Golf is now the most popular game played around the world and booming throughout Europe, America and Asia. The interest is universal, but the game’s spiritual home is still very much in Scotland, from where much of the history has unfolded over the centuries and, indeed, where many of the greatest golfing images have been painted.
Old Tom Morris, Park, Taylor, Baird and Varden are all legendary names of the game and fortunately these sentinels of golf were painted for posterity by equally gifted artists. It is fascinating to see how this art form has evolved and how it mirrored the personalities who gradually developed the game..
We must go back to the 17th century when golf was first played in the form of a game known as ‘kolf’ in the Netherlands. Fortunately there are many works of art from this period by such enduring masters as Van der Velde, Van Ostade, Van der Neer, and Adam van Breen who depicted the early game, which was often played on ice. There are has always been some controversy over the origins of the game. "Gouff" is recorded as a pastime activity by the Scots as far back as 1457 but it seems more likely that golf really developed with Dutch and Scots traders adopting aspects of each others game. This cross fertilisation helped clubs, balls and rules to evolve and it would seem the Scots took it to their hearts with a vigour second to none.
The emergence of the game as a popular pastime was captured by no less a master than Rembrandt who made a stunning etching of an exhausted golfer, entitled The Kolven Player, in 1645. However, throughout the 18th century most golfing paintings were as wooden as the golf clubs used. Some notable exceptions spring to mind.
The stunning double portrait of the Macdonald brothers pained in the late 18th century and attributed to William Mossman, is evidence of the establishment by that time of golf as a popular modern game. It was in 1787 though, that one of the greatest golfing images was painted. The artist was David Allan, himself a member of the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, who painted the portrait of his club captain, the surgeon William Inglis, leaning authoritatively on his club. Leith Links had been a favourite place for golfers since the early 16th century, and in 1744 the city of Edinburgh presented to its habitués, the prize shown in the middle-distance of a golf club with silver balls attached. In these early days gentlemen golfers could be identified by their traditional red jackets, a habit that was only phased out in the early 19th century. Clubs and particularly ball were expensive and it was not until the next century that the game became more widely accessible.
Other distinguished portraits of the late 18th century and early 19th century by Sir George Chalmers, Francis Abbot, Watson Gordon and Francis Grant all depict the early game evolving in Scotland throughout. Perhaps the greatest of all golfing pictures, though were those by Charles Lees entitled. One entitled The Grand Match, depicting the contest played over St Andrews links in 1841, has become a golfing icon. Interestingly Jaimie Patino acquired a fine oil sketch of this painting to add to his collection of golfing memorabilia at Valderrama.
As golf became more popular in the mid to late 19th century, more artists were drawn to the links and many gifted amateur hands produced inspirational work. Of particular note are the paintings of Thomas Hodge and Francis Powell Hopkins (also known as Major S). Both recorded the play and personalities of the day with Old Tom Morris and his associates featuring often. To many, Tom Morris was the father of modern golf and his influence on play and course design cannot be underestimated. Sir George Reid painted Old Tom in 1899 when he was then nearly 80 years of age and fairly cantankerous at that. It is recorded by Reid that when the sitter saw the final portrait he gazed at the work for some while in silence before announcing "well the cap's like mine…". Another stunning portrait was painted some 28 years later by the Irish born Sir William Orpen. The picture captures the airy sense of the links with the then Prince of Wales (later Edward the VIII), magnificently bedecked in his cloth cap and plus-twos. The future King, like Prince Andrew today, was a keen golfer and this portrait hangs at the Royal Academy in St Andrews.
Contemporaries of Orpen, like Cecil Auden and Sir John Lavery were also actively painting golfing subjects, Lavery in particular producing a number of memorable works for the Ford family at North Berwick. He painted the West Course on several occasions and ultimately produced the sumptuous Nancy, Lady Astor at North Berwick in 1920. This epic canvas which latterly belonged to a gentlemen's club in Glasgow was sold two years ago for the princely sum of £750,000 by Sotheby's and has since very sadly gone to America.
By the 1920s and 1930s golf had really caught the public imagination. PG Wodehouse was romanticising the game in a way that would amuse many generations to come. This flowering attracted not only the more ‘serious’ artists, buth another breed; the illustrators and cartoonists of the day. Here was something they could really get their teeth into – a game that reflected the very essence of life itself. After all, if you hack into a bunker, surely only you should get yourself out!
Sir Leslie Ward’s (Spy) caricatures for Vanity Fair were all the rage and golfers soon became household names, serving to popularise the game even further. Phil May produced for Punch some memorable pen and ink drawings, while John Hassell and Harry Rowntree caricatured many of the leading players. Heath Robinson, Frank Paton and George Pipeshanks were all also keen to portray the world of the golfer and the cartoon tradition continues to this day. However, perhaps the greatest and most enduring of all the golfing cartoons came from the quintessentially British hand of HM Bateman. The Man who Missed the First Drive at St Andrews remains a chilling reminder to keep the head down.
In July 1990, Christies held a sale of golfing memorabilia at St Andrews to coincide with The Open of that year. Nick Faldo grittily won the famous claret jug whilst half a mile away an extraordinary painting by J Michael Brown took top honours in the sale. The painting entitled A Rainy day at St Andrews, depicting Harold Hilton winning the amateur championship of 1913, has stuck in my mind ever since. The picture shows a group of spectators, looking on as a torrential rainstorm rages over a blackened landscape with the spires of St Andrews glinting in the background. It is truly a historic and romantic image of golf as played in its purest form in Scotland - there are no blue skies of summer, just the raw wind and rain as so often is the case. The painting sold for £71,500.
The world-wide demand and enthusiasm for such heroic images is naturally reflected in the huge prices that they now command and it is a great shame that we are loosing so many important works to overseas buyers. Our national galleries seem bereft of good sporting pictures of this quality. Is it because those in the higher echelons of the fine art world deem the subject matter unworthy of serious consideration? Certainly the aforementioned painters would argue not. Golf and golfing art are very much part of our national heritage and perhaps it is now time to give due regard to the art form as much as the great game itself
