James Muir Auld

Auld studied under J. S. Watkins and Julian Ashton, and began to exhibit at the Royal Art Society of New South Wales around 1906.

Towards the end of his life Auld spent 11 years at Thirlmere, New South Wales, living alone.

Auld recalled the impact of the 1930s Great Depression caused him the 'desolation of his soul', at Dee Why, where there were no buyers with money for his pictures.

[4] It was his brother-in-law, solicitor Frederick H. Greaves who then acquired the four-room 'shack' at Thirlmere for Auld, who took up an artist-hermit existence.

Auld drew the covers for two anthologies, 'Fair girls' (1914) and 'Gray horses' (1914), of Scottish-Australian poet and bush balladeer Will H. Ogilvie (1869–1963).

For the Archibald Prize, Auld made several submissions: His best works were considered to include 'Skydrift-Thirlmere' (1942), 'Cloudlands' (1942), 'Cloud Shadows' (1941), and 'Autumn Day' (1941), and also 'Bushland Peace' and the earlier paintings, 'Winter Morning', 'Thirlmere Landscape' and an excellent portrait of a young girl.