Miguel Mackinlay

An Introduction to The Life and Times of Miguel Mackinlay by Dorothy Erickson photography by Ric Bower and others

Miguel Mackinlay, gouache on paper, 47 x 27cm

The artist Miguel McKinlay / Mackinlay classes at the Perth Technical School became the ‘talk of the town’ being has been variously described as Spanish, whose art master James W. R. Linton ‘hung on the line’ at the Royal Academy Scottish and Australian and all three considered him the most successful Summer Exhibitions in the competitive descriptions are partially correct. Born in student he ever taught. On moving to art world of early 1930s London. He and the province of Guadalajara in Spain in London to further his career he mixed his family lived in an artists’ community 1893 to a Spanish mother and Scottish and exhibited with Australians in his early in Bushey in Hertfordshire where he had father he arrived in Western Australia as a years. He attended St Martin’s School a life as a busy commercial artist at a thirteen year old and undertook his major of Art and during World War I sketched time when arguably commercial art was art training there. The boy showed a vivid images of life on the Western at its apogee. This is a short version of remarkable facility for capturing a likeness Front. However marrying a Londoner his story. It has been written to engender and at fourteen was apprenticed to sign he stayed and enjoyed considerable interest in the wider community for this writers Meston & Walters and attended success as an artist and illustrator. He forgotten artist.

1 Left: Detail from a self-portrait aged about 16 years, c1912, oil on academy board, 26 x 17.5cm. Private collection, Melbourne

Right: Sir Frederick and Lady Bedford Presentation Album 1909 State Library of WA, Battye Library. Acc1991B

Miguel McKinlay / Mackinlay, known as Australia, now one of the world’s hotspots an untrained youth, and told him so. Michael in Western Australia, arrived in for endangered species.1 Not long after He flared into a temper, waving his Fremantle on the Orient Pacific Line’s this the family moved to a new suburb, arms and sketches around his head, Ortona on 16th January 1906 with his Victoria Park, on the Swan River where and dared me to let him paint a portrait father, sisters Williamina, Sara, Ramona, they had a large house with an orchard. then and there in our studio. From Margarita and his brothers Daniel and Mick or Mike, as he was familiarly called that day on, for the next five years he Juan. They had come the usual route by friends, could be found at the end of studiously and honestly went through via Marseilles, Naples, Port Said, Suez the orchard watching the glorious sunsets the drudgery of apprenticeship – and Colombo. With his wife Ramona and trying to catch the magnificent colour drudgery to him, as he told us after dead William, a retired engineer who had effects on paper. Legend has it he also years, as his aims were far beyond the reputedly worked for wealthy bourgeois drew portraits of visitors on the walls of the capacity of our humble business.” 4 José Ignacio de Figueroa y Mendieta family home.2 Miguel may well have found the work three times Prime Minister of Spain and Attaining the age of fourteen, when boring but it did provide him with a variety husband of the Marquesa of Villamejor, compulsory education ceased, he was of skills and encouraged him to practice Ana Josefa de Torres y Romo Cordoba apprenticed to Walter Meston (1870-1936) and work on a large scale later. Sotomayor, had decided to commence and Frank Walters (1877-1941) of Meston Life was not all drudgery for at a new life in Western Australia. Eldest & Walters “Signwriters and Decorative the Perth Technical School, where son Daniel, an accomplished sketcher Artists, (William Street), glass gilders apprentices were encouraged to enrol became a draftsman and before long was and embossers, calico signs, designs alongside art students, was a gifted working in Sydney and USA where he and estimates, banners, illuminated teacher James Walter Robert Linton remained after serving in WWI. The oldest addresses, scenic artists, cottage (1869-1947) and Miguel enthusiastically sisters Williamina and Sara kept house, plates, monograms, house painting and enrolled. According to Fry; Ramona trained to become a milliner and paperhanging.” According to expatriate “The work so stimulated his ideas that the youngsters Miguel/Michael, Juan/John news columnist Edith Fry, writing from he would frequently return home from and Margarita, attended Highgate School London in 1927, Frank Walters said: the school and ignore altogether the where in 1909, a design work of Miguel’s “We advertised for a boy to learn fact that his dinner had been placed was included in an album presented to decorating and amongst other in front of him on the family table. the retiring Governor, Rear Admiral Sir applicants came this dark-eyed lad of He would be reminded over and Frederick Bedford. The design featured 14 years, with a bundle of sketches over again that he should eat it, but two of the 11,000 or so of the unique under his arm.3 On inspection I could he preferred to express his ideas by wildflowers of the southwest corner of not believe that the work was that of sketching at the side of his plate.” 5

2 Left: Perth Technical School in 1912

Right: Linton with students at the Perth Technical School c1912. State Library of WA, Battye Library 6512B/2

Linton, who trained in the United also taught the students the technical 1968) and Ernestina Levinson (1887- Kingdom where his father had been art aspects of preparing canvases and once 1951) were able to do so. Levinson and tutor to Queen Victoria’s daughters, a week the students’ work was discussed McKinlay / Mackinlay stayed whilst the “... was insistent that the whole business in an open forum. Linton encouraged his other two who came and went between of art was based on drawing, more students to go to Europe and a number the two continents are now highly specially life drawing.” 6 Young Miguel of the talented ones such as Miguel, May regarded in Australia and the two who obviously absorbed this dictum. Linton Gibbs (1877-1969), Kate O’Connor (1876- remained overseas are virtually unknown.

