A Harbour in the South, c.1908 (oil on board)

Following his move to Paris in 1907, Fergusson worked almost continuously in his sketchbooks gathering information from which to produce oil ings in his studio. This was the case here where he wrote colour notes onto his original sketch to remind him of important areas of colour but simplified the final image. Fergusson's attitude to life and art were closely interwoven and many of these links are made evident by his working methods. He found satisfaction in the most everyday subject matter such as simply, 'the fullness of things, like rich earth, foliage, clouds'. He never tired of reworking the same basic elements. On his death in 1961 Fergusson left the largest collection of his works in existence to his partner, Margaret Morris (1891-1980). In 1963 she established the JD Fergusson Art Foundation, who subsequently gifted the entire collection, archive and copyright to Perth and Kinross District Council in November 1991.