The sign for Sivells Pub in the Glasgow Studen Union

 

 

 

 

Gallery

Select a painting below to see a larger image

Oil painting of Bob in 3/4 profile

Robert Sivell

 

self portrait in oil


 

 


Oil portrait of older man dozing in a chair

“Twilight”
Portrait of my Great Grandfather
“When you are old and grey and full of sleep”

Portrait of a young woman cutting oranges taken from a blue rimmed stoneware bowl

"For Agnes"
Portrait of Agnes Wallace, the artist's niece, from April, 1926.

Portrait of a Girl, at left, changed hands at auction in 2006; the new owner kindly sent me this photograph!

It has been identified as a portrait of Nancy Hunter, daughter-in-law of my maternal Great Auntie Kate Sayers Hunter. Nancy Hunter is the subject of several of Bob's portraits, including "The Senorita" owned by the Perth Art Gallery, and these two owned by my mother:

Close-up profile

Portrait of Agnes Sivell
This painting was given to Bob's sister Henrietta, and has remained in the family. The pose here is similar to the pose held by Agnes included in Bob's full-length family portrait.

Portrait of Molly Sayers, sister-in-law to the artist

 

A very glamorous portrait of Molly Sayers, one of the artist's sisters-in-law


Kenneth Dike (1917 - 1983) probably sat for these portraits when a student at the University of Aberdeen. Professor Kenneth Onwuka Dike became Vice-Chancellor of University of Ibadan, Nigeria, and was noted for setting up the Nigerian National Archives. As a proponent of Biafran independence, he became a roving ambassodor, and Vice-Chancellor at Nsukka University in Biafran territory. After the Biafran war, he moved to the United States, where he took a position at Harvard University, becoming the first Mellon Professor of African History at Harvard.

 

The images of these two portraits of Kenneth O. Dike are available for reuse under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0 Unported License and the GNU Free Documentation License (unversioned, with no invariant sections, front-cover texts, or back-cover texts).

Portrait of Baby Elspeth (Mother)


My mother as a baby in a rougher sketch

Nurse Violet Eleanor Reid, G.M.
This is a photo of a drawing commissioned by the Imperial War Museum in 1942. My sister owns another original portrait of this nurse, very similar to this one, but with a slightly different background.
Apparently the museum has been decommissioned, and the work sold. I would love to know where it is now.

See the Museum Label


My sister Jocelyn


Close portrait of guard with halbierd

 

"The Halberdier"
oil on wood, 12"x22", signed

“Sugar Loaf Mountain, Ireland”

Painting of Isobel Sayers as a young woman

The artist's wife Isobel & baby Elspeth, on the Isle of Arran, possibly a study for a more finished work,"Washing day, Corrie, Isle of Arran", recently (2006?) resold at auction.

 

And Isobel as a lovely young woman in the woods, this piece is titled "The Beechwood".


The Drawing Book


Belle
Isobel Sayers Sivell


My grandmother Belle


Painting in storage at the Aberdeen Art Gallery


Young Elspeth in Bed with Book
(possibly reading in bed while sick with diptheria)


Elspeth, seated

b&w photo of portrait Thumbnail Photo of Painting 
My mother with doll

Portrait of my Mother


Portrait of John Hill Willis

Untitled portrait
Could this oil sketch be a portrait of Jean Dymock?
It is untitled, & my mother kept it ...

This portrait is of a MysteryWoman is on the reverse of a board with the oil sketch of my mother (reading, sick in bed as a child shown above). She may be one of the Morton family from Craigie Hall, near Edinburgh.
Watercolor Landscape of an unknown location. It is signed (unusual for Bob) and has 1907 painted into the left hand corner. Bob was 19 in 1907.

Bob's parents, Robert Sivell & Agnes Wylie Sivell
Family Group

 

At left is new, high quality photo courtesy of Aberdeen Art Gallery (thank you!) of this large, well restored family portrait of Bob's immediate family. The artist is in the picture, but with his back turned toward to us and the family group. At one time the painting was cut in half for convenient storage... it is now in the good care of Aberdeen Art Gallery.

The painting ‘Family Group’ by Robert Sivell RSA, dated 1919, includes, left to right: Margaret, Agnes (Jr), Robert, Henrietta, Robert Sivell (Sr), Agnes Wylie Sivell, and John.Agnes Wylie Sivell, mother of the artist

Robert Sivell  Senior, father of the artist

These fully rendered & finished portraits of his parents may have been studies for this large work.

 


Was for sale December, 2013 on Ebay!

A portrait of Sam Hunter. I think this is the younger Sam, Bob's nephew by marriage, rather than his brother-in-law of the same name. Kate Sayers, my great aunt, married Sam Hunter, and I believe they had twin boys. Their are references to a painting of the twins, but I don't have an image or know what happened to this painting.

 

Left: Portrait of Sir George Pirie, Right: identity unknown

Profile of an Unknown Man

Spring
possibly a study (or a sales pitch?) for the Sivell's Pub murals, shows more detail & finish than the mural. Benno Scholtz mentions Bob's concern that murals might not be valued & protected, so he made paintings of key portions of his scenes. The actual murals are on all four walls of a large room.

It is great to know that the Aberdeen student union murals have been retained over the years, and sufficiently valued to be cleaned and restored. They seem to be appreciated still: although the student union has recently sold this downtown property, it seems the murals are to be protected due to the historic interest.

 

A closeup from the mural wall at left.


Revised 12-15-2013,
Sandra J. Stowell