Adam Sherriff Scott

Adam Sherriff Scott (July 18, 1887 – October 23, 1980) was a Canadian painter, often of portraits and historical or genre scenes, and a muralist. As a result of his ability to depict vivid historical scenes after considerable research in books, he received commissions for portraits, posters, murals and paintings that were reproduced in history books and calendars. Among these were paintings for calendar illustrations of Canadian historical scenes for the Hudson's Bay Company Calendars. These paintings were auctioned in 2025 at a special sale caused by the closing of the company. The portraits and other subjects he created for war posters are in the collection of the Canadian War Museum.

Upon returning to Montreal in 1919, he resumed his career, then in 1921 joined the Beaver Hall Group. In the 1920s, he travelled to the Canadian Far North and the Arctic and remained there for several years painting Inuit life. He exhibited his work from 1927 to 1954 with the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts,

His Fonds, the Adam Sherriff Scott collection, is in Library and Archives Canada.

Selected public collections

Scott's work is in the National Gallery of Canada, the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Canadian War Museum, and other institutions.

Murals Scott painted many murals for companies and clubs such as two in 1927, one for the Hudson's Bay Company Store at Portage Avenue Branch titled The Pioneer at Fort Garry, 1861 (now in the Manitoba Museum) and a second one, the Building of St. Charles (Manitoba Provincial Archives), both in Winnipeg. He also painted murals for Montreal and Quebec institutions such as the Masonic Temple of Montreal, a National Historic Site of Canada, the Richelieu Manor (now the Fairmont Richelieu Manor) in La Malbaie (1927)

The painting which sold for the highest price was lot 003, Scott's Chief Trader Archibald McDonald Descending the Fraser, 1828, oil on canvas, 32 x 26 in, 81.3 x 66 cm, Estimate: $7,000 - $9,000 CAD, which sold for: $361,250 (including Buyer's Premium). Another painting by Scott, Trading Ceremony at York Factory, 1780s, oil on canvas, circa 1954, 32 x 28 in, 81.3 x 71.1 cm, Estimate: $6,000 - $8,000 CAD, sold for: $97,250. Although the catalogue cautioned in an essay on Trading Ceremony, its "valorization of British iconography and idealized view of the trade relationship", the price realized suggests that buyers liked the work.

“Pioneer at Fort Garry 1861” – oil on canvas by Adam Sherriff Scott assisted by E.T. Adney, May 1927