Rare Prints and Monotypes: By Current and Past Members of the Royal Scottish Academy

Anne Redpath RSA was elected an Associate of the Royal Scottish Academy in 1947 and became the first woman to be elected a full Member in painting in 1952. These three lithographs were printed by Harley Brothers Ltd, commercial lithographers with premises at St James Square, Edinburgh. Inspired by the Paris ‘atelier’ system, the Harley Brothers printed over 100 editions with 35 artists during the late 1950s and early 1960s before the demolishment of St James Square began in 1962. Redpath’s Little Posy was the first print made by the Harleys funded by a grant from the Scottish Committee of the Arts Council of Great Britain. Redpath’s trips to Skye in the 1940s provided the inspiration for Landscape, Kyleakin and a stay in Corsica in 1954 resulted in Corsican Village. Amongst many other Academicians, Elizabeth Blackadder RSA, John Houston RSA and David Michie RSA also made lithographs with the assistance of the Harley Brothers. Based on his painting of the same subject from 1957 held by the Permanent Collection of the RSA, the lithograph Peasant by Sir Robin Philipson PPRSA (1916 – 1992) was also printed by the Harleys during the same period. 

Son of Anne Redpath RSA, David Michie RSA created the two-plate colour etching Yellow Garden in 1979 during his time as Visiting Professor of Painting at the University of the Arts, Belgrade. Michie was encouraged to make some etchings by Serbian printmaker, Marko Krsmanovic, who latterly visited Michie in Scotland and printed at Edinburgh Printmakers. Michie brought the plates for Yellow Garden back to Edinburgh Printmakers in the early 1980s and printed them with Master Printmaker Alfons Bytautas RSA. The screenprint, River Bank, printed at Edinburgh Printmakers by Tim Cockburn, has recently been redated to the late 1980s with Bytautas' assistance. Both prints are distinguished examples of Michie's skill in depicting botanical subject matter.

Alfons Bytautas RSA was introduced to etching at Edinburgh College of Art and his work gained exposure when it was included in the first Scottish Print Open Exhibition in the late 1970s. In 1983 Bytautas went to study at Atelier 17, the world-renowned studio of the pioneering post-war printmaker Stanley Hayter. From 1979 to 2009 Bytautas was Master Printmaker at Edinburgh Printmakers where he gained a strong reputation for technical innovation. Bytautas’ time in Paris is evident in his Modernist language of biomorphic forms and nebulous shapes that hint at his interest in the science of printmaking and, as he puts it, ‘the almost alchemical nature of its processes, the surprising ways in which it can transform the artist’s imagery and in doing so set the imagination free’.

Joyce W. Cairns was elected President of the Royal Scottish Academy in 2018 and is the first woman to hold the position in the history of the Academy. Born in Edinburgh, Cairns studied painting at Gray’s School of Art, Aberdeen (1966-71), and at the Royal College of Art, London (1971-74). Cairns' work is mainly autobiographical, based on past memories intertwined with present experiences, often set against the backdrop of the once fishing village of Footdee at the mouth of Aberdeen harbour where she lived for 33 years. Cairns was introduced to printmaking in the late 1970s at Peacock Printmakers, Aberdeen, where she made her first screenprint Variations on a Fish. In 1998 Cairns travelled to the Tidaholm Lithographic Academy, Sweden, with Arthur Watson PPRSA to produce lithographs with the Academy's Master Printers. The freedom afforded by the painterley medium of monoprinting lends itself well to Cairns' expressive, gestural style. These four monoprints were made at Peacock Printmakers with the assistance of Master Printmaker Michael Waight. 

Born in Falkirk, Barbara Rae RSA studied painting at Edinburgh College of Art (1961-65). Travelling to France and Spain on a post-graduate scholarship, her early work drew upon trends of abstraction and mixed media practices in European art at the time. Since her first solo exhibition in Edinburgh in 1967, Rae has gone on to exhibit worldwide. She was elected Associate of the Royal Scottish Academy in 1980 and became a full Member in 1992. Rae travels extensively, notably to Ireland, Spain, Mexico and Arizona, but always returns to her Edinburgh studio where she prints with her Takach Press, manufactured in New Mexico. In 2018 the landmark exhibition Barbara Rae: The Northwest Passage was held at the Royal Scottish Academy. The exhibition charted Rae's expeditions to the Arctic Circle in the footsteps of her namesake, the explorer John Rae. Often working with Master Printmaker Michael Waight, the creation of monotypes is an essential element of Rae's creative output, bridging the gap between her painting and printmaking practices. 

Kate Downie RSA is an American-born British landscape artist whose career over the past 30 years has spanned the media of painting, drawing, printmaking, performance and film. Downie's work responds to subjects as diverse as North Sea oil platforms, breweries, hospitals and bridge construction. In 2010 Downie won the RSA William Gillies Bequest Award allowing her to travel to Beijing and Shanghai to work with ink painting masters. In 2013 the new methodologies and techniques that Downie discovered in China resulted in the exhibition Walk through Resonant Landscape, mounted by the Royal Scottish Academy in conjunction with the Royal Glasgow Institute Kelly Gallery. In 2014 Downie was the Artist in Residence for the 50th anniversary celebrations of the Forth Road Bridge. More recently, the new Queensferry Crossing has become a key subject in her work. Having recently relocated her studio from Edinburgh to Fife, Downie's work is increasingly looking to the landscape of the east coast of Scotland. 

Arthur Watson PPRSA was the President of the Royal Scottish Academy from 2012 to 2018. He has been a presiding voice in Scottish contemporary art for the best part of half a century, providing impetus for a host of artist-led organisations and projects. A staunch supporter of Scottish printmaking, in 1974 Watson founded Peacock Printmakers where he collaborated directly with over 100 artists. In 1990 he represented Scotland at the Venice Biennale and in 1995 Watson was appointed Course Director of the Master of Fine Arts programme at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Dundee, before becoming Head of Graduate Studies in Fine Art in 2000. He established the Centre of Artists Books and Fine Art publishing at the Visual Research Centre with projects including the Great Book of Gaelic for the Gaelic Arts Agency and Voices of Scotland for the Scottish Executive. The screenprint Tangled Tent was made in 1973 whilst Watson was a student at Gray's School of Art, Aberdeen.