0:00:05 > 0:00:06'Rome -
0:00:06 > 0:00:10'for centuries, artists have been visiting the city.
0:00:10 > 0:00:14'They come to admire, to learn from a civilisation immortalised
0:00:14 > 0:00:17'through its architecture and its art.
0:00:23 > 0:00:27'20 years ago, I came here, too, on my own artistic pilgrimage.'
0:00:30 > 0:00:34I came here to study the monuments and the sculptures which had
0:00:34 > 0:00:38so impressed generations of aspiring artists before me.
0:00:38 > 0:00:43And here, at the Villa Borghese, I spent days sketching, measuring
0:00:43 > 0:00:49myself up against masterpieces by Bernini, Canova and Caravaggio.
0:00:49 > 0:00:52But the one thing that I never did was look up.
0:00:57 > 0:01:02'Here, on the ceiling of Salon XIX, are exquisite paintings.
0:01:05 > 0:01:06'For all outward appearances,
0:01:06 > 0:01:09'they bear the hallmarks of a Renaissance master,
0:01:09 > 0:01:14'but in fact they are by a man with a very un-Italian name,
0:01:14 > 0:01:18'Gavin Hamilton, a fellow Scot.
0:01:18 > 0:01:21'I really should have paid more attention.'
0:01:21 > 0:01:24When you think of ceilings and you think of Rome, it's always
0:01:24 > 0:01:29Michelangelo that comes to mind, not the story of Scottish art.
0:01:29 > 0:01:32But the fact is that if Scottish art is about anything,
0:01:32 > 0:01:35it's contradictions and surprises.
0:01:35 > 0:01:39And the work of Gavin Hamilton is no exception,
0:01:39 > 0:01:40because these images,
0:01:40 > 0:01:43like so much of what we're going to encounter,
0:01:43 > 0:01:47well, they're unexpected and they really do deserve closer examination.
0:01:50 > 0:01:54'Hamilton was one of a whole new generation of Scottish artists
0:01:54 > 0:01:58'who in the 18th century were about to dazzle their compatriots.'
0:02:00 > 0:02:03Scots emerged blinking into the sunlight.
0:02:03 > 0:02:07They were coming from a society where art had been suppressed,
0:02:07 > 0:02:10a place of sobriety and restraint.
0:02:10 > 0:02:16But in Italy, they would be intoxicated by what they encountered.
0:02:16 > 0:02:20Tanked up on history, ideas and culture,
0:02:20 > 0:02:23their imaginations would be unleashed.
0:02:29 > 0:02:34'Such polarising experiences sparked a powerful creative tension...
0:02:35 > 0:02:36'..and it is tension
0:02:36 > 0:02:40'that characterises this period above all else,
0:02:40 > 0:02:43'tension between the shackles of the past
0:02:43 > 0:02:46'and the freedom of bold new ideas,
0:02:46 > 0:02:51'between seductive myth and the sober reality,
0:02:51 > 0:02:56'between the driving forces of reason, restraint and romance.
0:02:59 > 0:03:03'And, for me, it is this tension that prompted the greatest
0:03:03 > 0:03:06'blossoming of visual art in Scotland's history.'
0:03:09 > 0:03:12From the ashes of the Reformation, a new country,
0:03:12 > 0:03:16a new culture emerged, and it was built on art.
0:03:42 > 0:03:47"Whatsoever is added to God's word by man's device, seem it never
0:03:47 > 0:03:51"so good or holy or beautiful.
0:03:51 > 0:03:56"Yet before God, which is jealous and cannot admit any companion or
0:03:56 > 0:04:01"counsellor, it is wicked, evil and abominable."
0:04:01 > 0:04:04Those are the words of John Knox,
0:04:04 > 0:04:08the clergyman who led the Scottish Protestant Reformation.
0:04:08 > 0:04:14"Be in no doubt, Catholic adornment is out. Put nothing in its place."
0:04:18 > 0:04:19In the 16th century,
0:04:19 > 0:04:23Scotland's creative landscape was lost in the shadows.
0:04:24 > 0:04:27The message remained stark and plain.
0:04:28 > 0:04:31Put your faith in words, not in pictures.
0:04:34 > 0:04:36And yet, as the 18th century dawned, it would
0:04:36 > 0:04:41in fact be words that would herald a golden age of Scottish artistry.
0:04:43 > 0:04:45But these wouldn't be the words of God,
0:04:45 > 0:04:50they'd be the words of enlightened minds, of authors, historians
0:04:50 > 0:04:53and philosophers who didn't distinguish between intellectual
0:04:53 > 0:04:55and artistic endeavour.
0:04:57 > 0:04:59'This was the age of the Scottish Enlightenment.
0:05:02 > 0:05:06'In 1707, the Act of Union with England had transformed
0:05:06 > 0:05:08'Scottish society.
0:05:08 > 0:05:10'Scotland's politicians
0:05:10 > 0:05:14'and aristocrats had migrated south to Westminster.
0:05:14 > 0:05:18'But you'd be surprised what can happen when the toffs leave town.
0:05:22 > 0:05:26'A new identity was emerging, built from the ground up.
0:05:30 > 0:05:32'Here, at the National Portrait Gallery,
0:05:32 > 0:05:34'the walls are graced with the noblemen
0:05:34 > 0:05:40'and monarchs who for centuries held sway over Scottish life.
0:05:40 > 0:05:45'But now intellectuals, scholars and writers took centre stage,
0:05:45 > 0:05:48'men such as the philosopher David Hume.'
0:05:52 > 0:05:56This painting was created by the first artist in Scottish history who
0:05:56 > 0:06:00could indisputably be described as brilliant,
0:06:00 > 0:06:02Allan Ramsay.
0:06:02 > 0:06:04He was a man with the skills.
0:06:04 > 0:06:06I mean, he could really have transformed his subject,
0:06:06 > 0:06:08slimmed him down and given him
0:06:08 > 0:06:12the kind of chiselled nobility that his stature demanded.
0:06:12 > 0:06:14But he didn't.
0:06:14 > 0:06:17I'm familiar with that delicate little problem.
0:06:17 > 0:06:20Should I perform a little bit of painted liposuction on that
0:06:20 > 0:06:24prodigious double chin just to please the client?
0:06:24 > 0:06:26And I'm not being trite here.
0:06:26 > 0:06:31It's crucial to our understanding of Ramsay, of Hume, indeed
0:06:31 > 0:06:36of the Enlightenment, that this artist chose not to gild the lily,
0:06:36 > 0:06:40so that when an artist like Ramsay began to create a painting,
0:06:40 > 0:06:43he was doing so intellectually.
0:06:43 > 0:06:47He said himself that art should be grounded in what is in front of you.
0:06:49 > 0:06:53So what we've got here is David Hume viewed square on, without any
0:06:53 > 0:06:55flourish or fanfare.
0:06:55 > 0:06:59He's simply materialising out of the darkness,
0:06:59 > 0:07:04a real human presence, just waiting for the conversation to start.
0:07:07 > 0:07:11'And it was debate that really fuelled the cultural
0:07:11 > 0:07:13'revolution in which Ramsay was immersed.
0:07:14 > 0:07:17'Mathematicians, historians, economists
0:07:17 > 0:07:22'and philosophers liberally exchanged new ideas, and not just in salons
0:07:22 > 0:07:27'and lecture halls but in the coffee houses and taverns.'
0:07:27 > 0:07:28So all these discussions
0:07:28 > 0:07:31and debates weren't just restricted to an intellectual elite, then.
0:07:31 > 0:07:33No, I don't think they were.
