Sculptor and painter born in Cromarty, but working in Edinburgh under the influence of Sir Henry Raeburn. He worked for a marble cutter named Dalziel, of Leith Walk, where he made the transition from simple carving to ‘actual sculpture’ and modelling in clay, and where he met John D. Marshall, with whom he often collaborated, though never, apparently, as a business partner. He also worked for Thomas Telford, managing a large team of masons and hewers on various engineering projects. He was a friend of the sculptor Alexander Handyside Ritchie, who made use of his painted portrait of the Rev. David Dixon in his mural monument to the minister on the west wall of St Cuthbert’s Church, Princes Street, Edinburgh (1844). Elected Royal Scottish Academician in 1829, he exhibited 101 works at the RSA’s annual shows, none of which, however, were sculptures.
Bibliography: W.T. Johnston, Dictionary of Scottish Artists (c.2000), Scottish National Library, ref CD-ROM.585; P.J.M. McEwan, The Dictionary of Scottish Art and Architecture, Ballater, Aberdeenshire, 2004; R. McKenzie, Public Sculpture of Edinburgh (2 vols), Liverpool, 2018, vol. 1, pp. 29–30, 338–39, vol. 2, pp. 150, 464; Royal Scottish Academy archives, ‘Reminiscences of Samuel Mackenzie (1785–1847) by his son’, unpublished typescript, n.d., pp. 5–7.
Ray McKenzie 2018