Yvon

D.Y. Cameron was a successful painter and a very influential etcher. He studied at the Glasgow School of Art before joining life classes at the Royal Scottish Academy. His work was acclaimed in Edinburgh, London, Berlin and Munich. During the First World War, Cameron was appointed official war artist to the Canadian government and in 1933 was made the King's Painter in Scotland. Cameron was highly sought after by collectors until the Great Crash of 1929 brought a collapse in prices for prints in general. Despite his excellence as a printmaker, his work still remains underrated both in art historical and market terms.

Strong tonal contrasts characterise his prints and his stark and dramatic paintings, which are mainly landscapes and cityscapes. His prints often feature areas of great darkness, offset by highlights. Cameron’s etchings are notable for their use of drypoint, a skill that he had mastered over his years of production. This is particularly evident in his studies of church interiors and Scottish landscapes.

Yvon is one of the few architectural subjects that Cameron created in this period of his career as a printmaker, for around the time of production, he had turned increasingly to his native landscape of Scotland. In <em>Yvon,</em> he revels in the quaintness of the old architecture of Chartres which is almost as remarkable in its way as the far more famous cathedral. This is an earlier state of the etching, prior to the removal of the heavy black shadows on the right wall of the restaurant and from the windows of the building in the foreground on the right of the work. It relates to a watercolour by Cameron of the same theme.  He modified it by removing a building (what the critic Malcolm Salaman called 'obstructive actuality') to let in a glimpse of sky and landscape, and enhance the charm of the scene.

This is a first state impression of the print; Te Papa also has a fourth state in its collection (1971-0048-23).

Sources:

Arthur M. Hind, The Etchings of D.Y. Cameron (London; Halton and Truscott Smith, 1924)

Campbell Fine Art:

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National Galleries Scotland,

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Young_Cameron

Dr Mark Stocker    Curator, Historical International Art   December 2017