Top: John McKinlay, c1912, oil on canvas, 41.5 x 36.2cm. Family collection, Perth

Bottom: William McKinlay, c1912, oil on canvas, 44.5 x 45cm. Family collection, Perth

3 Margarita McKinlay, oil on canvas, 45 x 42cm Family collection, Perth (still to be restored)

Whilst studying at the ‘Tech’ he exhibited He also won first and second prize in were set in advance and the members regularly with the West Australian Society Spencer’s Pictures’ Poster Competition. were requested to bring these as well of Arts. In the November 1911 ‘Black This encouraged him to join the Art as drawing materials to undertake ten and White’ show he exhibited a Portrait Society’s committee in February the minute sketches after which they indulged in Charcoal and Study of a Head in following year, volunteering to become in criticism sessions. This encouraged Charcoal.7 Shortly after, in December in secretary for the life class which, gave a facility for memory training, catching a an open competition at the Art Gallery, he him access to live models two nights each pose or likeness and rendering it quickly won the poster design section and came week. At the monthly meetings of the and accurately. He had a good facility in second in the figure drawing competition. society, subjects for sketching exercises this field that the regular practice honed.

Figure study, 1911-12, charcoal on paper Family collection, Perth

4 Portrait head, 1911-12, charcoal on paper Family collection, Perth

Miguel’s art supplies came from 1902 and were supportive of the local paintings were framed by Alberto Fortunato Barnett Bros. in Hay Street. This was arts community. Descendants of Martin Mayrhofer of Mayrhofer & Co. at 659 Hay a major stained glass studio that also Glick, who worked at the firm, still cherish Street, Perth. The firm were print sellers imported artist’s materials. They had paintings by the young artist whom family and artist colour men as well as framers exhibited at the great Paris Exhibition of legend has it Glick helped support by and had an art gallery that displayed their 1900 and in the Glasgow exhibition in supplying some of his materials. The prints and occasionally other artists’ work.

Left: Evening Glow, c.1912, 29 x 29.5cm, oil on academy board, exhibited West Australian Society of Arts 1912. Private collection, Melbourne

Right: Fremantle Harbour, 1910, oil on academy board, 39 x 34cm

5 Members of the art society met young man soon made an impression. exhibitors Miss Heap and Mr McKinlay regularly for painting excursions at In July 1912, when he exhibited and remarked on the quality of the picturesque sites around the city such as paintings Fremantle Harbour and Bazaar posters. Critic, Daisy Rossi stated he Fremantle Harbour, Cottesloe Beach and Terrace with the Society of Arts, he was showed “Three sound, well-studied boat the Old Mill in South Perth. They also described as “ ...this promising young sketches. His drawing is careful and his organized artist’s camps on the coast artist shows considerable talent. His colour strong and full. The composition of in Mandurah just south of Perth and in drawing is excellent, his colour values no 5 is a little cramped but the distance the hot summers at the seaside resort of are gauged with remarkable judgement is well expressed and the water moving, Albany on the south coast. Miguel joined and the treatment is broad, daring yet luminous and reflecting.” 9 His posters in these activities with many paintings he eminently successful.” 8 Newspaper soon graced the hoardings in the Perth later exhibited having titles derived from proprietor and patron Sir Winthrop railway station and were reproduced these places. At this time he signed his Hackett, introducing the Governor Sir on hoardings on the east coast of paintings and drawings ‘M. McKinlay’. Harry Barron who opened the exhibition, Australia.10 This would have provided As local news reports indicate, the remarked that he welcomed new welcome income.

Poster by McKinlay c1912-3, gouache paint on paper

6 By 1914 he had established quite a the French nudes of ‘Le Salon’.” 12 lesser hall. The ‘black and white’ entries reputation for bold coloured poster work, The pair exhibited at St George’s were mostly Cross’ work and the posters winning a national competition in January Lesser Hall in Hay Street, Perth in McKinlay’s, and included his five prize- at the Victorian Chamber of Manufactures’ March 1914 as a fundraiser for a trip to winning works.15 An unnamed reviewer in Great All Australian Exhibition in London.13 Their exhibition was opened the Daily News wrote of “… several of the Melbourne with The Wanderer.11 This was by Sir Edward Stone, the Lieutenant Cottesloe and Mandurah beach scenes are encouraging and he planned an exhibition Governor, who said they would be veritable gems” and discussing the posters with his friend Stan Cross (1888-1977) sadly missed by the Society of Arts. “All wrote; “… the writer would be pleased to who said Miguel had: “no atom of use for present, he felt satisfied were absolutely call pictures, and give them pride of place anything but Art. He never spoke but to astonished with the class of work on the walls of his home yet all are posters bandy some abstract thesis or to report exhibited that afternoon” 14 and wished in the true sense of the word with plenty of some artistic ‘find’ in the art section of the them every success. Some forty-one oil room left by arrangement for the addition of public library. How he haunted that library, paintings by the two men and almost the advertising matter.” The reviewer went on and how he hated that bewiskered old same number of posters, ‘black and white’ to state that, “ … the portraits prove that librarian who misconstrued his interest in and watercolours lined the walls of the the artists are destined to go far indeed.” 16

A view of the Cross and McKinlay exhibition the Western Mail 20th March 1914, p. 26

The 1914 catalogue, courtesy State Library of Western Australia, no PR4367

7 Top: Fishing boats (The White Sail), 1914, oil on academy board, 30 x 40cm, State Collection, Art Gallery of Western Australia. Gift of Doug Collins, 1961

Bottom: The Smugglers, exhibited in the duo exhibition in Perth 1914, oil on academy board, 21 x 31.5cm. Private collection, Melbourne

8 Left: Cross by McKinlay from the Western Mail 13th March 1914 p. 30

Right: McKinlay by Cross th from the Western Mail 13 March 1914 p. 30

Barely two days later and leaving a St Martin’s School of Art while supporting brother with funding, had cartoons accepted house full of art works behind, the pair sailed themselves with other work and in McKinlay for Punch magazine but soon returned to for London on the RMS Osterley departing / Mackinlay’s case probably with a stipend Australia where he became a household Perth on 24th March 1914.17 Both studied at from his father. Cross, who was helped by his name. McKinlay / Mackinlay never returned.

