The 'Mack' and Mackintosh 150 years, Glasgow's most famous landmark

The "Mack" Glasgow's much loved Art School

This year Glasgow celebrates 150 years since the birth of its most famous artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh. 

150 years major Exhibition Charles Rennie Mackintosh, ‘Making th Glasgow Style’ (1890 – 1920)

at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and museum – until 14 August. 2018 is the 150th anniversary of the birth of celebrated Glasgow architect, designer and artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868–1928). 

At the core of this style is the work of The Four: Charles Rennie Mackintosh, his future wife Margaret Macdonald, her younger sister Frances Macdonald and Frances’s future husband, James Herbert McNair. Glasgow was the birthplace of the only Art Nouveau ‘movement’ in the UK and its style had an impact internationally – with Mackintosh and Macdonald exhibiting to great acclaim in Vienna. Around 250 objects are on display across the full spectrum of media, including stained glass, ceramics, mosaic, metalwork, furniture, stencilling, embroidery, graphics, books, interiors and architecture. 

Willow tea rooms

It is wonderful to hear that the Willow Tearoomshave been refurbished and restored. On 7 June, art enthusiasts gathered to celebrate the launch of Mackintosh at the Willow, a £10m restoration of his iconic tearooms. Only a block away from the Mack, there was lots of excitement about the establishment of a Mackintosh quarter and the impact it could have. Heartbreaking that it could happened in the final stages of restoration.

Beautiful Glasgow art school library

The high street needs more unique experiences today. 

Glasgow boasts many unique art treasures; not least the impressive Kelvingrove museums, its university cloisters, the marbled stair cased town hall,  the Merchant City streets and the fine, delicate style of Mackintosh and Margaret Macdonald’s art nouveau buildings which were heavily influenced by the clean lines of Japanese buildings.

At any one time there are exhibitions of Mackintosh’s work on in Glasgow, from walking tours to  visiting his well loved buildings – School for an Art lover, Scotland street school, Willow tea rooms, The Lighthouse, 

https://www.glasgowmackintosh.com/events

LAUCHLAN GOUDIE – Mackintosh: Glasgow’s Neglected Genius

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b5ydcz

Margaret MacDonald

Sadly though not his renowned art school…

Saturday 16^thJune

Devastated of the news of the fire in Mackintosh’s Art school – unbelievable. Channel Four reports that a passing policeman raised the alarm. Was no one on site for fire protection – that is someone there guarding the site day and night to deal with this kind of event, which is predictable on an insecure building site. What were they thinking and who was the site manager?  

Another report the fire was sudden and spread through flammable materials - all seems very very strange - on the day the students were graduating and almost exactly four years since the original fire.

Thinking today of all the artists who studied there and how badly they must be feeling today. My thought was four years ago – this historic building was never made to house these ridiculous structures art students make today - AND THEY MUST BE MADE SOMEWHERE ELSE. Mackintosh’s art school should be only for an art museum and library – and not put at such risk ever again. 

Firefighters battle the horrendous blaze Friday night

"The rooms may smell of smoke, the hallways piled high with debris, but it's heartening to see how much of the Mackintosh and its contents survived."

"Whole rooms and their contents are left intact. The Mackintosh Room - used for board meetings - looks as if its occupants have just stepped out for a breath of air. The fireplace, light fittings, panelled bureau and distinctive windows show no trace of the devastating fire which swept through the building last Friday

“The Art School is, at the end of the day, one of the very best buildings of the early 20th century anywhere in the world.’ Appollo magazine

Scottish Women Artists Exhibition Edinburgh

Scottish Women Artists Exhibition Edinburgh - Painters and Sculptors 1885-1965 - 7th Nov 2015 − 26th June 2016; Modern Two (Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art)

Women artists in this exhibition will include - Bessie Mac Nicol, Phoebe Anna Traquair, Gertrude Alice Meredith Williams, Margaret Macdonald, Dorothy Johnstone and Hazel Amour, Phyllis Mary Bone, Joan Eardley and Bet Low.

The exhibition will focus on painters and sculptors and the period from 1885 to 1965. ,

(when Fra Newbery became Director of Glasgow School of Art, and until 1965, the year of Anne Redpath’s death).

The eighty years which lay between these events saw an unprecedented number of Scottish women train and practice as artists.  More than 90 works will be shown, from the National Galleries of Scotland’s holdings and other public collections from throughout the UK, as well as from private collections.

Early last century women were forbidden from attending life drawing classes. They also had to give up any art careers if they married. 

The conditions that the artists negotiated as students and practitioners due to their gender will be explored, shedding new light on this vital chapter of Scottish modern art history, whilst uncovering and celebrating women’s contribution to it.

The exhibition will include familiar masterpieces alongside important works by significant artists which are rarely seen and who are not widely known.

The galleries believe there is scope for more shows of female artists and the display is a precursor to a major re-think and re-hang of the gallery.

MY BLOG ON Women Artists - http://www.musicfootnotes.com/2014/10/woman-and-art.html

Modern Scottish Women will be accompanied by a book based on new research, as well as a free permanent collection display of prints by Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, selected from a recent gift of her work by The Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Charitable Trust.

Exhibition supported by The Wilhelmina Barns-Graham Charitable Trust and a sorority of women across Scotland

 Image: Dorothy Johnstone, Anne Finlay, 1920, Aberdeen Art Gallery & Museums Collections © Courtesy of Dr DA Sutherland and Lady JE Sutherland 

 https://www.nationalgalleries.org/whatson/on-now-coming-soon/modern-scottish-women/

Exhibition Margaret MacDonald

There is a big exhibition of Rennie Macintosh's work at the Huntarian Glasgow. I am a great admirer of his work and it was devastating about the Glasgow Art school fire this year.

His wife Margaret MacDonald, I probably admire her work even more - and her exhibition is away in Helensburgh. I've been writing on women artists recently - and they are usually treated as second class or ignored and hidden away. I notice too how often female artists are referred to as - collaborating with their partners, or being painted by them - when the reality is that these women artists were strong independent artists in their own right.

Margaret influenced the wonderful Austrian artist Klimt and others.

Macintosh credited her with being an important part of his figurative and symbolic interior designs. "Remember, you are half if not four-quarters of all my architectural...Margaret has genius, I have only talent."

Margaret MacDonald, (1864 Scotland) She was celebrated for her panels in Glasgow's famous Willow Tearooms - The May Queen, and Oh ye, all ye that walk in Willowood. Along with her husband Rennie Macintosh and Herbert MacNair, she was one of the most influential members of the collective known as the Glasgow Four. She exhibited with Mackintosh at the 1900 Vienna Secession, where she was an influence on the Secessionists Gustav Klimt and Josef Hoffmann.