Tribute to Clydebank (The Stretcher Bearers)
Hugh Adam Crawford
1941 oil on canvas

Hugh Adam Crawford RSA was born in Busby, Lanarkshire and studied at Glasgow School of Art between 1919 and 1923, then at art schools in London. He is most remembered for his ability to motivate and inspire as the teacher of artists such as Colquhoun, MacBryde, William Crosby and Joan Eardley. Crawford was Head of Drawing and Painting at Glasgow School of Art, Head of Gray’s School of Art, Aberdeen and Principal of Duncan of Jordanstone, Dundee. These roles made him one of the greatest influences on several generations of Scottish artists, although he never imposed his own vision on them but encouraged them to ‘kick away the props’ and explore their own ideas. Crawford was not only a teacher, however, with his own work continuing in the Glasgow tradition of representing reality. He painted portraits and murals like those commissioned for John Brown’s shipyard and Scottish Brewers Glasgow.

Crawford considered ‘Tribute to Clydebank, (The Stretcher Bearers)’ as his best work and indeed it was acclaimed ‘picture of the year’ when it was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1942. The painting depicts the grim reality of casualties born on stretchers during wartime but still portrays the quiet dignity of Renaissance painters such as Piero della Francesca. Cezanne also influenced Crawford, which is clear from the dynamism of the picture and his dramatic depiction of ‘the moment’. Despite its early success, however, the painting had to be rescued by the College in 1981 a few months before Crawford’s death. After failed attempts to have it accepted in a permanent gallery it is said Crawford had threatened to burn it.