Maritime Alps

John MacWhirter was a Scottish landscape painter. He attended school in Colinton, Edinburgh. He was unsuccessfully apprenticed to Oliver Boyd, an Edinburgh bookseller following the death of his father. This was not a success and he stayed just a few months.
His first work was exhibited at the Royal Academy when he was just 14. His early work was influenced by the detailed paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites, in particular John Everett Millais. Later, he adopted a looser, sweeping style, specialising in romantic landscapes. He loved to travel and visited Italy, Sicily, Switzerland, Austria, Turkey, Norway and the USA. He was especially inspired by the Alps and loved to paint trees.