This bust is an early work by Benno Schotz. James Pittendrigh MacGillivray had been made Sculptor in Ordinary for Scotland by King George V by the time he sat to the younger artist. In 1963, Queen Elizabeth II bestowed this honour upon Schotz. Schotz, who had originally come to Glasgow to study engineering, became an important figure in Scottish sculpture through his works, as a teacher at the Glasgow School of Art, as a supporter of émigré artists during the Second World War and as a promoter of modernist sculpture in Scotland.