The Sleeping Sea by Jack B. Yeats, at deVere's, Est €100/150,000.
There are a number of exciting paintings coming on the market between now and Christmas. Five works, including four by Jack B Yeats, from the Vincent & Jacqueline O’Brien collection at Adam’s are sure to attract attention, both for the quality of the work and the attractive provenance. Over at deVeres there’s another Jack B Yeats and a striking painting by Colin Middleton. Whyte’s also have a fine Jack B Yeats, The Dust on Thy Chariot Wheel, and a rare work with an interesting history by John Joseph Tracey. And Morgan O’Driscoll continues to offer both quantity and quality, with works by Donald Teskey, Sean Scully, and Elizabeth Magill.
Adam’s Important Irish Art
This auction on December 4 features five important works from the Vincent and Jacqueline O’Brien collection. These include four paintings by Jack B Yeats and a folksy Connemara interior by William Orpen. Given the provenance of the work, and Yeats’s affinity with horses, the painting that will surely arouse most interest is The Horsemen, painted in 1947.
The Horsemen by Jack B. Yeats, at Adam’s, Est €500/800,000.
Yeats’s depictions of horses had two distinct phases. In his earlier illustrative period, paintings such as Strand Races recalled his happy childhood in Sligo, where he would have attended those annual races. When he moved away from illustration to expressionism, the horse took on a different role. It became a symbol of freedom and adventure. The Horsemen belongs to this later period. The other Yeats painting featuring a horse from the O’Brien collection, He Reads a Book, was painted late in the artist’s life and seems to suggest his days of romance and adventure are over. These two magnificent and resonant works are both guiding at €500/800,000.
Morgan O’Driscoll’s Irish Art Online
Like a Bird by Elizabeth Magill at Morgan O’Driscoll
Bidding ends November 25 for this auction, and there are several understated gems on offer. Northern Irish artist Elizabeth Magill is known for her trees, but here she features one of their denizens perched on a wire. Like a Bird is a gorgeous evocation of grace and freedom, with a nod towards Leonard Cohen in its title.
Study Towards an Image of
Delacroix by Louis Le Brocquy
at Morgan O’Driscoll.
For a rendition of an earth-bound creature, there’s no better painter than Basil Blackshaw, renowned for his affection for dogs and horses. The humble donkey gets the loving treatment in Donkey. There is also a chance to own a piece of Sean Scully at a modest price. His etching Raval 7 is a colourful tribute to the neighbourhood in Barcelona where the peripatetic painter lived for a period.
Louis Le Brocquy’s Study Towards an Image of Delacroix is a soulful depiction of the celebrated French romantic artist – best known for his epic painting Liberty Leading the People.
See www.morganodriscoll.com for more.
DeVeres’ Outstanding Irish Art
Jack B Yeats also features in this November 26 sale. The Sleeping Sea is a benign image of a man preparing, perhaps, to take advantage of the conditions and enjoy a swim (guiding at €100/150,000). This auction also has a very evocative example of John Doherty’s photo-realist style: P. L. Dolan & Sons – a shopfront in Birr. Doherty is the poet laureate of faded aspirations and commercial decline in small-town Ireland. This is a meticulously painted record of a once-thriving business. The artlessly cluttered window display and the old-fashioned pumps speak of less sophisticated times. This is guiding at €40/60,000. Also worthy of note is a dramatic painting by the ever-eclectic Colin Middleton. Woman with Jug, Villanova is a prime example of Middleton’s characteristic blend of surrealism and abstraction. It’s guiding at €30/50,000.
Whyte’s Important Irish Art
The Irish Peasant’s Grave by John Joseph Tracey at Whyte’s. Est €15/20,000.
The Irish Peasant’s Grave, on sale at this December 2 auction, has an interesting history. There are two versions of this painting. The other one is located at the Crawford Gallery in Cork. Both versions were attributed to Cork artist Daniel MacDonald until academic Dr. Niamh O’Sullivan repudiated Cork’s claims in favour of the lesser-known John Joseph Tracey – a Dublin-born artist from a modest background. The fact that Tracey’s signature appears on a gravestone in the foreground, albeit faintly, appears to have escaped earlier experts. While the two paintings are very similar in composition, some elements differ. The Whyte’s version includes a Celtic cross and the ruins of an old abbey. The charm of the painting, despite its sombre theme, is in its incidental detail: the careless skull exposed, the blithely indifferent child, and the weary old priest (guiding at €15/20,000).
A Jack B Yeats with the title, The Dust on Thy Chariot Wheel, is also sure to generate a lot of interest. While the shadowy image of the Big Top suggests that this painting is about the circus coming to town, it also casts a cold eye on the vanity of our earthly aspirations. The title is taken from a short poem by Laurence Hope: “Less than the dust, beneath thy Chariot wheel…Even less am I.” Yeats was in his 70s when he painted it, and intimations of mortality were creeping in (guiding at €100/150,000).”
