Otto Theodore Leyde, R.S.A., R.S.W, was born in Prussia, in 1835, and studied at the Royal Academy of the Fine Arts at Keenigsberg under Professor Rossenfelder.
At the age of nineteen he came to Edinburgh, where he worked as a lithographic artist. He became a naturalized subject of her Majesty, devoted himself to painting, both in oils and watercolors and in 1858 exhibited for the first time in the Royal Scottish Academy.
Among his subject pictures are “The Toon’s Drummer” (1868), “The Return” (1878), “The Auld Sang” (1869), and his diploma picture, “Auld Robin Gray ” (1880). His portraits include “Sir Thomas Jamieson Boyd” (1873), now in the Merchant Company Hall, “The Countess of Wemyss” (1877), “The Countess of Dalhousie,” “Major-General Annesley,’ and “The Hon. Mrs. Cheape.”
He was elected an Associate of the Royal Scottish Academy in 1870, and ten years later an Academician. Since 1886 he ably discharged the duties of Librarian of the Academy. He died on 11th January.