SCOTT, John (1802-1885)
Marine and landscape painter in oil. Scott was born at SOUTH SHIELDS, and spent his early years at sea before becoming a pupil of John Wilson Carmichael (q.v.). Like his master, Scott became predominantly a painter of marine subjects, but unlike Carmichael. remained all his life on Tyneside. Here he became a popular painter of ship studies, including among his subjects colliers, keel boats, tugs and wrecks, and occasionally tackling major public events involving shipping, like his Opening of Tyne Dock, 1859. One of his notable works in ship portraiture was his painting of Garibaldi’s ship the Commonwealth, which work was sent to Italy as a present to the Italian patriot. His work in ship portraiture is, indeed, regarded as important; “an excellent and productive specialist in portraits of merchantmen off points of land as far apart as Dover and Cape Town”, says C. H. Ward Jackson, in his Ship Portrait Painters, published by the National Maritime Museum, 1978, doubtlessly basing his view on scrutiny of the several fine works by Scott in the Museum’s collection, and dated 1851-1870. Scott was also skilled in making models of ships, yachts and other vessels, and in 1851 won a medal at the Great Exhibition in London in a competition organised by the Duke of Northumberland. He exhibited sparingly, among his few exhibits being his view of The Castle Fort from Shields Bar, shown at the 1843 exhibition of the North of England Society for the Promotion of the Fine Arts, NEWCASTLE. However, Scott’s marines achieve high prices when sold at auction, based on his competence as an artist alone. He painted until quite late in life, dying at the age of eighty-three years at the home of his daughter, at SOUTH SHIELDS, just as the great days of the sailing ship were drawing to a close. Represented: National Maritime Museum; Laing A.G., Newcastle; Shipley A.G., Gateshead; South Shields Museum & A.G. [“The Artists of Northumbria”, 2^nd Edition 1982, Marshall Hall ISBN 0903858029]