0:07:33 > 0:07:37People are reading about it in their magazines or their newspapers,
0:07:37 > 0:07:40and if they're not able to do that, those
0:07:40 > 0:07:43ideas are in the streets, they're in the streets.
0:07:43 > 0:07:45So culture's really being unleashed.
0:07:45 > 0:07:48The floodgates have opened, and people are finding access to
0:07:48 > 0:07:51- things they might not have encountered 40, 50 years ago.- Yeah.
0:07:51 > 0:07:54Quite a number of the individuals at that time were multitasking.
0:07:54 > 0:07:58I mean, look at the idea of a male role today, you know,
0:07:58 > 0:08:00the stay-at-home dad who happens to be professionally
0:08:00 > 0:08:03trained as an accountant and does whatever else,
0:08:03 > 0:08:04actually, it's not a new thing.
0:08:04 > 0:08:07An artist like Allan Ramsay, he's dipping his toes into philosophy
0:08:07 > 0:08:09and thinking and writing, as well.
0:08:09 > 0:08:12You could be a philosopher, an artist, an engineer,
0:08:12 > 0:08:15all in the one person, and that was allowed, feasible.
0:08:15 > 0:08:17Yeah. People were much more open-minded.
0:08:17 > 0:08:20They didn't categorise things in the same way as we do now, and
0:08:20 > 0:08:24that's one of the reasons why it's such an exciting period, actually.
0:08:24 > 0:08:27Do you think this would have happened without the Act of Union?
0:08:27 > 0:08:31Many people think that that was certainly a pivot point
0:08:31 > 0:08:34in terms of Scottish culture and Scottish life,
0:08:34 > 0:08:38and what it also did was actually make major possibilities
0:08:38 > 0:08:41and opportunities for people to go elsewhere,
0:08:41 > 0:08:42so it's very noticeable
0:08:42 > 0:08:45that Scotland is very open to making the most
0:08:45 > 0:08:50of those opportunities and engaging with what's happening elsewhere.
0:08:52 > 0:08:57And Allan Ramsay was no exception. Born in Edinburgh in 1713,
0:08:57 > 0:09:00his father was an eminent Scottish poet.
0:09:00 > 0:09:04But Ramsay set his sights on conquering London,
0:09:04 > 0:09:08a crowded marketplace where ambitious artists competed to flatter
0:09:08 > 0:09:10the wealthiest patrons.
0:09:10 > 0:09:15Just look at the work of Ramsay's chief rival, Joshua Reynolds.
0:09:15 > 0:09:20Wigs were mighty, cheeks were powdered, and no matter how
0:09:20 > 0:09:25pigeon-toed, on canvas you became as nimble-footed as a prima ballerina.
0:09:27 > 0:09:31Ramsay, however, wasn't quite so accommodating.
0:09:35 > 0:09:39Anne Cockburn, Lady Inglis, is not a looker,
0:09:39 > 0:09:43all wrapped up in her bonnet, hunkered in the shadows.
0:09:43 > 0:09:47You couldn't imagine a composition that was more uptight,
0:09:47 > 0:09:49more Presbyterian.
0:09:49 > 0:09:54But with so very little, Ramsay manages to communicate so much.
0:09:54 > 0:09:59I mean, all that darkness, all that restraint, what it does is
0:09:59 > 0:10:04it draws you in towards the face, that place of reason and emotion.
0:10:04 > 0:10:08And when you get there, you realise that this isn't a stern
0:10:08 > 0:10:10and unapproachable painting.
0:10:10 > 0:10:14Lady Inglis might feel a little bit anxious at all this scrutiny,
0:10:14 > 0:10:19but there's great warmth here, there's honesty, there's respect.
0:10:30 > 0:10:34'You'd imagine such Presbyterian restraint would limit Ramsay's
0:10:34 > 0:10:38'appeal, especially in the rarefied circles of London society.
0:10:39 > 0:10:42'And yet, just two years after setting up his studio
0:10:42 > 0:10:48'here in Covent Garden, he declared, "I have put them all to flight
0:10:48 > 0:10:52'"and now play first fiddle myself."
0:10:52 > 0:10:56'And he wasn't exaggerating. Ahead of Reynolds and Gainsborough,
0:10:56 > 0:10:59'he was appointed Painter in Ordinary to King George III.
0:11:01 > 0:11:05'In his royal portraits, it is clear that he could evoke swagger
0:11:05 > 0:11:07'and splendour with the best of them.
0:11:07 > 0:11:12'But what makes him unique is that with it, he brings an honesty,
0:11:12 > 0:11:14'a tangibility.
0:11:14 > 0:11:16'These remain real people.'
0:11:17 > 0:11:20But you'd be mistaken if you thought that Ramsay's style was
0:11:20 > 0:11:23a distillation of Scottish first principles.
0:11:23 > 0:11:26In fact, his technique betrayed what the contemporary artist
0:11:26 > 0:11:31William Hogarth sneeringly described as "Ramsay's foreign flourish".
0:11:31 > 0:11:34His most important painting lessons hadn't been
0:11:34 > 0:11:39learnt in Presbyterian Scotland, nor were they honed here in London,
0:11:39 > 0:11:41but in a much more torrid climate.
0:11:51 > 0:11:54'The Grand Tour was a desirable part
0:11:54 > 0:11:57'of any well-heeled gentleman's education.
0:11:58 > 0:12:01'But for an artist of the Enlightenment such as Ramsay,
0:12:01 > 0:12:03'it would be essential.
0:12:11 > 0:12:15'The ancient world offered the promise of communing with
0:12:15 > 0:12:18'a society not ruled by God
0:12:18 > 0:12:20'but by thought.
0:12:26 > 0:12:31'Now, I've never really been a child of my time, and when I was 18
0:12:31 > 0:12:35'I emulated their journeys and spent a year in the Eternal City.'
0:12:36 > 0:12:40And I really do remember the first morning, when I came out,
0:12:40 > 0:12:44and 2,000 years of history hit me slap in the face.
0:12:44 > 0:12:47Well, I mean, that was it. I just couldn't stop drawing
0:12:47 > 0:12:49and sketching for the whole year afterwards.
0:12:49 > 0:12:54Arriving in Rome, for me, had been like a kind of visual detonation,
0:12:54 > 0:12:58and everything that I saw after that hit me like a chain reaction
0:12:58 > 0:13:02of fizzing masterpieces and historical icons.
0:13:02 > 0:13:04But for a cultural tourist like Ramsay,
0:13:04 > 0:13:07coming from a place where the Renaissance had been forbidden,
0:13:07 > 0:13:11well, I mean, the experience must have been hallucinogenic.
0:13:26 > 0:13:31'Like me, Ramsay's real training as an artist began here, in Rome.
0:13:36 > 0:13:41'He arrived in 1736, at the age of 23.
0:13:43 > 0:13:45'Over the next two years,
0:13:45 > 0:13:49'he learned to draw from the antique monuments and sculptures.'
0:13:55 > 0:14:00The subtle modulations of form, the shadows, the proportions,
0:14:00 > 0:14:03the perspective, every single classical sculpture,
0:14:03 > 0:14:05no matter how boring you might initially find it,
0:14:05 > 0:14:09is an extraordinary challenge, and Ramsay was up to the task.
0:14:09 > 0:14:13I mean, his drawings, not only from sculptures but from the life
0:14:13 > 0:14:17models that he would have encountered at the French Academy here in Rome,
0:14:17 > 0:14:21perhaps drawing from the nude model for the first time...
0:14:22 > 0:14:24..well, they're beautiful...
0:14:26 > 0:14:28..stunning...
0:14:28 > 0:14:30exquisite examples of his artistry.
