James Cassie
Encyclopedia
James Cassie was a Scottish
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...

 marine landscape, portrait
Portrait painting
Portrait painting is a genre in painting, where the intent is to depict the visual appearance of the subject. Beside human beings, animals, pets and even inanimate objects can be chosen as the subject for a portrait...

, genre and animal painter.

Life and work

Cassie was born at Keith Hall, Inverurie
Inverurie
Inverurie is a Royal Burgh and town in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, approximately north west of Aberdeen on the A96 road and is served by Inverurie railway station on the Aberdeen to Inverness Line...

 in Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire
Aberdeenshire is one of the 32 unitary council areas in Scotland and a lieutenancy area.The present day Aberdeenshire council area does not include the City of Aberdeen, now a separate council area, from which its name derives. Together, the modern council area and the city formed historic...

, in 1819. A childhood accident left him permanently lame. He determined on art as a career and became a pupil of James Giles RSA
Royal Scottish Academy
The Royal Scottish Academy is a Scottish organisation that promotes contemporary Scottish art. Founded in 1826, as the Royal Institution for the Encouragement of the Fine Arts, the RSA maintains a unique position in Scotland as an independently funded institution led by eminent artists and...

, a painter of highland scenery and animals. Cassie settled in Aberdeen
Aberdeen
Aberdeen is Scotland's third most populous city, one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas and the United Kingdom's 25th most populous city, with an official population estimate of ....

, where the sea and flsherfolk on its shores provided inspiration for his art.

In his style, he preferred broad harmonious effects to elaborate detail, and he most excelled at marine landscapes. However, he also painted animals, portraits,m and domestic scenes. He worked in both oils
Oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...

 and watercolour, and showed several pictures at the Royal Scottish Academy
Royal Scottish Academy
The Royal Scottish Academy is a Scottish organisation that promotes contemporary Scottish art. Founded in 1826, as the Royal Institution for the Encouragement of the Fine Arts, the RSA maintains a unique position in Scotland as an independently funded institution led by eminent artists and...

 (RSA), the Royal Academy
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...

 (RA), and other London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 exhibitions. In 1869, he was elected an Associate of the RSA and moved to Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...

, where he remained for the rest of his life. He was also a member of the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour (RSW). In February of 1879, he was elected a full member of the RSA, but his health had been failing for some time and he died on May 11 of that year.

Cassie was a friend of John Philip
John Philip
John Philip may refer to:*John R. Philip, Australian physicist*John Woodward Philip, American admiral-See also:*John Phillip , artist*John Philips, poet*John Phillips...

, who painted an excellent portrait of him. An anecdote describes how he and Philip were on a sketching holiday together, in Aberdeenshire and the northern Highlands
Scottish Highlands
The Highlands is an historic region of Scotland. The area is sometimes referred to as the "Scottish Highlands". It was culturally distinguishable from the Lowlands from the later Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands...

, when they chanced to meet fellow artist Sam Bough
Sam Bough
Sam Bough was an English-born landscape painter who spent much of his career working in Scotland.Born in Carlisle, Cumberland, England he was self-taught and worked as a theatre scenery painter in Manchester and Glasgow. Encouraged by Daniel Macnee to take up landscape painting he moved to...

 at a remote hostelry. Bough drew some sketches on the spot for the two friends, which Cassie described as "just beautiful".

Selected works

  • Holy Island Castle.
  • Chalk Cliffs, Sussex.
  • A Highland Goatherd.
  • The Mouth of the Mersey.
  • The Mussel Gatherers.
  • Morning — East Coast of Scotland (in the Edinburgh National Gallery
    National Gallery of Scotland
    The National Gallery of Scotland, in Edinburgh, is the national art gallery of Scotland. An elaborate neoclassical edifice, it stands on The Mound, between the two sections of Edinburgh's Princes Street Gardens...

    ).
  • Dumbarton Castle Sunset (1874).

External links

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