Aberdeen Art Gallery has helped pave the way for the first exhibition exclusively focussed on the work of the acclaimed Glasgow Boys to be held outside of the UK in more than a century.
A total of 14 works will be loaned from the gallery to the Drents Museum in Assen, the Netherlands, as part of a major new retrospective show.
It will feature Scottish landscapes, portraits and decorative paintings by ten artists – James Guthrie, Edward Walton, Joseph Crawhall, James Paterson, Sir John Lavery, William York MacGregor, George Henry, Edward Hornel, Arthur Melville and William Kennedy.
The Tennis Party, a famous painting of the urban middle-classes at play by Sir John Lavery, is one of the works being shipped from Aberdeen next month.
Several Scottish galleries will be contributing to the exhibition, which will feature a total of 80 paintings and 40 works on paper, focusing on the late 19th century period, when the group of young Glasgow-linked painters influenced artists across the world.
The Drents Museum is one of a number of prestigious venues which will provide temporary homes to some of Aberdeen Art Gallery’s prized collection while the gallery is closed as part of a £30million redevelopment project.
Christine Rew, Aberdeen Art Gallery and Museums manager, said: “We were delighted to be asked to lend to this important exhibition of work by the Glasgow Boys.
“As the art gallery is closed for redevelopment we are able to send some of our best loved paintings, including Going to School by Jules Bastien-Lepage and To Pastures New by Sir James Guthrie, where they will be seen for the first time by many new visitors.”
The Dutch exhibition is the first in the series “Art Around 1900 in International Perspective” and will be accompanied by a book which explores for the first time how the presence of The Hague School in Scotland influenced the Glasgow Boys.
Series director Annabelle Birnie said: “The exhibition will enhance and enrich the museum’s focus on its own collection of art around 1900, in which comparable realistic, impressionistic and symbolist works are represented.”
City council deputy leader Marie Boulton said: “During Aberdeen Art Gallery’s closure period the city’s collections will feature in a number of venues in the city and Aberdeenshire, and will travel nationally and internationally.
“It is clear how highly the city’s collection is regarded that pieces are in constant demand to be on show by prestigious galleries here and abroad.”