0:14:46 > 0:14:49Now, meticulous draughtsmanship really does underpin Ramsay's
0:14:49 > 0:14:51greatest portraits,
0:14:51 > 0:14:53but one of the most surprising techniques that he learnt
0:14:53 > 0:14:58here in Rome was the habit of underpainting the first
0:14:58 > 0:15:02stages of his portraits with a layer of blood-red pigment.
0:15:02 > 0:15:05Now, this was a really shocking technique that was completely
0:15:05 > 0:15:07unheard of in London.
0:15:07 > 0:15:11But I also feel that it represents a kind of metaphor for the true
0:15:11 > 0:15:14Allan Ramsay, the real character of the man,
0:15:14 > 0:15:18because on the surface, his greatest portraits appear to be all about
0:15:18 > 0:15:23restraint and poise, but in actual fact this isn't porcelain
0:15:23 > 0:15:27perfection, this isn't emotional sterility.
0:15:27 > 0:15:29Beneath that precision,
0:15:29 > 0:15:33there are really powerful emotions churning in Ramsay's portraits.
0:15:36 > 0:15:40Ramsay's life was full of personal tragedy.
0:15:40 > 0:15:44Both his wives and one of his sons died young.
0:15:44 > 0:15:49The image of his dead child is almost unbearable to contemplate.
0:15:51 > 0:15:55But even when I look at the portraits of his two wives,
0:15:55 > 0:15:59I get the impression that the feelings pulsing beneath that
0:15:59 > 0:16:03fragile film of paint are so violent they threaten to burst
0:16:03 > 0:16:05through at any point.
0:16:14 > 0:16:17'Like so many artists before and since,
0:16:17 > 0:16:20'Allan Ramsay had found his first taste of Italy sparked
0:16:20 > 0:16:25'a passion for the place, and he would return throughout his life.
0:16:27 > 0:16:29'But a fellow Scottish artist would find the experience
0:16:29 > 0:16:34'so powerful that he would turn his back on Scotland altogether.
0:16:38 > 0:16:42'Gavin Hamilton was born to a prominent family in Lanarkshire.
0:16:43 > 0:16:49'He came to Italy for the first time in 1744, a decade after Ramsay.
0:16:49 > 0:16:52'But while Ramsay was clearly influenced by the art that
0:16:52 > 0:16:57'he encountered in Rome, Hamilton was determined to emulate it.
0:17:07 > 0:17:11'Seduced by the myths and legends of the classical world,
0:17:11 > 0:17:16'he would devote the rest of his life to painting on an epic scale,
0:17:16 > 0:17:20'taking on the most ambitious form of art,
0:17:20 > 0:17:21'history painting.'
0:17:25 > 0:17:29These great historical images aren't just theatrics, you know.
0:17:29 > 0:17:33They're not just illustrations of Greek mythology.
0:17:33 > 0:17:36Gavin Hamilton was intellectually engaged in the subject,
0:17:36 > 0:17:41and he wanted to provoke in his audience really powerful emotions.
0:17:41 > 0:17:44These are paintings that bring to life the big debates about
0:17:44 > 0:17:50honour, virtue, the decent way to live your existence in a moral world.
0:17:50 > 0:17:54They were great lessons that people went to contemplate.
0:17:56 > 0:18:00'You could not find more contrasting artists in style and subject matter
0:18:00 > 0:18:04'than Gavin Hamilton and Allan Ramsay,
0:18:04 > 0:18:08'and yet they were both artists of the Enlightenment.
0:18:08 > 0:18:12'Both were wrestling with profound questions.
0:18:14 > 0:18:18'And both had interests far beyond the canvas.
0:18:19 > 0:18:21'And for these two men,
0:18:21 > 0:18:25'it was classical antiquity that captured their imagination.
0:18:29 > 0:18:32'The study of Roman archaeology has been luring foreigners to
0:18:32 > 0:18:35'Italy for centuries,
0:18:35 > 0:18:39'men such as Professor Bernie Frischer.'
0:18:39 > 0:18:41Gavin Hamilton was famous as a painter,
0:18:41 > 0:18:43and he came to Rome because he was a painter
0:18:43 > 0:18:46and he painted these wonderful cycles on Homer's Iliad
0:18:46 > 0:18:48and other historical scenes.
0:18:48 > 0:18:52But as he lived in Rome, he fell into the antiquarian culture
0:18:52 > 0:18:55and he got interested in collecting and in digging, in finding
0:18:55 > 0:18:59and then selling ancient sculpture.
0:18:59 > 0:19:02Is that what he was doing, just kind of looting the statues, or was he...?
0:19:02 > 0:19:06Well, from our perspective today, we would say he was a treasure hunter.
0:19:06 > 0:19:08We say that when you do archaeology, it's not to be
0:19:08 > 0:19:11looking for treasure, you're looking for knowledge.
0:19:11 > 0:19:14And he wasn't looking for knowledge, he was looking for statues.
0:19:14 > 0:19:17And is that one of the chief reasons that people are congregating in Rome?
0:19:17 > 0:19:20It is. We have a number of artists in Rome,
0:19:20 > 0:19:22Allan Ramsay, for example,
0:19:22 > 0:19:26who also in his own way was interested not only in painting
0:19:26 > 0:19:29but in antiquities and going out to the countryside
0:19:29 > 0:19:30and studying those antiquities.
0:19:30 > 0:19:32But he did that in a very different spirit.
0:19:32 > 0:19:36When he went out to the countryside and the hinterland around Rome
0:19:36 > 0:19:40on repeated occasions during his many visits to Italy
0:19:40 > 0:19:43and many years he lived in Italy, he had one obsession, one place he
0:19:43 > 0:19:46kept going back to from almost his earliest visit,
0:19:46 > 0:19:49- and that was Horace's Villa. - But why Horace's Villa?
0:19:49 > 0:19:53Ramsay thought that there was an intimate connection between artistic
0:19:53 > 0:19:57expression and the environment inspiring that expression.
0:19:57 > 0:20:01And he thought if he could only find the true site of Horace's
0:20:01 > 0:20:05country farm, that he would find it equally inspirational.
0:20:11 > 0:20:14'The Roman poet left only a few tantalising
0:20:14 > 0:20:17'clues as to the location of his humble farm.'
0:20:17 > 0:20:19THUNDER RUMBLES
0:20:19 > 0:20:24'But it was enough to inspire Ramsay to spend years scouring
0:20:24 > 0:20:25'the Sabine Hills...'
0:20:25 > 0:20:27THUNDER RUMBLES
0:20:30 > 0:20:32'..this child of the Enlightenment,
0:20:32 > 0:20:37'friend to the greatest thinkers of his age, a painter of kings...
0:20:38 > 0:20:41'..searching for Arcadia.'
0:20:42 > 0:20:43'And he found it.'
0:20:50 > 0:20:52Unlike Gavin Hamilton,
0:20:52 > 0:20:57Ramsay wasn't searching for an imperial palace full of riches.
0:20:57 > 0:21:01No, he was hunting down something much more modest,
0:21:01 > 0:21:05the farmhouse of a great classical poet.
0:21:05 > 0:21:08And he reveals to us that the real treasure isn't what you dig up
0:21:08 > 0:21:11out of the ground, it's how you lead your life.
0:21:11 > 0:21:15And he chose to lead his life without being hemmed in by the narrow
0:21:15 > 0:21:19boundaries of geography, faith or language.
0:21:19 > 0:21:22He wanted to be out there on a European stage, chasing
0:21:22 > 0:21:28the ideas and the ideals upon which our civilisation has been built.
0:21:28 > 0:21:30THUNDER RUMBLES
0:21:35 > 0:21:37'There is not much to see amongst the ruins,
0:21:37 > 0:21:43'but even under the rain this place has an aura, a timelessness,
0:21:43 > 0:21:47'something of what captured the imaginations of both Ramsay
0:21:47 > 0:21:49'and Hamilton.'
