Details

Name

Edward Atkinson Hornel

Brief Biography

1864–1933, British/Scottish

Occupation

Painter

Description

Hornel was one of the Glasgow Boy painters, but he wasn’t born in Glasgow, rather in Australia. However, he grew up in Scotland, in Kirkcudbright in Dumfries & Galloway, his Scottish parents deciding to return to Scotland shortly after he was born. His father was a shoemaker. Hornel attended Edinburgh School of Art in 1880–83, possibly chosen over Glasgow because his sister was teaching there at the time. He then studied at the Art Academy in Antwerp under Professor Verlat from 1883, perhaps because it was cheaper than Paris. He returned to Scotland in 1885, age 21, when he became involved with the Glasgow School of painters, known today as the Glasgow Boys, a group of young Scottish artists who were sending shock waves down the Scottish artistic establishment. They rebelled against traditional Victorian sentimentality, and romantic Scottish landscapes of Highland lochs and mountains. Their early work was notable for its focus on the lives of the rural poor, simple scenes of crofts and agricultural workers, often painted outside, inspired by the French Naturalist painter Jules Bastien-Lepage. However, in the mid-late 1880s their works became increasingly decorative and symbolic in approach.
Hornel’s work in particular is quite distinctive in technique and subject matter, using paint that was very thick and impastoed, often depicting young girls in landscape settings, inspired by the lush Galloway landscape where he lived and its local folklore and legend. He did spend time in rented studios in Glasgow, but generally lived in Kirkcudbright, making him more isolated than the other Boys who spent much of their time in Glasgow, at least initially, although his friends did come on summer sketching trips to Kirkcudbright. Hornel developed a particularly strong friendship with fellow Glasgow Boy painter George Henry. They collaborated on two paintings, The Druids: Bringing in the Mistletoe (1890) and Star in the East (1891) and in 1893–94 they visited Japan together, financed by the Glasgow art dealer Alexander Reid. This was quite an extraordinary adventure for the time when most artists were content to experience Japan through prints and objets d’art.
However, after Henry and Hornel’s Japan trip, their friendship waned and Hornel’s association with the Glasgow Boys diminished. His artistic isolation at Kirkcudbright increased. In 1901 he acquired Broughton House, now looked after by NTS, where he inputted much time creating a Japanese garden, library, studio and painting gallery (designed by John Keppie). Broughton House now holds his archive, which can be visited by appointment. Hornel always retained an interest in colour and flat pattern. However, his works into the 20th century became somewhat repetitive, sentimental and prettified arrangements of little rosy-cheeked girls and flowers. In 1907 he travelled to Ceylon and Australia.