Left: Study, chalk on paper, 56 x 39cm, probably from life classes at St Martin’s, 1914-17. Family Trust UK

Centre: Study, pencil on paper, 37 x 20cm, probably from life classes at St Martin’s, 1914-17. Family Trust UK

Right: Study, pen and wash on paper, 45 x 18cm, probably from life classes at St Martin’s, 1914-17. Family Trust UK

9 The handsome and dashing young the splendid Esplanade at the foot of to be included. However the Great War artist arrived in London apparently armed the city, and over the tops of the many intervened. McKinlay was on the Western with an introduction to the Western magnificent buildings, the outlines of Front in 1918. Australian Agent General and no doubt the distant Darling Ranges.” 19 When war was declared in August to others of his teacher Linton’s London The building, opened in February 1915, 1914 it was expected to end by Christmas circle such as the Woodward sisters, suffered bomb damage in a Zeppelin raid so McKinlay / Mackinlay continued with whose cousin Bernard was the curator later that year. The fate of the painting is his art studies. The next we know of him is at the Western Australian Art Gallery and not known but it was probably destroyed. in 1917 when he was living at 31 Cheyne Museum. They were the daughters of He may have been commissioned to do a Road, Chelsea, working as an illustrator Dr Henry Woodward FRS, geologist and replacement. and studying at St Martin’s School of Art.23 palaeontologist, Keeper of Geology at the Miguel’s circle in Chelsea included He was co-habiting with Laurie Anne R. British Museum and nieces of the Keeper South Australian Max Martin, who Carruthers (born Kensington 1897-1964), of Prints at Windsor Castle. Alice was a had come to London in 1913 to study, an artists’ model for Augustus John who well-known illustrator of children’s books was hung ‘on the line’ at the Royal bore a son Michael John that year while he working for Blackie & Co. The family lived Academy and became an overnight was away training to fight with the British in Chelsea and later moved to Bushey sensation in 1922.20 Another was the forces. In the dark days of 1917 when where Alice occupied no 17 of the Meadow expatriate Australian cartoonist and post- Britain looked likely to lose the war he was Studios. Miguel was to follow her lead, impressionist painter Horace Brodzky, a called up to the 3rd Battalion of the Suffolk living first in Chelsea and then moving member of the London Group who had Regiment, a home-front reserve infantry to Bushey. He also became an illustrator been schooled in, Melbourne, USA and regiment that was now required in Europe. for Blackie & Co. He was soon at work England and exhibited in many countries. After some training he embarked at Dover on commissions to decorate the Savoy Brodzky came from a wealthy Jewish on the 18th March 1918 and by the 21st House in the Strand, containing the offices family in Melbourne where his bohemian the Battalion was embroiled in the horrific and residence of the Western Australian father owned the society publication Table German Spring Offensive, ‘Kaiserschlacht’, Government.18 His commission to paint Talk.21 When H. S. Ede wrote his book and the British response that included the a grand panoramic view of Perth and the Savage Messiah in 1931 about French bloody but relatively successful Second Swan River for the main street window artist Henri Gaudier and Polish Sophie Battle of the Somme that held the Germans was admired and commented on as; Brzeska a reviewer wrote of the book: at bay.24 The toll was heavy. So many men “This is the work of young Mr M. “… they deal with their lives in Chelsea. were killed that units were decimated and McKinlay, a young Western Australian Everybody in the days before the war reconfigured with remnants of others into artist, and conveys some idea of the who knew Augustus John, Epstein, Max new Regiments. Three battalions were wonderful beauty of the outlook from Martin, Mike McKinley [sic], Margaret broken up and the new ones sent to areas the summit of Mt Eliza, with the broad Mansfield, Frank Harris and Roger Fry where an offensive was not expected. This waters of the river sweeping around by knew these two” 22 – quite a group in which was to give the men a chance to recover.

Montauban, Picardy after the battle of the Somme, pen and wash on paper, 17.5 x 23cm Family Trust UK

10 Captioned ‘Belgium’, pen and wash on paper, 20 x 16cm Family Trust UK

11 Top: Captioned ‘A rest camp 10/5/15’, pencil on paper, 16 x 19.5cm. Family Trust UK

Bottom: Captioned ‘Out for a rest after some hard fighting in the Kemmel front. Belgium 10/5/15’, pencil on paper, 17 x 23cm. Family Trust UK

12 Miguel’s unit suffered heavy losses in the lulls between the offensives or prevent the Germans reaching Paris. at Arras and was amalgamated. By in recovery weeks when his unit was There were lulls between the offensives. the 1st April he was in France with the sent to rest at places where an attack He sketched troops resting, on watch in 2/6th Battalion South Staffordshire was not expected. Miguel had been a house in Château-Thierry and even Regiment, which was also a territorial wounded and after time out at nearby 83 enjoying musical evenings before he was infantry regiment, formed originally as General Hospital Boulogne he re-joined wounded again in a major offensive, the a home service (‘second line’) unit.25 his unit on 5th May before being posted Third Battle of the Aisne, 27th May – 6th Annotated drawings mean we can trace on 21st May to the 4th Battalion South June 1918, a surprise German assault his movements in Flanders in Belgium, Staffordshire Regiment, an extra reserve on thirty-nine kilometres of the Allies front Picardy and Champagne in northern battalion, part of the 3rd Division of the trenches using over four thousand guns. France. They would have been done Allied forces in the area near Rheims His powerful drawings convey the agony in the seemingly endless waiting time, defending the Aisne and the Marne to of the occasion.