0:21:50 > 0:21:52For these countrymen, the architectural
0:21:52 > 0:21:56remains of the classical age were more than just relics.
0:21:56 > 0:22:00They were a blueprint upon which you could build the future.
0:22:00 > 0:22:04And a third Scot was going to turn that blueprint into a reality.
0:22:10 > 0:22:15'Robert Adam was born in Edinburgh to wealth, privilege and tradition,
0:22:15 > 0:22:17'the son of an architect.
0:22:17 > 0:22:21'His father trained him in the family business.
0:22:21 > 0:22:22'But it would be his time in Italy
0:22:22 > 0:22:25'that would exert the greatest influence.
0:22:30 > 0:22:35'Rome, of course, offered spectacular architectural inspiration.
0:22:35 > 0:22:37'But like both Ramsay and Hamilton,
0:22:37 > 0:22:40'he also ventured out beyond the city walls...
0:22:41 > 0:22:44'..and into the Italian countryside.
0:22:49 > 0:22:51'Here, along the Appian Way,
0:22:51 > 0:22:55'he would encounter ancient mausoleums lining the route...
0:22:57 > 0:23:00'..Roman ruins bathed in golden light.'
0:23:08 > 0:23:12You shouldn't see these Scots in Italy in isolation,
0:23:12 > 0:23:13because Robert Adam,
0:23:13 > 0:23:16who liked to sign off his letters as "Bob the Roman",
0:23:16 > 0:23:19would have known Allan Ramsay, who he described as "Old Mumpy",
0:23:19 > 0:23:23and together they drew side by side in the Colosseum, for example.
0:23:23 > 0:23:26And I can just imagine them chatting away, saying,
0:23:26 > 0:23:29"Oh, you've got that beautifully there, Old Mumpy.
0:23:29 > 0:23:31"Why don't you capture the light coming up behind the Colosseum?
0:23:31 > 0:23:34"Isn't it fantastic to be here in Italy?"
0:23:34 > 0:23:37And every day, as they sketched and drew
0:23:37 > 0:23:41and talked to one another about the experiences they were having,
0:23:41 > 0:23:45their sense of what the classical age could do for their own work
0:23:45 > 0:23:46would have increased.
0:23:52 > 0:23:55'It is hard to know, really, how Adam felt as he sat
0:23:55 > 0:23:58'and sketched here in Italy.
0:23:58 > 0:24:01'But we ARE fortunate to know what he sketched...
0:24:03 > 0:24:08'..as those early drawings survive, not in Rome but back in London,
0:24:08 > 0:24:12'in the Adam Research Library of the Sloane Museum.'
0:24:15 > 0:24:17This is wonderful!
0:24:17 > 0:24:21This really is a great privilege, because artists are always extremely
0:24:21 > 0:24:25sensitive about who they show their sketches and their sketch books.
0:24:25 > 0:24:27I know that I am.
0:24:27 > 0:24:28I can feel my own enthusiasm
0:24:28 > 0:24:32when I first arrived in Italy in these sketches, because they're
0:24:32 > 0:24:38not masterpieces but they are honest and they are enthusiastic.
0:24:38 > 0:24:43And what's intriguing is that you also find the moments where
0:24:43 > 0:24:46Adam has perhaps noticed a little detail,
0:24:46 > 0:24:48an architectural fragment that's caught his eye.
0:24:48 > 0:24:53In this case, he's given us table legs with the little table on top.
0:24:53 > 0:24:58And Robert Adam wasn't just filling time creating all these watercolours.
0:24:58 > 0:25:01What he was creating was an extraordinary resource,
0:25:01 > 0:25:05a sort of encyclopaedic record of ancient architecture that was going
0:25:05 > 0:25:09to fuel the rest of his glittering career once he got to London.
0:25:13 > 0:25:16'Wandering about the Sloane Museum, you get
0:25:16 > 0:25:18'a flavour of the immense appetite
0:25:18 > 0:25:22'for neoclassical souvenirs and relics.
0:25:22 > 0:25:25'But it was often displayed within a certain, shall we say,
0:25:25 > 0:25:26'clutter.
0:25:27 > 0:25:32'Increasingly, aristocratic collectors sought a more appropriate
0:25:32 > 0:25:36'architectural setting, and who better than Adam to provide it?
0:25:36 > 0:25:39'He rapidly built up a wealthy
0:25:39 > 0:25:44'and influential clientele clamouring for his neoclassical designs.
0:25:44 > 0:25:47'But to see the Adam style at its most dazzling,
0:25:47 > 0:25:51'you have to come to Syon House,
0:25:51 > 0:25:53'not to marvel at the exterior architecture,
0:25:53 > 0:25:57'in which Adam had no hand, but to experience its interior.'
0:26:05 > 0:26:10So, this is one of the very first distillations of the Adam style.
0:26:10 > 0:26:12It's a very important interior.
0:26:12 > 0:26:15It really sort of sets the scene for what Adam's trying to
0:26:15 > 0:26:17do in the rest of his career.
0:26:17 > 0:26:21Although he's obviously stealing very clear reference points
0:26:21 > 0:26:25from Italy, this is a grand room, but it doesn't feel like it's pastiche.
0:26:25 > 0:26:27It doesn't feel over the top or just a kind of fakery.
0:26:27 > 0:26:29It's original, still.
0:26:29 > 0:26:32I think what was perhaps most important about what Adam is
0:26:32 > 0:26:34doing, as you say,
0:26:34 > 0:26:38he's not copying ancient Rome or even elements from ancient Greece.
0:26:38 > 0:26:42He's combining the discoveries he and others have made with
0:26:42 > 0:26:44contemporary Italy, contemporary France,
0:26:44 > 0:26:49with traditional classicism in England and making
0:26:49 > 0:26:54a wonderful fusion that really suits the times and suits his patrons.
0:26:54 > 0:26:57It's all very new and very exciting
0:26:57 > 0:26:59and at the same time also calming.
0:26:59 > 0:27:02I mean, all the colours are deliberately muted.
0:27:02 > 0:27:05It's very much an architectural palate cleanser
0:27:05 > 0:27:07before the glories to come.
0:27:14 > 0:27:15- Look at this.- Wonderful!
0:27:17 > 0:27:19What a transformation!
0:27:19 > 0:27:22You were supposed to take a great intake of breath and go,
0:27:22 > 0:27:24"Oh, my goodness!"
0:27:25 > 0:27:28But you're probably also meant to burst out with some glee,
0:27:28 > 0:27:30some laughter, because it's theatrical, exciting.
0:27:30 > 0:27:34It is about theatre, you're right. And again, it's about fun.
0:27:34 > 0:27:37And fun's always had a rather varied reception in Britain.
0:27:37 > 0:27:42Later generations castigate him for enjoying himself too much.
0:27:42 > 0:27:44Well, what's wrong with that?
0:27:44 > 0:27:47If it creates such marvellous interiors as this, I think
0:27:47 > 0:27:50it's to be applauded rather than reviled.
0:27:54 > 0:27:57'But don't confuse wit for levity.
0:27:57 > 0:28:01'Make no mistake, Adam took his work VERY seriously.
0:28:01 > 0:28:03'He not only chose where the furniture went
0:28:03 > 0:28:06'but designed every piece.
0:28:06 > 0:28:10'Such attention to his "brand" saw him become the dominant architect
0:28:10 > 0:28:14'not just in Britain or in Europe but on the world stage.'
0:28:20 > 0:28:24I'm desperate to try and draw some of Adam's splendour,
0:28:24 > 0:28:27but I just don't know where to start. There's so much of it.
