James Stuart MacDonald

James Stuart MacDonald (28 March 1878 – 12 November 1952) was an Australian artist, art critic and Director of the National Art Gallery of New South Wales from 1929 to 1937.

MacDonald was born on 28 March 1878 in Carlton, Melbourne, the son of Solicitor Hector MacDonald and his American wife Anna Louisa, née Flett. He attended school at Kew High School and Hawthorn Grammar School, but proved unsuccessful in his studies. As a child, through family connections, MacDonald met many painters and in the mid-1890s studied at the National Gallery of Victoria's school.

MacDonald left Australia for London in 1898 to attend the Westminster School of Art. He then spent five years in Paris where he attended the Académie Julian and the Académie Colarossi. He exhibited his works at the Royal Academy of Arts and the Old Salon, Paris. He returned to Melbourne and married American arts student, Maud Keller on 4 August 1904. They moved to New York where he taught art until 1910 at a high school. Back in Australia he painted some portraits and landscapes and turned to drawing in charcoal and to lithographic portraits.

On 9 September 1914, with the outbreak of the First World War, MacDonald enlisted in the 5th Battalion, Australian Imperial Force. With the rank of Private he served at Gallipoli where, on 26 April 1915, he was wounded in the abdomen and was classified unfit for active service. He served as a pay sergeant from 1916-1917 in England. In 1918 he worked as a camouflage artist with the 5th Division in France and was medically discharged from the army in April 1919.

Returning to Australia, MacDonald took up art study, publishing works on Frederick McCubbin, Penleigh Boyd, David Davies and George Lambert. Having given up painting, from 1923 he was art critic for The Melbourne Herald.

In October 1928 MacDonald was appointed as the Director of the National Art Gallery of New South Wales. It was in this position that he gained a reputation for artistic conservatism and thus was harmonious with the gallery trustees. MacDonald held more exhibitions of Australian work than was customary and added workshops and storerooms to the gallery. In 1936 he applied to become Director of the National Gallery of Victoria and was appointed. He had strained relations with the Trustees, particularly the Chairman, Sir Keith Murdoch, who resented his ferocious attacks on contemporary art and the 1939 Herald exhibition of French and English painting, which MacDonald described as "exceedingly wretched paintings...putrid meat...the product of degenerates and perverts...filth". In 1940 the Trustees recommended against his reappointment and he was effectively dismissed in 1941.

In 1943 he was first witness on behalf of those who brought an action against the award of the Archibald Prize to William Dobell for his portrait of Joshua Smith. From 1943 to 1947 he was the art critic for The Age and was appointed to the Commonwealth Art Advisory Board, becoming Chairman from 1949-1952. Macdonald lived in Montrose and later joined the Liberal Party of Australia.

MacDonald died in Melbourne on 12 November 1952 and was cremated. In 1958 a collection of his writings, 'Australian Painting Desiderata', was published with a foreword by Menzies. His portrait by Hugh Ramsay is held by the University of Melbourne.