La Mitrailleuse France,1918. (‘The new gun’), pen and wash on paper, 25.5 x 27cm Family Trust UK

13 Top: A French Post, Château-Thierry, Champagne, 1918, pen and wash on paper, 29 x 32cm. Family Trust UK

Bottom: The Third Battle of the Aisne May, 1918, charcoal on paper, 10.5 x 16cm. Family Trust UK

14 In retreat – Resting in the Forêt d’ Epernay France, May 1918, pen and wash on paper, 11 x 15.5cm. Family Trust UK

He was invalided out, returned to drawings are a poignant reminder of the covers for their children’s annuals. He England and from 9th June until 16th war that was ‘the war to end all wars’. also illustrated for Oxford University August 1918 recuperated at the Royal After the war the young couple lived Press and Longman’s and appears to Victoria Military Hospital Netley. Miguel, with her parents at 65 Surrey Road have developed two personae, one the granted a week’s leave before being West Battersea and life was looking illustrator and one the artist; a common transferred to the 4th South Staffordshire promising. They soon had a daughter necessity of the time. Posters continued Regiment at Lichfield Station,26 married Laurie and he worked regularly as a to be strong and forceful. Following his artist’s model Laurie Carruthers on magazine illustrator on Hutchison’s WWII he undertook illustrations for John the 19th August 1918. She was twenty- Story Magazine, Nash’s and Good Bull magazine earning the epithet the one, working in a factory making screws Housekeeping signing his work ‘Mac’ British Norman Rockwell, which would for aeroplanes, and living at 65 Surrey and later ‘MM’ with his surname spelt probably have damned him in the eyes Lane, Battersea, the home of her father. ‘Mackinlay’. He illustrated Arthur O. of the art establishment. It seems he On 23rd August he was sent to the depot Cooke’s Godfrey Gets There for Blackie found the commercial work so lucrative at Ripon until November 7th. Armistice & Son in 1926 and went on to do a that he had little time to paint the many Day came on the 11th November. The considerable amount of illustrative work major works of art that had been his Great War was over much to everyone’s for this publishing house from the 1920s original intention and had been the hope relief. The Allies had been victorious. His to the 1950s including the well-known of those who followed his early career.

15 Top: Full Speed, frontispiece from The Young Fur Traders (1920s-30s)

Bottom: Poster sketch 1920s

16 The Grass Widower, cover for John Bull magazine 22nd July 1947. Miguel’s grandson Michael Wood protests while his father Ken Wood (later of the Kenwood Chef fame) bathes him

His painting career got off to a good This was a space on the fourth floor as the senior and very bohemian figure start in England once he had recovered of the department store in Tottenham in the New English Art Club, the Welsh his health following the horrors of WWI. Court Road opened as a venue for portrait painter Augustus John (1878- In 1921 he began exhibiting with the New young artists.27 He exhibited Still Life 1961). They both exhibited at the Royal English Art Club, seen as a stepping- and Lawrie. Now he commenced trading Academy in 1930 when John showed a stone to the Royal Academy, and with on his exotic Spanish connection and painting of heiress Tallulah Bankhead, The London Group; a progressive signed his paintings ‘Miguel Mackinlay’ which was criticized while Miguel’s co-operative dominated in the 1920s by by which name we know him. Miguel Tête-a-tête was hung ‘on the line’, the Roger Fry and the Bloomsbury set who was never formally a member of either of most prestigious position and was the exhibited in Heal’s new Mansard Gallery. these groups but mixed with men such sensation of the year.

17 Top: Michael John Mackinlay, c1921, oil on canvas, 94 x 74cm Family Trust UK

Bottom: The Blue Overall, c1921, oil on board, 36 x 31cm Family Collection UK

18 Convalescent,1922, (signed Michael John Mackinlay), oil on canvas, 58 x 40.5cm. Family Trust UK

Miguel exhibited Laurie and Michael in the Winter 1923 The Convalescent 1922 when Max Martin made his great in the 1921 Summer Exhibition of The and in the Summer in 1923 Dorothy.28 impression.29 La Siesta was also known New English Art Club. In the Winter He had painted La Siesta which to his as Mother and Child when published in Exhibition 1922 he showed The Blue satisfaction was hung in the Summer The West Australian in 1930. Overall, in Summer 1922 Charlotte, Exhibition at the Royal Academy in

19 Top: Drowsy Child, also exhibited as Lawrie c1922, oil on board, 39 x 60cm. (Laurie Marion Mackinlay) Family Collection UK

Bottom: La Siesta, hung in the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy 1922, also known as Mother and Child, c1922, oil on board, 48.5 x 38cm. (The two Lauries) Family Trust UK

20 Miguel, as one of the up and coming Marie Louise, Queen Victoria’s sculptor Max Martin, the young painter whose Australians, was selected to exhibit in daughter. The critic for the Sydney hard-bitten ‘Portrait group’ made Australian Artists at the Faculty of Art Sunday Times wrote: something of a sensation in the Gallery, University of London 30 in 1924 “The chief interest of the exhibition Academy two years ago ... Mr Miguel and Australian Artists in Europe at the … was to disclose the Dominion McKinley, [sic] with a painting of Still Spring’s Garden Gallery in 1925. The origin or connections of several Life, and Mr Horace Brodzky, with 1924 exhibition comprising a hundred artists well known in London. Of some racy paintings of street life and and fifty works was opened by Princess these the most noteworthy was Mr drypoints of the nude … “ 31

Still Life, 1924, oil on canvas, 45 x 50cm Family Trust UK

A writer for the Australasian discussing shows in which the artists are all artists such as; Sydney Long, Penleigh the exhibition wrote: tarred more or less with the same Boyd, Arthur Streeton, George Lambert, “Technically, the level of the exhibition brush, it was remarkable for the high Hans Heysen and Charles Condor. The was very high – in the opinion of standard of technical skill maintained critic for the Colour Magazine wrote of the several competent judges, as high in a great diversity of styles. paintings that, “These should find a home as that of an average academy Australian artists stood revealed in some Australian art gallery.” He was exhibition. It further resembled among the leading exponents of the referring to works by Max Martin, Miguel recent academy exhibitions in the artistic cults of the day.” Mackinlay, Rupert Bunny, Emanuel variety of schools it represented. It should be noted that the other Philips Fox, Edith Fry, Jessie Gibson and As distinguished from other London exhibitors included important Australian Horace Brodzky. 32 Martin and a number