0:28:27 > 0:28:30And it makes you think, what would John Knox have thought of all
0:28:30 > 0:28:34this very un-Presbyterian outburst of glee?
0:28:34 > 0:28:37I mean, Adam has taken ancient Rome as his template,
0:28:37 > 0:28:39but he's made it his own.
0:28:39 > 0:28:41I mean, here you've got the Pantheon, the Arch of Titus,
0:28:41 > 0:28:44you've got the Palace of the Domus Aurelius.
0:28:44 > 0:28:47Nero himself would have felt at home.
0:28:51 > 0:28:55'With all this sumptuous opulence, it may surprise you to hear that,
0:28:55 > 0:29:00'for me, his most affecting work is not about grandeur
0:29:00 > 0:29:01'but restraint.
0:29:06 > 0:29:09'Here, in Calton Hill cemetery in Edinburgh, Adam was
0:29:09 > 0:29:14'commissioned to design the mausoleum for the philosopher David Hume.
0:29:15 > 0:29:18'And to commemorate this great man of letters,
0:29:18 > 0:29:22'Adam didn't dream up an ostentatious memorial.
0:29:22 > 0:29:25'Instead, he designed a simple cylinder.'
0:29:27 > 0:29:30It does look like the kind of funerary monument that you
0:29:30 > 0:29:32might find on the Appian Way.
0:29:34 > 0:29:38And I know you think this looks unremarkable, but, for me,
0:29:38 > 0:29:41it's an idea that's been realised in stone.
0:29:41 > 0:29:46It represent the clarity and the precision of David Hume's writing.
0:29:46 > 0:29:50But it's also full of passion and sensory intensity.
0:30:01 > 0:30:06It seems so unprepossessing, but you've got to go inside.
0:30:06 > 0:30:08GATE CREAKS
0:30:13 > 0:30:16And I've learnt my lesson this time, because when you look upwards,
0:30:16 > 0:30:18it's not frescoes that you see,
0:30:18 > 0:30:21it's the sky!
0:30:21 > 0:30:26I mean, Adam was the great interior stylist to the stars.
0:30:26 > 0:30:31He designed living rooms and dining saloons for oligarchs.
0:30:31 > 0:30:33But he wasn't just about froth.
0:30:33 > 0:30:38And when you're in here, you feel the things that were important to people
0:30:38 > 0:30:44like Ramsay and Hume, that you should believe only in what you can see...
0:30:47 > 0:30:51..you should find beauty in simple truth.
0:30:53 > 0:30:56This is not just a tomb.
0:30:56 > 0:30:59It's Robert Adam's altar to empiricism,
0:30:59 > 0:31:02an altar to the Enlightenment.
0:31:02 > 0:31:04GATE CREAKS OPEN
0:31:08 > 0:31:11'You also get the sense that this might have been what Ramsay
0:31:11 > 0:31:15'was searching for at Horace's Villa,
0:31:15 > 0:31:17'a place of quiet contemplation,
0:31:17 > 0:31:20'even here in the bustle of Edinburgh.'
0:31:20 > 0:31:23VEHICLE HORNS BLARE
0:31:23 > 0:31:26'While you can choose to ignore the noise,
0:31:26 > 0:31:29'it's very difficult to block out another iconic feature
0:31:29 > 0:31:31'of Edinburgh's skyline...
0:31:34 > 0:31:36'..another structure dedicated to
0:31:36 > 0:31:39'the power of the word in Scottish culture.
0:31:39 > 0:31:42'But the Scott Monument is far from understatement...
0:31:44 > 0:31:47'..a metaphor for all the twists, flourishes
0:31:47 > 0:31:52'and melodrama that characterise Walter Scott's writing.
0:31:52 > 0:31:54'He brought romanticism to Scotland,
0:31:54 > 0:31:58'with bestselling tales of warriors, princes and heroes.
0:31:59 > 0:32:02'These two structures provide a compelling
0:32:02 > 0:32:07'symbol of the opposing forces that were set to dominate Scottish art...
0:32:07 > 0:32:11'reason on the one side and romance on the other.'
0:32:12 > 0:32:14How convenient.
0:32:14 > 0:32:16But it's too convenient.
0:32:17 > 0:32:21What I see when I look out over this magnificent cityscape,
0:32:21 > 0:32:23it's not order, but it's something
0:32:23 > 0:32:27much more provocative, much more dynamic.
0:32:27 > 0:32:30This wasn't a period that heralded a neat
0:32:30 > 0:32:32division between the artists of the Enlightenment,
0:32:32 > 0:32:35who dealt in truth, and that new generation who were more
0:32:35 > 0:32:39interested in the mystery and the magic of romanticism.
0:32:39 > 0:32:43These weren't just forces that raged between artists,
0:32:43 > 0:32:46but they could coexist simultaneously within them,
0:32:46 > 0:32:49sometimes to stunning effect, and there was one artist who
0:32:49 > 0:32:52encapsulated this better than any other.
0:32:55 > 0:32:59'Henry Raeburn, like Ramsay 20 years before him,
0:32:59 > 0:33:04'spent time in Italy and embarked on a career as a portrait artist.
0:33:04 > 0:33:06'But there the similarities end.
0:33:10 > 0:33:14'While Ramsay had decided to take London by storm,
0:33:14 > 0:33:17'Raeburn chose instead to conquer the Scottish art
0:33:17 > 0:33:22'establishment from his studio right here in Edinburgh.'
0:33:30 > 0:33:36Raeburn's ghost comes pouring at me through these enormous windows,
0:33:36 > 0:33:41because this was the view that Raeburn would have contemplated
0:33:41 > 0:33:43every morning.
0:33:43 > 0:33:46Ironically, one of the first things that he would have done is to
0:33:46 > 0:33:51obscure it by extracting a whole complex series of shutters
0:33:51 > 0:33:57and blinds in order to create an atmosphere in which drama
0:33:57 > 0:33:59and contrast could really thrive,
0:33:59 > 0:34:03because that's what mattered to him in his paintings.
0:34:03 > 0:34:08And by changing the lighting effects on his subject, he could really
0:34:08 > 0:34:12maximise the brooding intensity of the painting he was about to create.
0:34:15 > 0:34:20'On Raeburn's canvases, his subjects were cast in a romantic light...
0:34:21 > 0:34:26'..most appropriately in his portraits of Sir Walter Scott,
0:34:26 > 0:34:30'depicted here like a hero straight from one of his novels.
0:34:37 > 0:34:42'But there is one painting that I'm drawn to above all others,
0:34:42 > 0:34:47'a work I first encountered as a young and impressionable boy,
0:34:47 > 0:34:52'the most unapologetically iconic portrait in Scottish history.'
0:34:54 > 0:34:56The MacNab.
0:34:56 > 0:35:01This is one of the images that inspired me to paint as a child.
0:35:01 > 0:35:05My father would often give me tasks.
0:35:05 > 0:35:10He'd give me images to draw and learn from, and he knew that this
0:35:10 > 0:35:13kind of dramatic icon would excite my imagination.
0:35:13 > 0:35:16It's got swords, it's got drama, it's got clouds,
0:35:16 > 0:35:20it's got an incredible Highland chieftain.
0:35:20 > 0:35:24And even as a child, it wasn't just the theatricality of the subject
0:35:24 > 0:35:29that got me, it was the theatrical way that Raeburn used the paint.
0:35:29 > 0:35:32His whole approach to the canvas was instinctive.
0:35:32 > 0:35:35Raeburn wouldn't fret, he wouldn't overanalyse.
0:35:35 > 0:35:39Apparently, he'd actually run at the canvas from across the studio.
