Hugh William Williams

Hugh William Williams FRSE (1773–1829), known as "Grecian Williams", was a Scottish landscape-painter.

Hugh William Williams, 1818 portrait
The grave of Hugh William Williams, Canongate Kirkyard

Hugh William Williams

Life

Williams was born on board the ship of his father, Captain Williams, whilst en route to the West Indies. His mother, "Miss Lewis", died in 1782, and his father, being unable to care for the nine-year-old Hugh, left him in the care of Louis Ruffini, a textile manufacturer in Dalkeith.[1] Ruffini encouraged Hugh to become a painter.[2] For some years he concentrated on Highland landscapes.[3]

An extended tour in Italy and Greece, from which he returned in 1818, gave his work its particular character, and earned him the nickname "Grecian Williams". In 1822 Williams held an exhibition of watercolours, based on his tour. It was a critical success, its ruins and famous scenes of Greek history chiming with the taste of the time.[3]

Williams was an original member of the Associated Artists in Watercolour (1808), with Andrew Wilson, which was short-lived;[2] and an associate of the Royal Institution, Edinburgh. Towards the end of his life he took an interest in the proposed amalgamation of the Scottish Academy and the artist associates of the Institution, an arrangement which was completed a month after his death.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1823 his proposer being Sir David Brewster.

He died at home, 65 Castle Street[4] in Edinburgh's First New Townon 23 June 1829.[3] He is buried in Canongate Kirkyard in the lair of his in-laws, the Millars of Earnock. His wife Robina Millar died in 1874.[5] The grave lies in the eastern extension, adjacent to the link to the main churchyard.

Works
Hugh William Williams, View of Thebes (1819)

Williams was active since the early 1790s with the earliest recorded work dated 1792. In 1802 an engraving after a painting by him of Hermitage Castle, Roxburghshire, as the frontispiece for Sir Walter Scott's "Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border" was published by Kelso.[6] In 1811–12 Williams published six large engravings of scenes in the north, while many of his early topographical drawings appeared in the Scots Magazine. An account of his travels in southern Europe, in two volumes, appeared in 1820. Written in the form of letters, and dedicated to John Thomson of Duddingston, the intention of the work was descriptive of scenery, and peoples as they appeared to him. The illustrations were engraved by William Home Lizars from drawings by the author.[3]

Between 1827 and 1829 Williams published Select Views in Greece in numbers, each containing six plates. While he painted some oil pictures, he mostly used watercolour, in broad washes of transparent colour over a careful pencil design. His work was acquired by the National Gallery of Scotland and South Kensington Museum.[3] More works can be found in the following public collections: Amsterdam Rijksmuseum, Athens Benaki Museum, Birkenhead Williamson Art Gallery, Birmingham Museum, Cambridge Fitwilliam Museum, Cardiff National Museum of Wales, Dublin National Museum, National Galleries of Scotland, The British Museum, Victoria and Albert Museum, and many other galleries. Research by The Fine Art Society shows most of his works from Greece are held in that country.[7]

Family

Shortly after his return from the Near East in 1827 Williams married Miss Robina Miller of Garnock, a wealthy lady. They moved in Edinburgh society, where he was popular.[3] They had no children and in 1828 Williams becomes unwell in the summer of 1828 and dies the following year after a painful illness. He was buried in the Miller plot in the Cannongate churchyard, Edinburgh on 22 June. Robina and the other trustees, Aeneas MacBean WS, and the miniaturist painter William John Thomson RSA, arranged a studio sale in 1831.[8]

Notes
  1. Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0-902-198-84-X.
  2. Campbell, Mungo. "Williams, Hugh William". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/29511. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  3. Lee, Sidney, ed. (1900). "Williams, Hugh William" . Dictionary of National Biography. 61. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
  4. Edinburgh Post Office Directory 1828
  5. Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0-902-198-84-X.
  6. The life and Works of Hugh William Williams, by J Rock 1996 Vol 1 p7 and Vol 2 catalogue of works after the artist P7. Accessed 1 Nov 2018
  7. The life and Works of Hugh William Williams, by J Rock 1996 Vol 1 p10. Accessed 1 Nov 2018
  8. The life and Works of Hugh William Williams, by J Rock 1996 Vol 1 p9. Accessed 1 Nov 2018.

Attribution

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Lee, Sidney, ed. (1900). "Williams, Hugh William". Dictionary of National Biography. 61. London: Smith, Elder & Co.

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