21 of others were virtual exiles because of “His technique follows the broad this talent. It is accompanied by real the Australian import duties. Import duties lines laid down by Cézanne, which merits in pure painting. would have been a deterrent for artists the modern may honestly follow MacKinlay draws also with a great such as Miguel and his friend Brodzky to without losing his own personality sense of style, and the pen drawing return to Australia as Leslie Rees wrote and with the possibility of unlimited of mother and child we reproduce is in Art in Australia in 1931; “I fancy that development. … A strong sense beautifully sensitive. Some of his other both these accomplished artists would of individual character MacKinlay drawings have an almost pre-Raphaelite like to return to Australia, even if only for undoubtedly has; and this, we may care and tenderness of line. All his a short time. They will not do so without note, is one of the features of the work shows a reverence for nature – a encouragement from the Australian public. Spanish genius. The Andalusian with carefully thought out design and the It remains for the public to show them his coarse strength of countenance capacity for taking pains which a true practical sympathy.” 33 is extremely well realized, and artist must possess. It is to be hoped Mr Miguel’s involvement in these and MacKinlay has done other portraits MacKinlay [sic] will occupy himself less, other exhibitions engendered interest and in which the same striking quality as time goes on, with the illustrative he was feted with an article in the premier of personality appears, notably in work he has recently been doing and art magazine The Studio in December a picture of a thin young girl, who concentrate on pure painting – in which 1926. El Andaluz was illustrated along holds an orange in her hand. He is field he has great promise.” 34 with Drowsy Child and a pen and ink excellent at seizing a likeness; but Miguel continued with the illustrative work. sketch The Mother. The Studio writer W. one does not feel constrained to rest It paid the bills. He was soon able to G. remarked of Miguel: all one’s appreciation of his work upon celebrate earning £1000 in one year.

Top: El Andaluz c1924/5, print reproduced in The Studio magazine in 1926

Bottom: The Mother, Miguel’s drawing of wife, Laurie, with their baby, Laurie, as published in The Studio in 1926 Courtesy The Studio

22 Battersea Roofs, c1920, oil on canvas, 60 x 50cm

23 Girl with Orange, c1925, oil on canvas, 77 x 61cm, discussed in The Studio Dec. 1926. Family Trust and family collection UK

The Summer Exhibition at the Royal prestigious position where large paintings wrote of: “… the gifted Western Australian, Academy had been a fixture on the English and those by famous artists hung. Miguel Miguel Mackinlay, whose large picture, art calendar since 1769. Paintings by the continued exhibiting in these summer The Bath has an unusual combination of most important artists as well as the largest exhibitions at the Royal Academy. The Bath, qualities – accomplished technique, artistic were usually ‘hung on the line’, originally this Interior and El Andaluz were reviewed in conception and psychological insight – was with the bottom edge of the painting 1927 by Edith Fry for the Western Mail in conspicuously lacking in most exhibits which 244cms from the floor. This was the most Perth and the Sydney Morning Herald. She surround it.” 35

24 The Bath, hung in the Summer Exhibition of the Royal Academy in 1927, oil on canvas, 126 x 187cm. The models are his wife Laurie, son Michael and daughter Laurie. Family collection. On loan to Bushey Museum and Art Gallery

Left: Woman Undressing, 1920s, pen and blue wash on ivory paper, 42 x 29.1 cm, Princeton University Art Museum collection

Right: Head of a Child, 1920s, black and yellow chalk on paper, 27.4 x 22.7cm, Princeton University Art Museum collection

Far right: Children in a tub, c1920s, pen and wash on paper, 15.4 x 19.3cm, Princeton University Art Museum collection

25 About this time Miguel’s drawings London dealer F. R. Meatyard between of Elizabeth Milner (1860-1953) at were collected by Dan Fellows Platt 1924 and 1928. Two of Miguel’s works neighbouring Bourne Hall. With the size (1873-1937), a wealthy American that Platt collected, Javanese Dancer of the major paintings he was producing ‘Renaissance man’, trained in and A Bather, were exhibited in the Art a large studio was a necessity. Whether archaeology and law, who travelled the Institute of Chicago in 1932.36 The others he still continued to paint there after about world, lectured on art and amassed a are in the university collection. 1932, when the family moved to ‘The major collection of drawings which he left In 1928 the family moved to 31 Hut’ in Finch Lane with its own capacious to his alma mater Princeton University. He Bournehall Road in the artist colony area studio, is not known. Later when he purchased the thirteen drawings now in of Bushey in Hertfordshire. Mackinlay moved to ‘Rutlands’ he also had a studio the Princeton University Art Museum from painted in the Bourne Hall Studio at the Bushey Meadows Studio complex.

Top: The Hut, Finch Lane, Bushey 1932, oil on canvas, 49.5 x 60cm. The garden at their new address. Family Trust UK.

Bottom: Tête-a-tête, hung on the line at the Royal Academy 1930 oil on canvas, 202 x 237cm. Family collection, on loan to Bushey Museum and Art Gallery

