Spurge With Withyham - Charles Rennie Mackintosh
Archival giclée
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Description
A delicate botanical study by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, capturing the structural beauty of spurge in watercolour and pencil, dated June 1909.
Charles Rennie Mackintosh produced this botanical study in June 1909 during a period of residence in Withyham, Sussex. The work displays his characteristic approach to natural forms: a synthesis of precise, linear draughtsmanship and delicate watercolour washes. Mackintosh often favoured the structural qualities of plants, observing their growth patterns with the same rigour he applied to his architectural designs.
The composition features a cluster of spurge, rendered with a focus on the geometric arrangement of the leaves and bracts. Mackintosh uses thin, controlled pencil lines to define the contours of the stems and petals, allowing the watercolour to bleed slightly beyond the boundaries in places. This technique provides a sense of transparency and lightness. The palette is restrained, relying on muted yellows, greens, and soft purples to capture the specific character of the specimens.
Unlike traditional Victorian botanical illustrations that sought to document species for scientific classification, Mackintosh treats the plant as a formal arrangement. The inclusion of his signature monogram and the location label within a small, hand-drawn box at the base of the stems is a recurring feature in his later works. This detail anchors the study in a specific time and place, reflecting his habit of documenting his surroundings during his travels. The work remains a clear example of his transition from the rigid geometry of his earlier Glasgow Style towards a more fluid, observational mode of drawing. It demonstrates his ability to balance decorative sensibility with a direct, honest engagement with the natural world, avoiding unnecessary ornamentation in favour of clarity and structural integrity.
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Each print is produced to order using 12-colour giclée printing on FSC-certified archival paper. Designed in Britain and printed at your nearest production hub to reduce waste and speed up delivery.
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Materials & Sizing
Museum-grade giclée on FSC-certified archival matte paper, with framed and canvas options.
- Paper sizes: A4, A3, A2, A1, A0 and B2 (50×70 cm)
- Canvas: XS (20×30 cm) to Large (60×90 cm)
- Frames: black, natural wood, dark wood or white
Spurge With Withyham - Charles Rennie Mackintosh
Artist Biography
Charles Rennie Mackintosh
He was the fourth of eleven children, seven of whom survived infancy. His father was a police superintendent. The boy was probably dyslexic, struggled badly at school, and used sketchbooks to manage what appear to have been emotional difficulties. He had a contracted sinew in one foot that gave him a limp, and childhood rheumatic fever left one side of his face permanently drooped. None of this stopped him drawing.
He enrolled at Glasgow School of Art at fifteen, studying part-time while apprenticed to the architect John Hutchinson. In 1889 he joined Honeyman and Keppie, where he would remain for nearly two decades. He met Margaret Macdonald in 1892. Together with her sister Frances and Herbert McNair, they formed a group that became known as The Four. Mackintosh and Margaret married in 1900. He acknowledged publicly that Margaret had genius where he had only talent.
His greatest commission was the Glasgow School of Art building itself, won in competition in 1897. The library wing, completed in 1909, is considered one of the finest interiors of the twentieth century. He designed all four tea rooms for the entrepreneur Catherine Cranston, going so far as to specify the waitresses' dresses and order the flowers. In Vienna, at the eighth Secessionist Exhibition in 1900, his work was received with an enthusiasm Glasgow never matched.
His style fell from favour. He drank. He was asked to leave his firm. In 1914 he and Margaret moved to Walberswick in Suffolk, where he was briefly arrested as a suspected German spy because of his Vienna correspondence and unusual manner. He was released without charge but effectively driven from the village.
In 1923, they moved to Port Vendres in the south of France. The light and landscape revived him. He painted watercolours of the surrounding hills and harbour with an obsessive attention to geological detail, completing around forty before returning to London for the last time.
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