0:35:39 > 0:35:40You've got to love the guy!
0:35:43 > 0:35:47'Despite the swagger, Raeburn was as committed to Enlightenment
0:35:47 > 0:35:50'principles as his predecessor, Allan Ramsay.
0:35:50 > 0:35:55'In his paintings of key intellectual figures of the day, he observes
0:35:55 > 0:35:58'and reveals the individual characters
0:35:58 > 0:36:01'that lie behind their reputations.
0:36:01 > 0:36:03'And if you look closely at The MacNab,
0:36:03 > 0:36:07'the swashbuckling bravado begins to give up a few secrets.'
0:36:09 > 0:36:12In actual fact, when this image was completed,
0:36:12 > 0:36:18the mighty MacNab was notorious as a drunkard, a womaniser who'd fathered
0:36:18 > 0:36:2432 children and had gambled away the MacNab family fortune and estate.
0:36:24 > 0:36:29And when you gaze into his eyes, you find the manic look
0:36:29 > 0:36:33of a sozzled charlatan on the brink of being exposed.
0:36:33 > 0:36:36And in the fleeting passage of Raeburn's oh, so brutal
0:36:36 > 0:36:39brushstrokes, he pins him down.
0:36:45 > 0:36:49'Raeburn's portraits captured a world of privilege with bravura
0:36:49 > 0:36:50'and brilliance.
0:36:50 > 0:36:52'But ultimately,
0:36:52 > 0:36:56'this was hardly representative of the lives most people endured.
0:36:56 > 0:36:59'It would take a more precise brush
0:36:59 > 0:37:02'to paint Scotland with a common touch.'
0:37:03 > 0:37:06David Wilkie was born the son of a minister
0:37:06 > 0:37:08in the parish of Cults in Fife.
0:37:13 > 0:37:16His early paintings were rooted in the customs
0:37:16 > 0:37:20and the provincial habits of village life and he had the habit
0:37:20 > 0:37:24of visiting local fairs and markets to sketch the people around him.
0:37:27 > 0:37:30Like Wilkie, I go out and sketch all the time
0:37:30 > 0:37:35and it's great to train your hand to almost draw automatically,
0:37:35 > 0:37:38for your eyes to be looking at the subject and your hands
0:37:38 > 0:37:41just tracing the movement because you're not thinking too hard,
0:37:41 > 0:37:46you're just recording exactly what is happening in front of your eyes.
0:37:48 > 0:37:51And Wilkie, the precocious young 19-year-old,
0:37:51 > 0:37:54when he took all those sketches back to his studio
0:37:54 > 0:37:56and created his finished paintings, he would present
0:37:56 > 0:38:00life in a rural community as a kind of soap opera -
0:38:00 > 0:38:04a world of daily humour, tribulations
0:38:04 > 0:38:06and the occasional urinating dog.
0:38:17 > 0:38:19It might not look like social documentary to you,
0:38:19 > 0:38:22but to an audience unused to seeing the humble British peasant
0:38:22 > 0:38:27immortalised on canvas, this was vicariously thrilling.
0:38:30 > 0:38:34And yet, Wilkie would be increasingly unsettled that his audience
0:38:34 > 0:38:38loved the humour but seemed to ignore his implicit message
0:38:38 > 0:38:42that everyone was worthy of dignity and respect.
0:38:46 > 0:38:51So in 1815, he decided to abandon his Scottish provincial work
0:38:51 > 0:38:55and focus on a very serious English crisis
0:38:55 > 0:38:58provoked by a change in English law.
0:39:00 > 0:39:02Distraining For Rent shows
0:39:02 > 0:39:05a ruined tenant farmer confronted by bailiffs.
0:39:05 > 0:39:10They are here to seize his possessions and his dignity.
0:39:11 > 0:39:14This image packed a real documentary punch
0:39:14 > 0:39:17when it was first revealed.
0:39:17 > 0:39:21And the usual landed ladies and gentry, who would turn to Wilkie
0:39:21 > 0:39:26for a jolly point of conversation, were caught a bit short.
0:39:26 > 0:39:29I mean, an image that seemed to attack the morality
0:39:29 > 0:39:32of the nation's landlords, that was bad form.
0:39:32 > 0:39:35In this painting, there is no clear reason for the catastrophe,
0:39:35 > 0:39:40there's no sense that this man is a drunkard or that he is lazy.
0:39:40 > 0:39:44This man and his family just appeared to be victims.
0:39:44 > 0:39:49For Wilkie, what was also important is that it's a domestic epic.
0:39:49 > 0:39:51If you look at all these characters,
0:39:51 > 0:39:55they are arranged across the stage in one line, like a classical frieze.
0:39:57 > 0:40:01If you dressed them up in togas, you could be forgiven for mistaking
0:40:01 > 0:40:04this for a painting by Gavin Hamilton.
0:40:08 > 0:40:11Increasingly, that's what came to intrigue Wilkie -
0:40:11 > 0:40:17how to give ordinary life the same consideration as you might
0:40:17 > 0:40:19a grand history painting.
0:40:22 > 0:40:26Wilkie's focus upon an English scene brought him the appreciation
0:40:26 > 0:40:28and understanding that he craved.
0:40:31 > 0:40:35And saw him become the toast of London society.
0:40:35 > 0:40:39But this only highlighted a persistent anxiety
0:40:39 > 0:40:42for Scottish artists, how to work within the Union
0:40:42 > 0:40:45without your own sense of nationality being overwhelmed.
0:40:47 > 0:40:49Restless with his artistic identity,
0:40:49 > 0:40:53Wilkie accepted a commission from the Duke of Wellington himself,
0:40:53 > 0:40:55which he hoped would bring some resolution.
0:40:55 > 0:40:58This was going to be another bustling street scene,
0:40:58 > 0:41:01but the key players in this performance weren't going
0:41:01 > 0:41:05to be rustic peasants, they were going to be war veterans.
0:41:13 > 0:41:17Wilkie found himself coming down to sketch on the streets of Chelsea.
0:41:19 > 0:41:20Over the next six years,
0:41:20 > 0:41:25he would set to work on his most ambitious subject matter -
0:41:25 > 0:41:26war.
0:41:28 > 0:41:31Chelsea Pensioners Reading The Waterloo Dispatch
0:41:31 > 0:41:33isn't a provincial scene, it is
0:41:33 > 0:41:38a coming together of multiple identities. It's the celebration
0:41:38 > 0:41:40of a national achievement,
0:41:40 > 0:41:43not English, not Scottish, but British.
0:41:51 > 0:41:55But reconciling Wilkie's ambition to be a British painter
0:41:55 > 0:41:58of modern history with the public's perception of him,
0:41:58 > 0:42:01as a Scots illustrator of provincial comedies,
0:42:01 > 0:42:04was going to be a battle he could never win.
0:42:04 > 0:42:06Artists are by nature sensitive people
0:42:06 > 0:42:09and he endured huge mental turmoil.
0:42:09 > 0:42:11And only two years
0:42:11 > 0:42:14after completing this painting, he had a nervous breakdown.
0:42:20 > 0:42:23It would not, however, be the end of Wilkie.
0:42:23 > 0:42:27As part of his recovery, he headed to the Continent.
0:42:27 > 0:42:29Some years after Raeburn and Ramsay,
0:42:29 > 0:42:33but it would have just the same transformative effect upon his art.
0:42:41 > 0:42:46To see this, I'm sadly not returning to Rome but to the dark stores
0:42:46 > 0:42:51of the National Galleries in an unassuming suburb of Edinburgh.
0:42:52 > 0:42:58We began with the word, with the Word of God and the words of John Knox.