26 In 1930, when he was again hung in roundness of things that are round, describing Tête-à-tête as ”very terrifying The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, adds emphatically the values of mass with its two heavy young women lying Miguel’s Tête-à-tête created quite a stir and weight.” 40 on a slope so steep that the tea-things among the 1669 exhibits. It was the His La Siesta – Mother and Son was just below are in danger every moment, first thing noticed when entering the also illustrated and written up 41 in Perth, but its’ forms and lights and colour are Academy, being described by eminent Western Australia where his career was interesting.” 42 Leslie Rees discussing art historian and critic William Moore in being avidly followed. The critic for the Mackinlay and Brodzky in Art in Australia the Brisbane Courier as “…the success West Australian wrote: in February 1931 also wrote that: of the year”.37 Gui St Bernard noted that “Mackinlay has very definite “Among Australian painters who Tête-à-tête “was of ‘decided merit;’ … . theories about his art and is a direct have left Australia to seek a larger The effective placing of component arts descendant of Cezanne, in that he fortune in London, only a few and soundness of figure construction are aims first at the realization on his have adapted themselves to those also characteristics …” 38 This was his canvas of solidarity and volume in principles, which have become known year to be the success of the season. The his forms by use of massed planes of popularly as ‘Modern’. Fred. Porter, Week-end Review declared it “one of the colour. In other words he is definitely a Horace Brodzky, Max Martin and best pictures in the show, with something three-dimensional artist. His capacity Miguel Mackinlay stand out… While of the suave openness of a Seurat but for achieving the effect of roundness both [Brodzky and Mackinlay] are without the childish incapacity to maintain in an object that is round, of adding essentially modern, neither subscribes a background steadily … and if he is a the values of weight and mass, is to theories so abstruse or abstract as young man he should perhaps be warned well seen in the picture called Mother to cause head scratching in front if against getting the Prix de Rome.” 39 An and Son. The child’s head here is their pictures. They are neither of them innovation that year was the presentation not lying merely on the pillow but is so keen on emotional self-expression of five ‘tableaux vivants’ at the Coliseum essentially pressing into it. Mackinlay’s that they throw technique to the winds featuring Academy paintings. Brightly lit early training in modelling no doubt and try to achieve art in a passing living representations of the hung works of influenced him in this insistence on the spasm of aesthetic agony.” 43 Miguel, Royal Academicians Laura Knight third dimension… It is only necessary Discussing Miguel’s entry in the Royal and Russell Flint, plus Walter Webster and to examine the picture Tête-a-Tête to Academy Summer Exhibition the following Campbell Taylor were posed on the stage see that Mackinlay is a constructive year the critic for London’s Sunday Times surrounded by huge gold frames. Miguel’s designer of skill. He builds his pictures was unfamiliar with the artist and wrote: tableau was also illustrated in the Daily with a kind of solid deliberation and “From afar we can see Miguel Sketch. Australian critic Leslie Rees wrote: the movement in them is slow. The Mackinlay’s The First Communion “Tête-à-tête was one of the most appearance of the figures in Tête- (631), which occupies the centre of discussed and most outstanding a-Tête combines in an individual the centre wall of Gallery VIII. … his pictures in the last Academy. Like way the static solidity of sculpture picture – which suggests Besnard with Cezanne, whose method he follows, with a plastic rhythm of line possible a soupçon of Marchand – has a familiar he is concerned with expression not only in painting. He favours figure look. It is very sunny, clear and dry in surfaces, but of essential structures compositions on an unusually large colour, the kind of thing we are more that is to say he paints not what scale, but also paints landscape and accustomed to see at the Tuileries than he sees, or not only what he sees still life.” in Burlington House. I suspect the artist but, what he knows to be there. The critic for the Brisbane Telegraph and is Paris trained.” 44 He achieves par excellence the Boston Evening Transcript had other ideas That must have amused him.

The First Communion,1931, oil on canvas, 74 x 59cm Private collection UK

27 Top: Rutlands, 1940, oil on canvas, 67 x 81cm. Family collection

Middle: The Marrow Bed, oil on canvas 59 x 74cm. Family Trust UK

Bottom: Theresa in the Bushey Meadows studio, 1945. Oil on board, 62 x 74cm Family collection Canada

28 Top: Gypsy Caravans, 1930s, watercolour and ink on paper, 27 x 37cm. Family Trust UK.

Bottom: Brixham Harbour, Devon, 1930s, watercolour on paper, 24.5 x 35cm. Family Trust UK

Life in a rambling house on Bushey sea and boats. Holidays, especially in the kept a boat in France, possibly Dieppe Heath was pleasant. The extensive 1930s were mostly taken in Cornwall and where the family holidayed in the 1920s gardens that he cultivated provided fruit, Devon where there were several artists’ and early ’30s.45 Trips to the countryside vegetables and flowers and room for colonies and contacts could be made to saw farmyard scenes painted and, in later elder daughter Laurie’s little black dog plug into exhibition circuits. Numerous years when his TB or war wound was that appeared in a number of paintings. images of the sea and harbours remain in troubling him, many vases of flowers from Yet Miguel never lost his interest in the his portfolio. He was also reputed to have his garden.

29 Top: Self Portrait as artist, c1940s, oil on board, 59.5 x 49cm Family Trust UK

Middle: (Probably) Cornish Village, 1936, oil on canvas 60 x 49.5cm Family Trust

Bottom: (Possibly) Kitchen Bunch, 1945, oil on canvas 75 x 62cm Family Trust UK

30 During and immediately after World wearing the uniform of this British colonial continued until he returned for supper at War II (1939-1945) there were housing service (1920-1948) established to maintain 6.30. He had two studios, one at the bottom shortages as British people rebuilt services after the defeat of the Turks in of the garden and one at Meadow Studios. the shattered country. When eldest WWI and continued until the establishment The one in the garden usually contained daughter Laurie married Ken Wood at the of Israel. Michael John served during or just a bunch of flowers and he painted a great fashionable St Margaret’s Westminster in after the ‘Arab Troubles’ in what remains a number of flower paintings, which appear 1944 the young couple lived at Rutlands very troubled region. Michael John married to have been a popular subject even for for the next two or three years, providing Lorna Hart in 1945. She was painted some of the avant-garde artists. He also him with models to draw. They had four c.1950. They had a son Michael Anthony read, enjoying the classics and listened to children Michael (1945-), Stuart (1948-?), in 1946, a daughter Michele in 1950 and the radio. His youngest daughter Theresa Sally (1949-) and Gillian (1955-). Like family a daughter Carolyn in 1954 and lived in posed for many of the sketches that and friends they were subjects for his pencil Tanganyika for some years. became the basis for advertisements. She and brush. Michael Wood most famously A typical day for Miguel in the 1950s also accompanied him to visit art galleries. was the cover of John Bull in 1947. Son was to rise at 7am, and after breakfast of She says that when commissioned he Michael John, who was painted many times black pudding or porridge he would walk spent considerable time with the subject as a child before serving in the Palestine to the studio by 10am, prepare for the day and undertook a number of sketches Police Force was painted circa 1947 and start to paint or sketch by 11am. This before commencing the painting.46

