The Macdonald Sisters: How They Visually Created Equality Between Men and Women

The prevailing issue of fin-de-siècle France was the increasing autonomy of women. Independence for women threatened traditional social and gender roles, and consequently men’s civil power. Margaret and Frances Macdonald embodied this “new woman” with their status and education as professional artists and the visual motifs that they accordingly employed. They managed to combine feminine and masculine characteristics into one figure in their works, effectively establishing an androgynous figure. In the process they managed to establish an equality, if not superiority, of women and men.

Margaret Macdonald was born in November of 1864 and Frances was born in August of 1873. Being raised in an upper-middle-class family enabled both sisters to attend art school and to initiate innovations in the art world. The social position of the Macdonald family ensured that they were educated and that they had a certain amount of independence. From the beginning, they were enrolled in the most progressive schools, including the Orme Girl’s School. This institution pioneered female education including Latin, French, German, English, mathematics, music, natural sciences, ancient and modern history, and art in their curriculum. Margaret enrolled in the Glasgow School of Art in 1884 with her sister closely following her in 1890. As early as 1878, it was understood that many of the day students were women1. The director, Francis H. Newbery, was committed to an excellence in art that combined functionalism with beauty while encouraging individuality and experimentation among his students2. Here the instructors trained the Macdonald girls as professional artists. This is also where they met their future husbands, Charles Rennie Mackintosh and James Herbert McNair.

These four youths came to be known as the “Glasgow Four” during their time at the school. They had their first group exhibit held at the Arts and Crafts Society in 1896. Around this time, Margaret and Frances set up their own studio at 128 Hope Street in the city of Glasgow. The Glasgow Four often collaborated on posters and artworks submitted to the school Magazine, a student-based publication that showcased various works of art and literature. This extensive collaboration between the youths caused them to often be classified as the “Spook School” by their critics in the community. Their furniture and graphic designs were recognized as original, if not thoroughly eccentric, for they were influenced by Celtic art and Symbolism3.

Part of the curriculum at the Glasgow School was learning from the nude model. However, neither the Macdonald sisters nor any of their female friends made ‘life-like’ representations of the nude figure except for these classes. The figure that entered their compositions was always a stylized, de-sexualized figure and crossed the boundaries of debates about representation of the female body. Margaret was elected a member of the Royal Scottish Society of Watercolours in 1898, thus establishing her place in the public eye. She also exhibited at the International Society of Sculptors, Painters, and Gravers in London and at the International Exhibit of Art in Venice in 1899 near the end of her Glasgow career. Also around this time, Frances married Herbert McNair. Although it is assumed that Margaret was involved with Charles at this point in time, they did not marry until 19004.

Margaret and Frances grew apart after their marriages, and, more often than not, aligned themselves with their husbands’ art rather than each others’. Frances’ work, especially, changed after the birth of her son in 1900. It experienced a transformation from an interest in gothic elongation to distorted female figures surrounded by a female ‘sweetness’. From this time until her death in 1921, Frances made some jewelry, some decorative art with her husband, particularly for their home in Liverpool, and watercolor drawings. In nearly every instance the watercolors elaborate upon phases of the female experience5. In 1908, Herbert and her returned to Glasgow. There, they resignedly accepted low-pay positions as instructors at their former alma mater.

Margaret, on the other hand, had a significant amount of freedom after her marriage.

The lack of children resulting from this union opened up possibilities for furthering their respective careers. This allowed Charles and her to travel and participate in numerous exhibitions all over Europe. As a result, their popularity and acclaim in the art world soon out-paced that of the McNair’s. In 1902, she participated in the Esposizione Internazionale d’Arte Decorativa Moderna in Turin. She again, in 1909, participated in an exhibit of women artists at the International Society of Sculptors, Painters, and Gravers. After moving to Chelsea and Collioure, Charles died of cancer in 1928. Margaret lived on her own in London until she died in 1933 in her studio in Chelsea6.

Work done by the Macdonald sisters, on account of their sex, was often attributed to their respective husbands. Consequently, scholarship that covers them is far and in between. P. Morton Shand, in 1933, was recorded as claiming that “while Margaret was her husband’s ‘constant inspiration and collaborator,’ she was nonetheless ‘of a decidedly inferior artistic calibre’.” Even as late as 1990, Jocelyn Grigg stated that “Charles may have ‘exaggerated her role in his work’.” The fact is that there was, and still is, a gendered hierarchy in the art world - architecture and commerce as masculine, decorative design and teaching as feminine7. This hierarchy, and resulting bias against female artists, continues today. In the definition for “Macdonald” at Oxford Art Online, it states that “at times weak and whimsical in design and execution, [Macdonald] production[s] are often of considerable originality…”8. The following discussion will be an attempt to categorize, and create an argument for the positive and distinctive valuation of the Macdonald’s work.

Starting with Margaret, her work was often gentler than that of Frances9. Solitary depictions of the female figure are mostly seen in her early posters from the Glasgow School. Yet there are some examples that feature a particular type of woman whose elongated body and expressive features combine with a heavily symbolic content10. In La Mort Parfumee 1921 (Fig.1), the rose is used as a symbol for the feminine. There are other female figures present, but they are seen in a supplicating positing, bent over the flowers that are being presented to the prominent female figure. This “leader” is seen wearing some type of elaborate headdress and seems to be in command of the roses, or, by association, her femininity. Thus, this can be conceived as a visual representation of the power Margaret felt later in life as a female artist. The contrast between the dark background and the pastel-colored roses emphasize this distinction between the “dark”, critical world and her individual competence as a feminine figure.

The headdress, itself, would have perhaps been classified in fin-de-siècle France as Amazonian due to its primitive and geometric structuring. The Amazon woman was often seen as a “threat” to the established cultural roles. She embodies everything that put traditional social and gender roles in peril; the independent and strong woman. This “new woman” was a rising concern as the increase of autonomous females emerged into the French scene. While Margaret stayed within the “safe” boundaries of the decorative arts, she increasingly pushed the public’s limits with her success and innovation in the art world.