0:42:58 > 0:43:04And after almost 300 years, we're back with John Knox
0:43:04 > 0:43:06and his verbals all over again.
0:43:06 > 0:43:11Now Wilkie had already shown that paintings have the power
0:43:11 > 0:43:14to provoke, the power to inspire.
0:43:14 > 0:43:16Even ones as small as this.
0:43:16 > 0:43:20It must have been no small irony to him that in the 19th century,
0:43:20 > 0:43:25the son of a Presbyterian minister was free to be an artist,
0:43:25 > 0:43:30free to depict John Knox, that very nemesis of all creativity,
0:43:30 > 0:43:34mid-rant in a hugely theatrical painting.
0:43:34 > 0:43:36When I first saw this, I thought,
0:43:36 > 0:43:39"There can be few images that can depict a moment upon which
0:43:39 > 0:43:43"so much hinged in the history of Scottish art."
0:43:43 > 0:43:45That was until I saw this.
0:43:57 > 0:44:01What's extraordinary about this enormous canvas is that Wilkie
0:44:01 > 0:44:05has placed John Knox standing at the centre of this huge
0:44:05 > 0:44:09unfinished composition as if he were Jesus Christ himself
0:44:09 > 0:44:12presiding over The Last Supper. You get the feeling
0:44:12 > 0:44:15that Wilkie, having travelled all across Europe
0:44:15 > 0:44:20and been exposed to the most wonderful treasures of Catholic art,
0:44:20 > 0:44:23has come back to Britain determined to create
0:44:23 > 0:44:27an equally confident future for the art of his Protestant homeland.
0:44:28 > 0:44:31You feel that Wilkie is painting out his own credo,
0:44:31 > 0:44:35his own artistic faith because he wouldn't be told how
0:44:35 > 0:44:37to paint by anyone, not the critics,
0:44:37 > 0:44:40not the visitors at the Royal Academy.
0:44:40 > 0:44:43"I will do it my own way, thank you very much, Mr Knox."
0:44:47 > 0:44:52Wilkie epitomises just how far we have come.
0:44:52 > 0:44:55Scottish artists had stepped confidently out of the shadows
0:44:55 > 0:45:00and now were feted at the Royal Academy and favoured by kings.
0:45:07 > 0:45:09However, the nation was still struggling
0:45:09 > 0:45:13to assert its identity within the Union.
0:45:13 > 0:45:15It would not be paintings of the privileged few
0:45:15 > 0:45:19or ordinary folk that would offer a resolution.
0:45:20 > 0:45:22It would be the landscape itself.
0:45:28 > 0:45:32Scottish landscape painting had its origins in interior decoration
0:45:32 > 0:45:36in the works of men like James Norie
0:45:36 > 0:45:38who ran a family business
0:45:38 > 0:45:41ornamenting grand country houses with painted parodies
0:45:41 > 0:45:44of the Italian campagna.
0:45:47 > 0:45:52The concepts of moral, spiritual and civic order were vital
0:45:52 > 0:45:55to the Enlightenment and they had found expression
0:45:55 > 0:45:57in the ideal landscape.
0:45:58 > 0:46:03Safe, picturesque, not a loch or a glen to be seen.
0:46:09 > 0:46:11I love to paint landscapes,
0:46:11 > 0:46:17but there's always a moment when the subject reveals its ability
0:46:17 > 0:46:19to intimidate and threaten.
0:46:30 > 0:46:33The implicit untamed savagery of the Scottish wilderness
0:46:33 > 0:46:37had repelled the classical mindset,
0:46:37 > 0:46:41but increasingly the notion that the landscape could represent
0:46:41 > 0:46:42something dangerous,
0:46:42 > 0:46:48uncontrolled and sublime appealed to the 19th-century imagination.
0:46:49 > 0:46:52And one imagination in particular.
0:46:55 > 0:46:59Queen Victoria's fascination with the romance of Scotland was first
0:46:59 > 0:47:01aroused by the novels of Sir Walter Scott.
0:47:03 > 0:47:07And after visiting the Highlands in 1842, she was besotted.
0:47:12 > 0:47:15Where the Queen led, the masses followed.
0:47:15 > 0:47:19Scotland's glens were soon flooded with tourists
0:47:19 > 0:47:22and landlords were swift to displace the local population
0:47:22 > 0:47:25to make way for their Highland fantasies.
0:47:27 > 0:47:31Captured here by the Queen's favourite artist, Edwin Landseer.
0:47:33 > 0:47:38Landseer was a Londoner by birth, but established a reputation
0:47:38 > 0:47:41for capturing the stirring majesty of the Scottish landscape.
0:47:43 > 0:47:46And the cult of the Highlands is encapsulated by one
0:47:46 > 0:47:48painting of his in particular.
0:47:50 > 0:47:53Excuse me, can you tell me where I'll find the Monarch of the Glen?
0:47:53 > 0:47:56This painting is not to be found in the royal collection,
0:47:56 > 0:47:59or a gallery, but a museum.
0:48:00 > 0:48:05Although it is proving a little tough to find. Even here.
0:48:11 > 0:48:14Victorian artists always used to worry about where their work
0:48:14 > 0:48:16would be positioned at the Royal Academy.
0:48:16 > 0:48:19Would they be hung in a side gallery,
0:48:19 > 0:48:22or maybe above a doorway into a refreshment room?
0:48:22 > 0:48:26It was a way that the institution had of signalling that, although the work
0:48:26 > 0:48:31was accepted into the exhibition, it was perhaps not quite up to standard.
0:48:31 > 0:48:35So, where do I find one of the most iconic pieces of Scottish art,
0:48:35 > 0:48:39but above a doorway at the end of a corridor?
0:48:39 > 0:48:41An awkward member of the family.
0:48:43 > 0:48:44Does it look familiar?
0:48:44 > 0:48:48This image has spawned countless imitations,
0:48:48 > 0:48:51prints and engravings, advertisements, whisky labels,
0:48:51 > 0:48:56beer mats, biscuit tins, and as if ubiquity wasn't crime enough,
0:48:56 > 0:49:00any footnote to this painting will tell you that
0:49:00 > 0:49:03the stag and stag hunting were key culprits
0:49:03 > 0:49:05in the tragedy of the Highland Clearances.
0:49:05 > 0:49:11It's symbolic of a culture that prioritises rich men's sports
0:49:11 > 0:49:13over poor men's lives.
0:49:14 > 0:49:18We feel so guilty about this painting.
0:49:18 > 0:49:20People absolutely loathe it.
0:49:20 > 0:49:25But, when I look at the Monarch of the Glen, what do I see?
0:49:25 > 0:49:28I see a brilliantly executed painting.
0:49:28 > 0:49:32I see a wonderful piece of Victoriana, a blockbuster,
0:49:32 > 0:49:36the kind of instantly recognisable imagery that any other country
0:49:36 > 0:49:38in the world would just kill for.
0:49:40 > 0:49:45Many people interpret this image as an example of cultural colonialism.
0:49:47 > 0:49:50A myth imposed by an Englishman
0:49:50 > 0:49:54intended to obscure a more authentic national identity.
0:49:55 > 0:49:57But we're not the victims here.
0:49:57 > 0:50:00Scots have always been complicit in exploiting a selective
0:50:00 > 0:50:06kind of imagery, of heroism, of grandeur, and one of the most
0:50:06 > 0:50:10dramatic landscape painters of the age was, in fact, a native.
0:50:12 > 0:50:14It's easy to sneer at Horatio McCulloch.
0:50:14 > 0:50:19He didn't travel to Italy to commune with our ancient, classical heritage.
0:50:19 > 0:50:24He began, like so many Scottish landscape painters, as a decorator.