Summer, 1933, oil on canvas, 166 x 200cm, was hung at the Royal Academy in 1933. Family collection on loan to Bushey Museum and Art Gallery; and a study for the painting, charcoal on paper, 56 x 38cm. Family Trust UK

Miguel’s best-known image is that of figure hugging rather than the preceding made of The Poacher hung at the Royal Summer, currently on loan to the Bushey baggy Edwardian style. Miguel with his Academy in Burlington House and the Museum and Art Gallery. It had been facility in figure drawing was in his element. next year in Bradford. Miguel continued a exhibited at the Summer Exhibition of the Son Michael and his friends Pat and Boy lucrative career as a portrait painter and Royal Academy in 1933. Swimming had were models for figures in the painting. illustrator in England and painted for the been introduced as an Olympic sport for Later Theresa often sat for her father when academy Summer exhibitions. women in the 1920s and costumes became a child was needed. In 1936 much was

31 The Poacher, hung at the Summer Exhibition of the Royal Academy in 1936, oil on canvas, 214 x 150cm. Family Trust UK

32 The Poacher being hung in Bradford in 1937. Yorkshire Observer 19th March 1937

The Spanish Civil War happening at was hung at the Royal Academy the family and during the second World War (1939- this time 1936-1939 must have caused had moved to rent the spacious seven 1945) Miguel worked as an artist for the him some heartache, particularly if family bedroom Rutlands, The Rutts, Bushey Heath Ministry of Information painting recruitment connections were involved. By 1939, when which Miguel enjoyed painting. War broke posters but as he still had WWI shrapnel in the painting of the infant Theresa in her cot out again between Germany and the Allies his leg did not serve in an active capacity

Middle: The Young Reader, 1945, oil on canvas, 50 x 44cm. Leamington Spa Art Gallery & Museum Collection. Exhibited Royal Academy 1945

Bottom: Still Life with Dress Uniform, possibly Props, exhibited RA 1942, 74 x 62cm Family collection, currently on loan to Bushey Museum and Art Gallery

33 Miguel continued to exhibit at the and Art Gallery. In 1943 Theresa, the Gallery. One of the loveliest and last Royal Academy during the war but artist’s daughter was hung in the Summer paintings he undertook was of daughter ceased when it became discredited after Exhibition. This actually features both Theresa’s wedding bouquet when she the war being considered old fashioned. daughters, Laurie and Theresa. In 1944 married John Quarrington in 1957. Miguel In 1942 he exhibited Props which was Kitchen Bunch was hung, and in 1945 did not live to see the birth of her eldest hung in the Summer Exhibition. This is The Young Reader, which is nine-year child Jenny or the boys Mark and Duncan probably the painting Still Life with Dress old Theresa. This is now in the collection and died of tuberculosis and cancer in Uniform later loaned to Bushey Museum of Leamington Spa Museum and Art January 1959.

Top: Wedding Bouquet, 1957, oil on board, 37.5 x 47.5cm. Daughter Theresa’s wedding bouquet. Family collection UK

Bottom: Thought to be granddaughter Gilly, Miguel’s daughter Laurie’s youngest child, c1957, pencil on paper, 33.5 x 23.5cm

34 In 1961 Fishing Boats was donated to works are permanently on display at Bushey encouraged the Bushey Museum Trust to the Art Gallery of Western Australia. This Museum and Art Gallery and at Leamington feature The Art of Miguel Mackinlay in the rarely displayed item is almost certainly Spa Art Gallery & Museum. A 1980s’ loan 1990 Bushey Festival Exhibition held in The The White Sail exhibited in 1914. In Britain of Miguel’s paintings by Michael John Gallery, Church House, High Street Bushey.

Two images of the 1990 retrospective exhibition at Bushey Museum and Art Gallery Courtesy Bushey Museum and Art Gallery

The following year on the other Tête-à-tête. In the foreword the director merit, they reveal so much of the social side of the world Miguel’s part of the Neil Walker discussed the aim of the history of the period.” 48 presentation album from the students project, which was to bring attention to the A recent sales pitch on the internet for a of Highgate School to retiring Governor British artists who celebrated the 1930s’ print of “Summer” stated that Miguel was: and Lady Bedford in 1909 was exhibited interest in health, outdoor leisure and ...one of a small group of British in Wildflowers in Art at the Art Gallery sporting activities, well documented by figure painters whose crisp realist of Western Australia and featured in social realist painters on the continent, but style enjoyed great notoriety across the book of the same name by curator which had had little attention in Britain. He 1930s Europe. Positioned between Janda Gooding. Another exhibitor was stated “The crisp, realist style of painting the avant-garde abstractionists Rica Erickson, the author’s mother. In which characterises the majority of this and Edwardian traditionalism, they 2000 Miguel’s 1933 painting Summer work has instant appeal and the power to fostered a mainstream popularity for also featured in the book Art and Design conjure the period in all its immediacy.” 47 this style of art. However it is only in Western Australia: Perth Technical The exhibition reviewer Peyton Skipworth now that these painters are being College 1900-2000 edited by myself, writing of the whole exhibition in the fully recognised for the contribution Dorothy Erickson. Apollo stated that they made to British art in the years More recently (in 2006) Djanogly “ … one cannot help but be struck by between the two great wars. Art Gallery in Nottingham published a how modern and up-to-date they are, It is time to recognize Miguel’s part book and mounted a major exhibition A and I mean modern not avant-garde, in this. Exhibitions in 2018 at Bushey Day in the Sun: Outdoor Pursuits in Art which clearly they are not. … They Museum and Art Gallery and Leamington in the 1930s which also travelled to The provide a foretaste of 1960s’ pop art Spa Art Gallery featuring some of his Lowry at Salford Quays. This had been and predict other post-war cultural war drawings has drawn attention to his curated by Timothy Wilcox and featured phenomena … their re-evaluation now work and an exhibition and book covering McKinlay / Mackinlay’s Summer, and is timely as, apart from their aesthetic, more of his oeuvre is proposed.

