Footnotes

Provenance
Collection of James Meldrum Esq, acquired after the Memorial Exhibition, thence by descent
With Barlclay Lennie Fine Art, Glasgow
Private Collection, UK

Exhibited
Glasgow, McLellan Galleries, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Margaret Macdonald, Memorial Exhibition, 1933
Glasgow, Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Mackintosh Watercolours, July 1978 - January 1979, cat.no.19

Literature
Billcliffe, Mackintosh Watercolours, 1978, illustrated p.51
Robertson, Charles Rennie Mackintosh: The Architectural Papers, 1990, illustrated p.64

In 1883, Mackintosh won a Travelling Studentship that had been set up by the Trustees of the Alexander Thomson Memorial for prospective British architects, aged between 18 and 25, of 'approved moral character'. Mackintosh was just 22 years old and this was his first major professional success.

Mackintosh spent three months travelling through Italy. He was in Siena from the 10th to the 19th May 1891 and spent most of is time sketching in and around the Cathedral. His contact with Italian art and architecture provided both aesthetic and critical stimulation at a formative period in his career. He brought back a portfolio of drawings and watercolours which developed his reputation as an artist.

In October 1891, a selection of these Italian watercolours were displayed in the Glasgow School of Art Club Annual Exhibition. James Guthrie was reputedly so impressed with the work, he exclaimed to Fra Newbery, Director of the School, "but hang it Newbery, the man ought to be an artist". (Cited to R. Eddington Smith, Secretary of the Glasgow School of Art Club in a letter to The Glasgow Evening Times, 17 February 1933, p.6).