0:50:30 > 0:50:33He started out painting snuff boxes and tea caddies.
0:50:35 > 0:50:37Examples of his handiwork are rare.
0:50:49 > 0:50:51Look at that. Glowing.
0:50:53 > 0:50:56When I say to you "tea chest", or "tea caddy",
0:50:56 > 0:50:59you probably just think it's a piece of ornament - nothing really
0:50:59 > 0:51:04to threaten the English Breakfast, but this is a treasure chest.
0:51:04 > 0:51:11And although there is all the stuff of classical lyricism in here,
0:51:11 > 0:51:13a gilded land of fantasy,
0:51:13 > 0:51:19already Horatio McCulloch is pushing at the borders of his frame.
0:51:19 > 0:51:25And he's created something in which there is a menace in these woods.
0:51:25 > 0:51:29There's a glowering sense of romanticism.
0:51:29 > 0:51:32And therein lies the hint that this man is going to become
0:51:32 > 0:51:36the purveyor of enormous Highland landscapes.
0:51:40 > 0:51:43McCulloch didn't stick to painting tea caddies for long.
0:51:43 > 0:51:46Instead, he headed out into the big country.
0:51:53 > 0:51:55And this particular painting has proved
0:51:55 > 0:51:59so popular that it's been on public view virtually without interruption
0:51:59 > 0:52:04since the day that it was purchased by Glasgow Municipal Council in 1901.
0:52:05 > 0:52:09Glencoe still is Scotland's Monument Valley.
0:52:09 > 0:52:14This place and this painting are the very essence of romanticism.
0:52:16 > 0:52:20Sometimes McCulloch's paintings can feel a bit neat in reproduction
0:52:20 > 0:52:24but, when you meet them in the flesh, you realise that the canvas is
0:52:24 > 0:52:28covered in texture and expressive, gestural brushstrokes.
0:52:28 > 0:52:31McCulloch was a harum-scarum kind of character.
0:52:31 > 0:52:35He was a real Boy's Own Adventure type, and the way that he
0:52:35 > 0:52:39treats the paint reveals the thrill he gets from the subject.
0:52:53 > 0:52:57McCulloch's reputation has become as mythical as his paintings.
0:52:57 > 0:53:00A legendary figure trekking up the mountains,
0:53:00 > 0:53:02doggedly battling the elements
0:53:02 > 0:53:05to capture the awesome power of the surroundings.
0:53:17 > 0:53:21But the mythology that surrounds McCulloch means
0:53:21 > 0:53:24that getting to the truth about him is equally problematic.
0:53:24 > 0:53:26Because he didn't scale these precipices with a canvas
0:53:26 > 0:53:31on his back, in order to create his magnificent paintings.
0:53:31 > 0:53:35They were, for the most part, completed entirely in his studio.
0:53:36 > 0:53:38But what he did do was that,
0:53:38 > 0:53:41during annual summer painting trips in Scotland,
0:53:41 > 0:53:46he would come to such points and he would create the most exquisite,
0:53:46 > 0:53:51intuitive and expressive studies of the landscape.
0:53:52 > 0:53:55And when you're confronted by this mighty subject matter,
0:53:55 > 0:53:58you realise that McCulloch wasn't making it up.
0:54:00 > 0:54:02Scotland gives you this.
0:54:07 > 0:54:11McCulloch's work has often been regarded as overblown or
0:54:11 > 0:54:16fraudulent and yet, standing here, it appears almost photorealistic.
0:54:20 > 0:54:23And it finds an echo in the work of contemporary photographer
0:54:23 > 0:54:24David Eustace.
0:54:27 > 0:54:29Who, like McCulloch 200 years before him,
0:54:29 > 0:54:32has found rich inspiration in the Highlands.
0:54:41 > 0:54:43What do you find particularly difficult
0:54:43 > 0:54:45about photographing the Highlands?
0:54:45 > 0:54:48The one thing you can't do is, you can't compete with nature.
0:54:48 > 0:54:50You come here. We're looking at this, it's stunning.
0:54:50 > 0:54:53And I go, "OK, I'm going to make a photograph of this."
0:54:53 > 0:54:57So you make it 5' x 4', and you go, "That's OK."
0:54:57 > 0:55:00But, for me, when I made the Highland Heart portfolio,
0:55:00 > 0:55:03what I wanted to get from the landscape here
0:55:03 > 0:55:05was the vastness of this, was this,
0:55:05 > 0:55:07but what I took from it was a delicacy.
0:55:07 > 0:55:10So, from now on, I will possibly make a lot smaller prints.
0:55:10 > 0:55:13- And I think that's important. - That's actually the truth.
0:55:13 > 0:55:16It actually prefer McCulloch's sketches of the landscape
0:55:16 > 0:55:19to his large portraits. And they're only so big.
0:55:19 > 0:55:22And he manages to condense that power into a delicate format.
0:55:22 > 0:55:24- It makes you want to look into it.- Yes.
0:55:24 > 0:55:28That, to me, is how my mind's going which is maybe just coincidental
0:55:28 > 0:55:32again, but I love that idea of this delicacy, this fragility,
0:55:32 > 0:55:34that you go, "I'm going to actually be lost in this."
0:55:38 > 0:55:40McCulloch was a pioneer,
0:55:40 > 0:55:44working on these small sketches directly from his subject, he managed
0:55:44 > 0:55:48to create paintings that captured the majesty of this landscape.
0:55:52 > 0:55:56But, in his larger canvases, there remains one element that is
0:55:56 > 0:55:58conspicuously and consistently absent -
0:55:59 > 0:56:01people.
0:56:05 > 0:56:09The uneasy shadow of the Highland Clearances has led many
0:56:09 > 0:56:13contemporary eyes to view McCulloch's grand style with suspicion.
0:56:14 > 0:56:16But that's what Highlandism does.
0:56:16 > 0:56:20It subjects Scotland to the drama filter.
0:56:20 > 0:56:27It suppresses all signs of modernity and it simply wipes out the people.
0:56:27 > 0:56:29And, in the place of individuals,
0:56:29 > 0:56:32it's the landscape itself that seems to become a person...
0:56:34 > 0:56:39..projecting human attributes of honour, dignity
0:56:39 > 0:56:41and endurance.
0:56:47 > 0:56:50Horatio McCulloch is remembered today as a painter
0:56:50 > 0:56:54of the romantic fantasy and yet, his sketches reveal
0:56:54 > 0:56:58that his work was entirely grounded in direct observation.
0:57:00 > 0:57:02McCulloch embodies the tensions
0:57:02 > 0:57:06and contradictions that we have encountered time and time again.
0:57:07 > 0:57:12This was a period when artists from Scotland travelled all across
0:57:12 > 0:57:16the continent in order to encounter the wonders of European art history.
0:57:16 > 0:57:21And it's almost as if all that travelling, all that studying,
0:57:21 > 0:57:23was about bringing us to this point,
0:57:23 > 0:57:26when an artist could be born in Scotland,
0:57:26 > 0:57:28when he could study in Scotland
0:57:28 > 0:57:32and he could spend his career creating paintings
0:57:32 > 0:57:36that rooted the Scottish identity in the wonders of our landscape.
0:57:36 > 0:57:42And these were the paintings that cemented a powerful and enduring
0:57:42 > 0:57:45image of Scotland in the imagination of the world.
0:57:52 > 0:57:55However, as the 19th century drew to a close,
0:57:55 > 0:58:00majestic landscapes seemed unbecoming of an emerging industrial nation.
0:58:06 > 0:58:09Artists from Scotland would reject the principles of romanticism
0:58:09 > 0:58:13and embrace a whole new way of painting.