35 References

1. Sir Frederick and Lady Bedford Presentation 20. Victor Harbour Times (South Australia) Feb. 30. This could account for the notion that he Album Battye Library, State Library of Western 11 1949, p. 2 and ‘London Lights: Australians had trained at the Slade. However the Faculty Australia Acc. No 1991B. and the Academy’, The West Australian June 4 of Arts was an independent body not attached 2. ‘A Painter of Note: Miguel Mackinlay’ The 1932, p. 5. to the university. Its aim was to consolidate the Western Mail (Perth WA) August 18 1927, p. 26. 21. ‘London Lights: Australians and the Academy’, arts and had other sections such as literature 3. Poetic license, his eyes were actually grey The West Australian June 4 1932, p. 5. and music, photography and commercial art. according to his war record. 22. In an as yet unidentified cutting from 31. Sunday Times (Sydney) August 10 1924, p. 6. 4. ‘A Painter of Note: Miguel Mackinlay’ The Miguel’s cutting book. 32. Quoted in the Huon Times (Tasmania) Nov. Western Mail (Perth WA) August 18 1927, p. 26. 23. Record of Service Paper Army form B2513. 24 1924, p. 3. 5. Ibid. 30971_173059_00239. For this information I 33. ‘Two Australians in London’, Art in Australia, 6. Gray, Anne. Line, Light and Shadow: James am indebted to genealogist Jacqui Kirk who Feb. 15 1931, p. 38. W. R. Linton: Painter, Craftsman, Teacher. has researched his war records. 34. The Studio, December 1926, pp. 393-4. Perth, Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 1986, p. 45. 24. http://www.suffolkregiment.org/Calendar. 35. The Western Mail (Perth), August 18 1927, 7. Catalogue WA Society of Arts. Nov. 1911. html accessed May 2016. p. 26 and Supplement p. 2 and the Sydney State Library of Western Australia (SLWA), 25. www.1914-1918.net/sstaffs.htm accessed Morning Herald, July 23 1927, p. 11. Battye Library PR 10795/27. April/May 2016. 36. Exhibition catalogue held by the family. 8. The West Australian, July 17 1912, p. 4. 26. Furlough, Army Form W3016. For this and 37. William Moore in ‘Art and Artists’, The 9. The West Australian, July 23 1912, p. 8. other information I am indebted to genealogist Brisbane Courier July 5 1930, p. 23. 10. Truth Feb. 28, 1914, p. 4. Jacqui Kirk who tirelessly researched records 38. St. Bernard, Gui, ‘The Royal Academy and 11. ‘A Painter of Note: Miguel Mackinlay’, The to elucidate Miguel’s life during the war. the Public in The Studio 99 (1930), pp. 387-402. Western Mail (Perth WA), August 18 1927, p. 27. Research notes provided by Claire 39. The Week-end Review (London) May 10 26, SLWA PR4367. Fitzgerald May 2016 citing Denys J. Wilcox, 1930, p.nk. 12. ‘Three Musketeers of Art’, Smith’s Weekly The London Group 1913-1939: the Artists 40. Rees, Leslie. The West Australian, May 31 (Sydney), Dec. 25 1937, p. 16. and their Works (Aldershot: Scholar Press, 1930, p.18, ‘Two Australians in London’. Art in 13. Catalogue of exhibition of paintings etc. by c1995), p. 180 and London Group. 1914-64 Australia, Feb. 1931, pp. 36-38. M. McKinlay and S.G. Cross opened by Sir Jubilee Exhibition. Fifty Years of British Art 41. West Australian May 31 1930 p. 18. Edward Stone [Perth] 16 March 1914. Battye at the Tate Gallery (exhibition catalogue, 15 42. ‘A Bird’s Eye View’, Telegraph (Brisbane), Library, State Library of Western Australia Call July – 16 August 1964) (London: Tate Gallery, June 19 1930, p. 4. no PR4367. 1964), appendix ‘Fifty years of London Group 43. Rees, Leslie. The West Australian, May 31 14. The Western Mail (Perth), March 20 1914, p. 46. Exhibitions 1914-64’, no pagination. 1930, p.18, ‘Two Australians in London’. Art in 15. Note the spelling of his surname on this. 28. Research notes provided by Claire Australia, Feb. 1931, pp. 36-38. 16. Daily News, March 17 1914, p. 6. Fitzgerald May 2016 citing De Lapperriere, 44. Sunday Times (London) May 3 1931, p.nk. 17. Daily News (Perth), March 24 1914, p. 5. Charles Baile (ed.), The New English Art Club 45. Information from daughter Theresa 2016. Where the paintings and other objects that Exhibitors 1886-2001: a Dictionary of Artists 46. Communication from his daughter Theresa 2016. filled a shed went on his brother John’s death and their Works in the Annual Exhibitions of 47. Wilcox, Timothy. A Day in the Sun: Outdoor is at present a mystery. The New English Art Club (Calne: Hilmaron Pursuits in Art in the 1930s, Djanogly Art 18. Western Australia in London 1915: opening Manor press, 2002), volume III, p. 93. Gallery Nottingham, Philip Wilson publishers, of the new offices of the Agent General, Savoy 29. Royal Academy Exhibitors 1905-1970: 2006, p. 7. House, Strand, W.C. State Library of Western A dictionary of artists and their work in the 48. Skipworth, Peyton. ‘A Day in the Sun’, Australia, Q 994.1 WES. Summer Exhibitions of the Royal Academy Apollo (163: 531) May 2006, p. 38. 19. Battye Library, State Library of Western Australia, of Arts, vol. V. Wakefield: EP Publishing Ltd, Q 994.1 WES. The Western Mail, Feb. 26 1915, p. 2. 1981, p. 91

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