FRANCIS CAMPBELL BOILEAU CADELL R.S.A., R.S.W. (SCOTTISH 1883-1937)

FRANCIS CAMPBELL BOILEAU CADELL R.S.A., R.S.W. (SCOTTISH 1883-1937)
INTERIOR - SANTA MARIA DELLA SALUTE, VENICE
Signed and indistinctly dated '10, oil on canvas
117cm x 91cm (46in x 36in)
Acquired from the Artist by Sir Patrick Ford (1880-1945)Lyon & Turnbull, Edinburgh, Fine Paintings, 2 June 2011, lot 91 and thence by descent to the present ownerExhibited: Possibly The Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh, Exhibition of Pictures of Venice &c.; by Mr F. C. B. Cadell, 16 - 26 November 1910, no.15 or no.38 (both 'Interior Santa Maria della Salute, Venice' and not for sale)Possibly Royal Glasgow Institute, Annual Exhibition, 1931, no.484 ('Sta Maria della Salute - Venice', £300) Possibly Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, Annual Exhibition, 1932, no.285 ('Santa Maria della Salute, Venice')Possibly National Gallery of Scotland, F. C. B. Cadell 1883-1937, April 1942, no.176 ('Church Interior, 1910' lent by Sir Patrick J. Ford, Bart.) and tour to Glasgow Art Gallery, June 1942, no.87 ('Church Interior, 1910' lent by Sir Patrick J. Ford, Bart.)Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, Festival Exhibition: S. J. Peploe R.S.A., F. C. B. Cadell R.S.A. and Leslie Hunter, 1949, no.107 (as ‘Church Interior’ and lent by the Trustees of the late Sir Patrick Ford, Bt., H.R.S.A.)City Art Centre, City of Edinburgh Museums & Galleries, long-loan 2015 - 2025 City Art Centre, Edinburgh, Scottish Art: People, Places, Ideas, May – September 2015City Art Centre, Edinburgh, Hidden Gems, October 2017 – May 2018City Art Centre, Edinburgh, The Italian Connection, September 2019 – August 2020Literature: Tom Hewlett, Cadell: The Life and Works of a Scottish Colourist 1883-1937, The Portland Gallery and Bourne Fine Art, London and Edinburgh,1988, p. 28, ill.p.29, pl.17.Tom Hewlett and Duncan Macmillan, F. C. B. Cadell: The Life and Works of a Scottish Colourist 1883-1937, Lund Humphries, Farnham, 2011, p.40, ill p.42, pl.31.
Interior - Santa Maria della Salute, Venice is one of the most significant paintings to have resulted from the Scottish Colourist F. C. B. Cadell’s breakthrough trip to the Italian city in 1910. Financed by a cheque for £150 from his schoolfriend Patrick Ford, the beauty and splendour of Venice, whether experienced outside along its canals or within its piazzas, or inside its magnificent churches and palaces, had an immediate and dramatic effect upon Cadell’s practice. Built to commemorate Venice’s deliverance from the plague and consecrated in 1687, the ‘Basilica della Salute’ is one of the city’s most important architectural landmarks and stands at the entrance to the Grand Canal. For an artist with a pronounced interest in the genre of the interior, its soaring arches and columns, two domes, statuary, side chapels, altars, chandeliers and patterned marble floor provided rich subject matter. In the present painting a sense of scale is created by contrasting the seated and standing figures with their imposing surroundings. A swirl of brushstrokes suggests the highly-ornate flooring and particular attention is paid to highlights of red and gold in the décor, as the eye is lifted ever upwards to admire the capitals of the columns. Natural light flooding in from tiers of windows gleams upon stonework and metalwork, creating an atmosphere at once peaceful and impressive.Such was the attraction that Santa Maria della Salute had for Cadell that he also painted a small oil of its interior and one of its exterior, on modestly-sized boards which would have been easy to transport and use whilst working ‘en plein air’; the latter was one of three Venetian works presented to the National Galleries of Scotland in 2014 in Ford’s honour. In contrast, the canvas of the present work measures 46 x 36”, an imposing scale to match that of its subject and one that would have been created as a fully contemplated studio painting.This trio of works were three of the six that Ford received in return for his patronage, as recorded in the Register of Pictures Cadell compiled between 1907 and 1930, listing sales and gifts of works as well as his annual total income (on loan from a private collection to the National Galleries of Scotland). Interior – Santa Maria della Salute appears as ‘Oil (large)’, differentiated from ‘Interior of the Salute’ an ‘Oil (small)’. In the absence of contemporary illustrations, this had led to some confusion over the present work’s exhibition history though given its scale and significance it is more likely to have been selected for display than its diminutive sibling. Both are believed to have been included in Cadell’s solo show, Exhibition of Pictures of Venice, & c., mounted at The Scottish Gallery in Edinburgh in November 1910.Ford continued his generous support of Cadell’s career and appears frequently in the Register of Pictures. Moreover, he was the financial underwriter of the Society of Eight, the exhibiting society of which Cadell was a co-founder in 1912 and whose annual exhibitions provided the most significant and sustained showcase of the artist’s work for the rest of his life. Interior – Santa Maria della Salute was included in the milestone exhibition of work by Cadell, S. J. Peploe and Leslie Hunter that was mounted by the Royal Scottish Academy in 1949. It was the first group show of the artists now known as the Colourists (minus J. D. Fergusson) in a public as opposed to a private gallery and was the first time that the three artists were shown together in the country of their birth. 122 works were included, thirty-eight of which were by Cadell, of which four were lent by the Trustees of the late Sir Patrick Ford, Bt. following his death four years earlier. The Scotsman’s review of 22 August 1949 declared:‘The exhibition by Peploe, Cadell, and Hunter will certainly open the eyes of many visitors …[to]…these fine painters, the most individual and gifted of their generation in Scotland…Their different though inter-related work presents a peculiarly Scottish brand of…post-impressionism, and is of a quality that takes a worthy place in European art of the twentieth-century…This is an exhibition which will give great pleasure, and does full justice to one of the most attractive and important phases of Scottish painting.’