Sir William George Gillies, C.B.E., R.S.A., R.A. 1898-1973

Painted c.1958 Still Life with an Octagonal Table represents the full developed style of Gillies mature work, with several pieces of porcelain that appear in some of his greatest still lifes, including the fish-shaped bowl and the diamond-patterned jug. It was painted soon after Gillies was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1957, during a period of peace, simplicity and fruitful endeavour for the artist; 'The seasons and the years slipped away in a succession of jam and wine crops, summer picnics, winters round the Raeburn, and optimistic springs... Neither the telephone nor television seemed necessary or desirable... refugees from the city began to buy themselves peace and quiet.' (W. Gordon Smith, W G Gillies - A Very Still Life, 1991, p. 69) Gillies was a hard working professional painter but also found time to fulfill his duties as the Head of Drawing and Painting at the Edinburgh College of Art, eventually becoming the Principal in 1960. His income from teaching was supplemented by the relatively high prices he achieved for his paintings, but he retained a careful attitude to money, as recorded by his friend and neighbour Mary McIver; ''I hadn't much money and Bill disliked spending much money; we rarely spent more than threepence on anything' and his acquisitions ended up, often enough, in his still-lifes and interiors. He enjoyed telling her how some of the most spectacular trees and shrubs in his garden had cost him only sixpence at pre-war Woolworth's - 'the low price was part of the enjoyment'' (ibid Gordon Smith, p. 74). This items of furniture and porcelain were not simply items that added appropriate colour or form to his compositions, they were the very subject of the still-lifes and each was given equal importance within the paintings. Unlike the earlier still lifes, in which items often merged into one another as part of a patch-work design of objects, in these paintings the forms are clearly differentiated by outlines and stark changes in colour. Thus the items are given more solidity within the paintings.