Born in Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, on 11 April 1931, John McKinnon Crawford was a painter in the Scottish Colourist tradition, using subtle, sensitive colour and vigorous brushwork. After studying at Glasgow School of Art, where he was a prominent member of the Glasgow School of Art Students’ Association, he went into teaching as Principal in Art and Design at Campbeltown Grammar School and was particularly inspired by the village of Machrihanish, its dunes and golf course, and by the Iona Cross at Campbeltown’s quay head. Crawford exhibited widely, including at the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts. He produced a significant number of cityscapes, including Glasgow tenements, as well as landscapes, still lives and portraiture. His principal subject was the west coast – from Kintyre to the Hebrides. Later in his career, John Crawford was to become Principal Adviser of Art and Design to Highland Region, where his impact on art education is widely recognised. The village of Strathpeffer where he lived acted as a centre for his visits to schools, art classes and amateur groups throughout the region. In the early 1990s Crawford took early retirement after 28 years of dedicated service to art education so that he could devote himself entirely to his art. He remained in Strathpeffer and left in 2003 to focus on painting the East Neuk around Lossiemouth. He died in 2005, aged 73, at Lossiemouth.