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Samuel John Peploe RSA (British, 1871-1935) Rocks, Iona image 1
Samuel John Peploe RSA (British, 1871-1935) Rocks, Iona image 2
Samuel John Peploe RSA (British, 1871-1935) Rocks, Iona image 3
Lot 59

Samuel John Peploe RSA
(British, 1871-1935)
Rocks, Iona

21 May 2025, 12:00 BST
Edinburgh

Sold for £61,360 inc. premium

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Samuel John Peploe RSA (British, 1871-1935)

Rocks, Iona
signed 'Peploe' (lower right), and inscribed in pencil 'Iona' (verso)
oil on panel
37.2 x 45.5cm (14 5/8 x 17 15/16in).

Footnotes

Provenance
With The Lefevre Gallery, London.
Collection of George Wright Hall.
Collection of R. Forbes-Hutchison.
With Aitken Dott & Son, Edinburgh.
Private collection, UK; thence by descent.

Exhibited,
Edinburgh, Aitken Dott & Son, Recent Acquisitions, April-May 1977, cat. no. 95.

In landscape painting, Peploe was a more instinctive and expressive artist. Unlike his highly controlled and considered still lifes designed to reach perfection in composition; with landscapes, he was pragmatic and reactive to the ever changing conditions experienced when painting en plein air in Scotland. This pragmatism is indicated in a letter of 1923:

"We had miserable weather in Iona this year – worst in living memory – gales and rain the whole time... But that kind of weather suits Iona: the rocks and distant shores seen through falling rain, veil behind veil, take on an elusive quality, and when the light shines through one has visions of rare beauty. I think I prefer it these days to your blue skies and clear distances." (Peploe to William McDonald in a letter dated November 1923).
(Guy Peploe, S.J. Peploe, London, 2012, p. 152)

Additional information