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Phillip, John, RA HRSA

1817 – 1867

RSA Annual Report, 1867, Notice VIII; "Having thus discharged the agreeable task of recording in detail the progress and acquisitions of the Academy during the past official year, it is now the mournful duty of the Council to allude to the irreparable loss which that institution and the Arts in Great Britain have sustained in the death of John Phillip, RA, Honorary member of the Royal Scottish Academy. Had the genius of this remarkable man been less conspicuous, or had it received from the public recognition less universal and unqualified, the Council would have considered it their duty to give some expression of the estimate in which his powers as an artist are held by the body which they represent. But this, under the circumstances, they feel to be uncalled for. Nor do they deem it necessary here to bear testimony to the generous and unselfish character of their departed friend, for that, too, has been recognised, in no uncertain way, by his professional brethren and by all who knew him. But they feel that they would be unjust to his memory, and, indeed, to their own sentiments, did they fail to place on record their high sense of the patriotic attachment towards the Royal Academy of his native country which he displayed during the whole of his career; an attachment to which his important contributions to its Annual Exhibitions—often procured by him from reluctant proprietors at the cost of much personal inconvenience—bore yearly testimony. And the Council take this opportunity of expressing their hope that the example thus set by ‘the glorious painter, the brave and good man, passed away in the fullness of power, from amid the honour of his nation and the love of his friends,“ may not be lost on other compatriots somewhat similarly circumstanced, and yet more closely connected with the body than he was."



An image from the RSA collection.