John Miller Gray

John Miller Gray (1850–1894) was a Scottish art critic and the first curator of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery.

John Miller Gray
Portrait of John Miller Gray
Born	(1850-07-19)July 19, 1850 Echo Bank Cemetery, Edinburgh, Scotland
Died	March 22, 1894(1894-03-22) (aged 43) Edinburgh
Resting place	Newington, Edinburgh

History

John Miller Gray was born on 19 July 1850 in Edinburgh, his father a shawl manufacturer who was bankrupted in 1857, his mother dying at his birth. He attended Mr. Munro's school in Newington (Archibald Munro; 1823–1898) and Munro's Clare Hall Academy in Edinburgh,^[1] but was forced aged 16 to finish his education and take up work as an apprentice bank clerk at the Bank of Scotland, where he remained for 18 years.^[2] Although he detested the work, in his spare time he educated himself about art and worked as a critic.^[3] He was particularly influenced by the art critic and writer Walter Pater, with whom he corresponded as well as reviewing some of Pater's work including Marius the Epicurean.^[4]

Gray was friendly with a number of prominent artists and public figures, including artists William Bell Scott and Phoebe Anna Traquair, and physician and writer John Brown.^[3][2] In 1884 he was appointed first curator of the new Scottish National Portrait Gallery, initially at temporary premises and later in Robert Rowand Anderson's Queen Street building, which opened in 1889.^[2]

He wrote regularly for periodicals including Academy and the Edinburgh Evening Courant and was chief art critic of the Scottish Leader.^[4] His publications included an 1880 book on Scottish artist George Manson and several essays on the iconography of Robert Burns.^[2] His two-volume Memoir and Remains was posthumously published by David Douglas in Edinburgh in 1895.

He died on 22 March 1894 of a brain haemorrhage, shortly before his 44th birthday, and was buried at Echo Bank cemetery in Newington, Edinburgh. He left most of his estate to the Gallery.^[5][6][2]

A portrait of John Miller Gray by Patrick William Adam is in the collection of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery (see Gallery).^[7]

Gallery

• 
  1885:
  Portrait of John Miller Gray (1850–1894), art critic and first curator of the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, painted in oil on canvas by Patrick William Adam (1852–1929), a member of the Royal Scottish Academy (RSA). Housed at the National Galleries of Scotland.