
Originally, he began honing his craft as a portraitist before specializing in landscape painting. He is best known for his genre painting of interior scenes, created with his light and airy brushwork in an impressionist style. He exhibited his works, which were well received at the Royal Scottish Academy, as well as the Royal Academy, and won the acclaimed Maclaine Watters medal in 1878. Patrick Adam died in North Berwick in 1929.