Douglas Anderson, Scottish, (1934-?), “The Fox Cub”
Elected into the prestigious Royal Society of Portrait Painters in 1961, Anderson painted the queen a second time in 1964, as well as the Queen Mother and the Duchess of Gloucester, and in 1991, he painted Princess Diana.
At the age of 27, Anderson was the youngest person at the time to be elected to the royal society, an English portrait group, he said. “It’s very old, rather like a club, and its patron is the monarch,” Anderson said of the society that allows a maximum of 37 members.
Anderson said he started painting when he was about 4. “I have pictures I painted in 1938,” he said. “My father was a very good amateur painter. I used to watch him, and he used to teach me.”
At 13, Anderson left Scotland to attend Eton, a school in England. “I studied some painting there, but not too much,” he said. “It muddled up with what my father taught me.”
Remaining true to his father’s method, Anderson went to Italy to study with Pietro Annigoni, who was then known for his portrait and fresco work, said Anderson. “(Annigoni) put the polish on it,” he said, referring to his father’s technique.
“There were about five of us who studied with him during that two-year period,” which lasted from 1955 to 1957.
“I fell in love with (Italy) when I was a young man,” Anderson said. “I
went out practically every succeeding year, and bought a place in 1972.” He now lives in Palaia, Italy.
After nearly 20 years of painting portraits, Anderson returned to landscape and wildlife work in 1977. He said today he alternates between portraiture and nature scenes.
