This portrait was painted by eighteen-year-old Gunn when he was a student. It was conceived as a companion to his own equally experimental portrait by Hutchison, painted in the same year. Both pictures share qualities of studied informality and a preference for sombre colours and fluent brushwork, recalling the early paintings of Scottish Colourist, S J Peploe. After the First World War, Gunn settled in London where he decided to focus on portraiture. He continued to exhibit regularly in Scotland and occasionally worked in his native Glasgow on receiving commissions for civic and academic portraits.
Sir Herbert James Gunn (Scottish, 1893 - 1964)
Glasgow-born artist (Herbert) James Gunn briefly studied art at Glasgow and Edinburgh before moving to the Académie Julian in Paris in 1911. After serving with the 10th Scottish Rifles in the First World War, Gunn returned to Scotland where he married twice within a decade. His second wife, Pauline Miller, became a model for some of his best-known paintings. In 1929 Gunn decided to devote himself to portraiture and soon established a prolific and successful career in London. His portraits are sometimes sombre but always carefully painted, with close attention to detail. His distinguished sitters included Queen Elizabeth, Prince Philip and the Queen Mother. Yet official recognition was slow to come, and only in 1961 was Gunn finally made a member of the Royal Academy.