Online talk: William Bell Scott’s Screen: A Pre-Raphaelite Romance
Wednesday 11th February 2026 at 6pm
In 1867 and 1868, William Bell Scott – an Edinburgh-born member of the Pre-Raphaelite social circle – created a folding screen, known as The King’s Quair, for the Newcastle industrialist James Leathart. Bold in colour and rich in detail, it illustrates The Kingis Quair, a fifteenth-century poem attributed to King James I of Scotland that narrates his courtship of his future queen, Lady Joan Beaufort. It also reproduces – on a much smaller scale – scenes that Scott painted in a mural at Penkill Castle in Ayrshire, south-west Scotland, for Alice Boyd, a fellow artist with whom he had a long and loving relationship.
The screen was sold after Leathart’s death and exhibited only once during the twentieth century. But it has recently been the focus of a major conservation project and is now a highlight of the Scottish collection of the National Galleries of Scotland. In this lecture, Emily will share her research into the screen and the associated King’s Quair mural, explaining their complex imagery and symbolism. She will discuss them in relation to the decorations at Red House – the home of William and Jane Morris – and identify the intriguing Pre-Raphaelite portraits that are hidden within.
Dr Emily Learmont has recently completed a PhD on William Bell Scott, which was an AHRC-funded Collaborative Doctoral Partnership Studentship at the University of Edinburgh and the National Galleries of Scotland. Her thesis focusses on what Scott termed his ‘decorative painting of a pictorial kind’, including his wall paintings, decorated furniture and stained-glass windows. Her book, William Bell Scott’s Screen: A Pre-Raphaelite Romance, was published by the National Galleries of Scotland in 2023, and she curated an exhibition, William Bell Scott: The King’s Quair Mural, for the galleries in 2024. She is a Teaching Fellow at the University of Edinburgh Centre for Open Learning and an educator for the National Galleries of Scotland.
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Wednesday 11th February 2026 at 6pm
In 1867 and 1868, William Bell Scott – an Edinburgh-born member of the Pre-Raphaelite social circle – created a folding screen, known as The King’s Quair, for the Newcastle industrialist James Leathart. Bold in colour and rich in detail, it illustrates The Kingis Quair, a fifteenth-century poem attributed to King James I of Scotland that narrates his courtship of his future queen, Lady Joan Beaufort. It also reproduces – on a much smaller scale – scenes that Scott painted in a mural at Penkill Castle in Ayrshire, south-west Scotland, for Alice Boyd, a fellow artist with whom he had a long and loving relationship.
The screen was sold after Leathart’s death and exhibited only once during the twentieth century. But it has recently been the focus of a major conservation project and is now a highlight of the Scottish collection of the National Galleries of Scotland. In this lecture, Emily will share her research into the screen and the associated King’s Quair mural, explaining their complex imagery and symbolism. She will discuss them in relation to the decorations at Red House – the home of William and Jane Morris – and identify the intriguing Pre-Raphaelite portraits that are hidden within.
Dr Emily Learmont has recently completed a PhD on William Bell Scott, which was an AHRC-funded Collaborative Doctoral Partnership Studentship at the University of Edinburgh and the National Galleries of Scotland. Her thesis focusses on what Scott termed his ‘decorative painting of a pictorial kind’, including his wall paintings, decorated furniture and stained-glass windows. Her book, William Bell Scott’s Screen: A Pre-Raphaelite Romance, was published by the National Galleries of Scotland in 2023, and she curated an exhibition, William Bell Scott: The King’s Quair Mural, for the galleries in 2024. She is a Teaching Fellow at the University of Edinburgh Centre for Open Learning and an educator for the National Galleries of Scotland.
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