Dictionary of National Biography, 1912 supplement/MacCallum, Andrew
MACCALLUM, ANDREW (1821–1902), landscape painter, born at Nottingham in 1821, of Highland descent, was son of an employé at Messrs. William Gibson & Sons' hosiery manufactory in that town. Living in boyhood near Sherwood Forest, he early developed a love of landscape art, of which his family disapproved. Being apprenticed against his will to his father's business, he devoted his leisure to drawing, and was encouraged by Thomas Bailey [q. v.], father of Philip James Bailey [q. v. Suppl. II] the poet, who allowed him to copy pictures in his collection.
On his twenty-first birthday young MacCallum left his uncongenial home, it is said, without a shilling. He maintained himself by teaching, and is stated to have sold his first picture to W. Enfield, then town clerk of Nottingham. At the age of twenty-two he became a student in the recently founded Government School of Art at Nottingham. He exhibited a view of Flint Castle at the British Institution in London in 1849, and probably in the same year became a student at the Government School of Design at Somerset House, where J. R. Herbert [q. v.], R. Redgrave [q. v.], and J. C. Horsley [q. v. Suppl. II] were among his instructors. In 1850 he first exhibited at the Royal Academy. From that year till 1852 he was assistant master at the Manchester School of Art, and from 1852 to 1854 he was headmaster of the School of Art at Stourbridge, where he resided at the Old Parsonage, New Street. In 1854 he went to Italy with a travelling studentship awarded by the Science and Art Department. Part of his time was devoted to procuring facsimiles of mural decorations for use in schools of art. His manuscript 'Report of a Sojourn in Italy from the year 1854 to 1857' is in the library of the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Returning to England in 1857, he decorated the western exterior of the Sheepshanks Gallery at the South Kensington Museum with panels of sgraffito. Thenceforth he devoted himself to landscape, which he had practised in Italy, and he found congenial subjects at Burnham Beeches and in Windsor Forest. Among purchasers of his pictures were John Phillip, R.A. [q. v.], and James Nasmyth [q. v.], and he was awarded a silver medal by the Society for the Encouragement of the Fine Arts. Towards the end of 1861 he painted at Fontainebleau; in 1864 he worked in Switzerland and on the Rhine; in 1866 he was in Italy; in the winter of 1866–7 he was in the neighbourhood of Paris. Between 1870 and 1875 he paid several visits to Egypt. About 1875 he was commissioned by Queen Victoria to paint five views near Balmoral.
MacCallum sent fifty-three pictures to the Royal Academy (1850–1886) and a few to the British Institution, Society of British Artists, and International Exhibitions (1870–1). Special exhibitions of his paintings were held at the Dudley Gallery in 1866 (6 water-colours and 29 oils, including his large 'Charlemagne Oak, Forest of Fontainebleau,' and 'A Glade in Sherwood Forest') and at Nottingham in 1873. His 'Sultry Eve' was shown at the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia in 1876. His reputation rests mainly upon his woodland subjects, but he also produced imaginative compositions such as 'The Eve of Liberty' (1876). He endeavoured to exemplify in his paintings the compatibility of breadth and detail. His presentation of trees betrayed a laborious fidelity which is hardly known elsewhere, but his meticulous attention to intricate branching and other details exposed him to the criticism that he lacked spiritual power and imagination. He not infrequently used water-colour, and he drew in pastel and, in gold, silver, and copper point. He sometimes lectured on art subjects.
He died on 22 Jan. 1902 at 5 The Studios, Holland Park Road, Kensington. He had lived in the neighbourhood since 1858 when he leased from Thomas Webster, R.A. [q. v.], his house in The Mall, Kensington. He was twice married: (1) to Miss Tetlow (d. c. 1875) of Altrincham, a cultured lady of independent means; and (2) to Miss Salway of Ludlow, by whom he had two sons, who both served in the South African war. His portrait was painted by J. H. Sylvester in 1888.
The Tate Gallery has his 'Silvery Moments, Burnham Beeches' (1885), and 'The Monarch of the Glen'; to the Victoria and Albert Museum belong 'In Sherwood Forest—Winter Evening after Rain' (1881), 'S. Maria delle Grazie, Milan' (1854), 'Rome from the Porta San Pancrazio' (1855–6), 'The Burning of Rome by Nero, and the Massacre of the Christians' (1878–9), a 'Head of Christ' after Daniele Crespi, two pencil and two water-colour studies of trees, and numerous drawings of ornament; and at the City of Nottingham Art Gallery are 'The Major Oak, Sherwood Forest' (1882), which measures about 9 ft. by 12 ft., and 'The Opening Scene in Bailey's "Festus."'
[Private information; Illustr. London News, 23 June 1866; Art Journ. 1866, p. 218, and 1877, pp. 321–324 (illustr. art. by J. Dafforne); Fine Arts Quarterly Review, 1866, i. 373; Clement and Hutton, Artists of the Nineteenth Century; Sir H. Cole, Fifty Years of Public Work, 1884, i. 329; P. G. Hamerton, in English Painters of the Present Day (1871), pp. 60, 61; G. H. Shepherd, Minor Masters of the old British School, 39; Müller and Singer, Allg. Künstler-Lexicon; Graves, Dict. of Artists, Roy. Acad. Exhibitors, and British Institution; Cat. Tate Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum (oils and water-colours), Nottingham Art Gall., and Dudley Gall. (1866); The Times, 31 Jan. 1902.]