40
Jack Butler Yeats RHA (1871-1957)
Estimate:
€250,000 - €350,000
Sold
€320,000
Live Auction
The Ernie O'Malley Collection in association with Christie's
Size
18 by 24in. (45.7 by 61cm)
Description
Title: THE FIGHTING DAWN, 1945
Note: Two men, in a fantastic landscape, head out at dawn. One sits in a rowing boat while his companion strides out to join him. This imposing theatrical figure is dressed in a great coat and harlequin trousers. He commands the space as he gazes purposefully into the distance. Hilary Pyle has described these men as ‘republican soldiers’. (1) An O’Malley family anecdote says that it represents Irish Volunteer intelligence men who had dressed up to attend a costume ball at a local Anglo-Irish house in order to glean information. The subject can be related to that of Men of Destiny (1946, National Gallery of Ireland), another painting that refers to republican manoeuvres during the War of Independence. This one also takes place at dawn and features a boat and striding figures. Those in The Fighting Dawn appear to be older and more closely related to the vagabonds and strolling figures that dominate many of Yeats’ later paintings. The painting is dominated by vibrant colours. The faces of the figures are sculpted out of thick blue and pink paint, a myriad of shades make up the neck and face of the striding figure. Their hiding place is made of dark green vegetation with highlights of red and yellow, painted in a series of long strokes. To the right shorter, more random strokes of blues, pinks and yellows evoke the open landscape of the sea, sky and mountain into which the two men venture. The rising sun casts a rosy hew over the water, conveyed in dense pink streaks across its surface. The painting encapsulates the unconventional beauty and vibrancy of the natural world at this moment, when everything comes to life. Its competing colours and moving forms are chaotic and perplexing. The work was bought by Ernie O’Malley directly from Yeats in May 1945, just a few weeks before the opening of the National Loan exhibition. Dr Róisín Kennedy September 2019 1. Hilary Pyle, Jack B. Yeats. A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, Andre Deutsch, 1992, II, p. 630.
Note: Two men, in a fantastic landscape, head out at dawn. One sits in a rowing boat while his companion strides out to join him. This imposing theatrical figure is dressed in a great coat and harlequin trousers. He commands the space as he gazes purposefully into the distance. Hilary Pyle has described these men as ‘republican soldiers’. (1) An O’Malley family anecdote says that it represents Irish Volunteer intelligence men who had dressed up to attend a costume ball at a local Anglo-Irish house in order to glean information. The subject can be related to that of Men of Destiny (1946, National Gallery of Ireland), another painting that refers to republican manoeuvres during the War of Independence. This one also takes place at dawn and features a boat and striding figures. Those in The Fighting Dawn appear to be older and more closely related to the vagabonds and strolling figures that dominate many of Yeats’ later paintings. The painting is dominated by vibrant colours. The faces of the figures are sculpted out of thick blue and pink paint, a myriad of shades make up the neck and face of the striding figure. Their hiding place is made of dark green vegetation with highlights of red and yellow, painted in a series of long strokes. To the right shorter, more random strokes of blues, pinks and yellows evoke the open landscape of the sea, sky and mountain into which the two men venture. The rising sun casts a rosy hew over the water, conveyed in dense pink streaks across its surface. The painting encapsulates the unconventional beauty and vibrancy of the natural world at this moment, when everything comes to life. Its competing colours and moving forms are chaotic and perplexing. The work was bought by Ernie O’Malley directly from Yeats in May 1945, just a few weeks before the opening of the National Loan exhibition. Dr Róisín Kennedy September 2019 1. Hilary Pyle, Jack B. Yeats. A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, Andre Deutsch, 1992, II, p. 630.
Medium
oil on canvas
Signature
signed lower right; titled on reverse
Provenance
Purchased directly from the artist by Ernie O’Malley, May 1945;
Thence by family descent
Literature
Hilary Pyle, Jack B. Yeats: A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, Andre Deutsch, London, 1992, Vol. II, page 630, catalogue no. 697
Exhibited
‘Loan of Paintings from the Collection of Ernie O’Malley’, Limerick Art Gallery, October 1948, catalogue no. 6;
‘Joint Exhibition of Paintings from the Collection of the late Ernie O’Malley and the Yeats Museum’, County Library and Museum, Sligo, 2-20 August 1963, catalogue no. 2 (illustrated);
‘Loan Exhibition’, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Hayden Gallery, Massachusetts, 11 January to 17 February 1965, catalogue no. 47;
‘Jack Yeats: Irish Expressionist’, Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama, 15 March to 30 April, 1980 catalogue no. 47 (illustrated);
