Maclauchlan Milne RSA (privately published in 2022 and available via The Missing Colourist website) for writing this catalogue note.