Founded nearly 150 years ago, the Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour has long championed watercolour and water-based media and its Annual Exhibition highlights the versatility and relevance of these art forms.
‘The show demonstrates the variety of work, from the meticulously detailed to the free and expressive. It reflects both the strength of traditional skills and the continuing freshness and energy of the artists’. – Anthea Gage, RSW President
The 2026 event features 350 paintings by established and emerging artists, from RSW members to work selected from an open submission by non-members. As always, the Royal Scottish Academy in Edinburgh is a grand setting to display contemporary landscapes and portraits, still-lifes and botanical studies.
Fiona McIntyre depicts a windswept seascape in Walking into Winter (above), looking out over crashing waves to snow-carpeted mountains. The colour palette is restrained: cool blues, slate greys and chalky whites crisply illustrate frost, sea spray and icy light. With a precise perspective, this impressionistic scene flows through luminous layers, to contrast the sharp-shaped, jagged rocks with painterly, fluid washes across sea and sky. Scraped and etched surfaces give a tactile, weathered quality, reinforcing the winter theme – completely frozen, this barren yet beautiful environment evokes a lingering sense of solitude and contemplation.
Ruth Thomas is fascinated by the coastline, observing pebbles, seaweed and shells indecorative detail. The conical hills of Jura, known as The Paps, are set between a flat plateau to capture a broad panoramic view across a calm expanse of sea. This neat, inventive composition is divided into two separate horizontal strata: the more naturalistic vision of the island, juxtaposed with the abstracted shimmer of a shoreline.
Muted, earthy tones from the shallow, translucent water dappled with light, to the grey, rocky hills, flow with atmospheric harmony: sweeping brushstrokes and scratched, sketchy linear marks create texture and depth. By blurring the foreground, the clear focus is on the geological formation of the twin peaks, resonating their ancient, sculptured permanence under a sun-streaked sky.
A seascape blending realism with whimsical humour, Seasons by Saul Robertson features a hotel, precariously perched on a cliff edge, akin to a fantasy storybook illustration. Architectural elements are exquisitely rendered, yet the spatial logic is gently distorted, heightening the surreal, dreamlike quality. Formally, the steep perspective over layered levels, pinpoints the small figure of the solitary waiter and neatly laid tables on the curved precipice.
The dramatic, witty narrative feels suspended in a moment before guests arrive for lunch or stay at this scenic yet absurd location, reminiscent of the Amalfi coast. A change of season, late spring into summer, is implied by the empty tables and quiet stillness.
In similar vein, Peter Graham offers us a sunny Mediterranean scene in Window to Cannes, with masterly French Impressionistic observation: perhaps a homage to Les Pigeons, Cannes, by Pablo Picasso (1957), a view from a balcony with plants and birds, overlooking the Côte d’Azur.
Graham’s composition is neatly framed by the yellow shutters, ornate balustrade and palm trees below, leading out to the horizontal bands of sea, lighthouse, hills and sky. Colour is the dominant force: cool aquamarine and turquoise counterpoint hot pinks, orange and lime green, the watercolour hues layered in silky transparent streaks with rhythmic fluidity. The vibrant, joyful palette expresses the warmth of the sun while the whole decorative picture echoes a tapestry-like design.
Paul Murray specialises in landscape and still-life paintings to demonstrate a delicate balance of shape and space. This is clearly illustrated in Still Life on Black and Pink, a jazzy jigsaw of interlocking blocks around a mesmerising maze of painterly gestures. Curved outlines hint at vessels or domestic objects, but are partially fragmented within the geometric pattern, as edges blur and forms dissolve. The palette is bold but controlled as a dialogue between a spreading mass of dark black shadow and luminous colour planes, each given room to breathe: like a collage, the textured grid format is rooted in the still life tradition.
Merging abstraction and landscape to capture the atmosphere of place, Christopher Wood’s oblong, vertically-oriented, Flight and Fall, catches the eye from across the gallery.
With sharply compressed contours, the shimmering gold-yellow and fiery red fields are a powerful anchor for the loose teal, turquoise and orange marks, splattered with calligraphic rhythm. The varied brushwork, intricate layers and scrapes create a rough, cracked surface over the lower pale, buttercream plane suggest the natural erosion of the environment. Sophisticated in its asymmetrical balance, experimental in its energetic flourish, the precise palette and pattern evoke a landscape trapped between elevation and descent, shifting through the passage of time.
The term Magic Realism was invented by the German art critic Franz Roh in 1925 to describe modern realist paintings adorned with fantastical imagination. In such a manner, June Carey is inspired by the language of dreams and subconscious thought in her magical paintings, such as The Present, Distant Memories. Combining portraiture and surreal symbolism, the ethereal, icon-like woman poses with a thoughtful expression, the blue mosaic, moonlit background glowing like a sacred halo.
Frida Kahlo’s self-portraits were enhanced with supernatural elements to reflect her feelings and experiences. Likewise, Carey uses bold colour, crisp outlines and graphic imagery of birds, fish and ornate jewellery; the symbolic tattoo, REST and the tightly-held petal suggest the tension between holding on and letting go, the co-existence of present self and distant past. Imbued with wonder and mystery, this is a visual poem to express themes of identity and emotion, myth and memory through quiet introspection.
Ian Ritchie is fascinated by real-life stories of Victorian women murders who poisoned victims with arsenic-laced tea, in order to explore the dangerous side of human nature.
Heathen Apostle is a striking Southern Gothic portrait of a pale-faced Dark Angel, poised and self-possessed, who turns toward the viewer with a calm yet challenging gaze. Her porcelain skin, crimson lips and auburn hair heighten the black lace dress and wide-brimmed, feathered hat. The mourning clothes are infused with bewitching mystique, suggesting ritual and rebellion within a strictly ordered Victorian society. Crows in flight, moths, a church, and a desolate, wuthering, Brontë landscape frame her as both sacred and profane – an ‘apostle’ outside conventional faith. The portrait feels devotional but subversive, contrasting beauty and brutality, conformity and immorality with a haunting, cinematic mood.
Michael Clark distils the design of a solitary Party Dress into an imaginative ‘portrait’ as a symbolic stand-in for the sitter, with the focus on the shape, off-the-shoulder neckline, slim waist, soft flare, draped on the hanger. With a dimly lit, theatrical background, the shadowy silhouette criss-crosses between still-life and contemporary realism, with a hidden narrative on human presence through absence.
The dark indigo-black dress is carefully layered with subtle, tonal shifts rather than detail, evoking Chanel’s motto, ‘Simplicity is the key to true elegance’. The LBD became her timeless symbol of sexual empowerment, allowing women to dress with understated sophistication. Like Coco’s design philosophy, Clark’s simple yet effective composition values clarity and a minimalist aesthetic – a meditation on femininity, style and the enduring passion for fashion.
This review is a snapshot highlighting a selection of distinctive artists from the range of exemplary, experimental paintings on display at the RSA. There is a full programme of artists’ events and workshops.
With thanks to Vivien Devlin for contributing this review.
