![]() | M055 Competition design for Glasgow Art Galleries (dome)Date: 1891–2Client: Association for the Promotion of Art and Music in Glasgow Authorship: ![]() |
John Honeyman & Keppie produced three designs for the competition for a new art gallery and museum building in Kelvingrove Park. One design was in a severe Ionic classical style; the second was French Renaissance-inspired, with four towers and a busy roofline; the third was also French Renaissance, with a large dome. It has previously been said that the Ionic and domed designs were submitted in the preliminary round of the competition, and that the design with towers was produced for the final round. However, contemporary reports and the competition organising committee's minutes show that all three designs were submitted in the preliminary round. The Ionic and towered designs were among the six entries short-listed, and they advanced unchanged to the final adjudication.
Authorship:
This design has been attributed to John Keppie and Mackintosh working in
collaboration. It appears to draw on recent work by Mackintosh and by
architects they both admired. The entrances with their echoes of James Sellars
may be due to Keppie while the double-transomed windows recall Mackintosh's
student design for a Museum of Science and
Art. The sculpted frieze was copied directly from John Burnet
Senior's 1878 design for the Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts galleries.
1
Status: Unbuilt
Notes:
1: David Walker, 'The Early Works of Charles Rennie Mackintosh', in Nikolaus Pevsner and J. M. Richards, eds, The Anti-Rationalists, London: Architectural Press, 1973, p. 118.