Hunter began to achieve limited success after a trip to the Etaples art colony in northern France in 1914. Here, inspired by French art and the local landscape, he began to develop the style and ability that would later identify him as a colourist. However, the onset of the First World War forced him to return to Scotland, where his work became noticed by Alexander Reid of Reid & Lefevre. In 1915, Hunter held his first one-man exhibition with Reid in Glasgow. Hunter's work at this stage of his career focused primarily on still lifes, inspired by Chardin, Kalf and Manet. During the 1920s, Hunter began to be associated with a group of three other artists: John Duncan Fergusson, F. C. B. Cadell, and Samuel Peploe. The four of them became known as the Scottish Colourists, although the term was not used until 1948, by which time only Fergusson was still alive.