Few artists have had as profound an impact on modern Scottish painting as S. J. Peploe, J. D. Fergusson, George Leslie Hunter and F. C. B. Cadell. Together known as the Scottish Colourists, their encounters with modern French art helped introduce a new brilliance of colour, freedom of brushwork and approach to composition into Scottish art.
Their lives, work and influence are explored afresh in The Scottish Colourists: Art & Life, a new book by Alice Strang, our Associate Director and Senior Specialist in Scottish, Modern British and Contemporary Art, published by the National Galleries of Scotland in September 2026. The book is due to be published on 24 September 2026.
Richly illustrated with 120 images and informed by new research, the book explores the four artists individually and collectively, looking at the experiences that shaped their work and the contribution they made to the development of modern art in Scotland.
