65
Colin Middleton MBE RHA RUA (1910-1983)
Estimate:
€10,000 - €15,000
Sold
€13,000
Live Auction
Irish & International Art
Size
23 by 23in. (58.4 by 58.4cm)
Description
Title: EARLY MORNING IN DUNDRUM, 1964
Note: Early Morning: Dundrum is likely to have been the painting of the same title included in Colin Middleton's 1965 exhibition at the Ritchie Hendriks Gallery in Dublin. It was one of three paintings included that were inspired by this picturesque village near the Mournes, completed at a time when the Middleton family kept their caravan in that area for holidays. The 1965 exhibition charts a move in Middleton's landscape painting, a topographical change from north Antrim to County Down which also marked a shift in his interests as a painter. The austerity and abstraction inspired in his work at the beginning of this decade by the specific geological nature of County Antrim, slowly gives way to a treatment of the landscape where pictorial structure and technique is also driven by more transitory effects of light and weather. These would become even more central in Middleton's paintings around Lough Erne later in the decade.Early Morning: Dundrum demonstrates the manner in which Middleton was exploring this changing language. A diverse range of repeated marks leading the eye towards the horizon expresses the scale and texture of the landscape around the Mournes, while the lighter palette almost recalls Middleton's paintings of the 1950s, as does the impasto in the sky. Dickon Hall, November 2019.
Note: Early Morning: Dundrum is likely to have been the painting of the same title included in Colin Middleton's 1965 exhibition at the Ritchie Hendriks Gallery in Dublin. It was one of three paintings included that were inspired by this picturesque village near the Mournes, completed at a time when the Middleton family kept their caravan in that area for holidays. The 1965 exhibition charts a move in Middleton's landscape painting, a topographical change from north Antrim to County Down which also marked a shift in his interests as a painter. The austerity and abstraction inspired in his work at the beginning of this decade by the specific geological nature of County Antrim, slowly gives way to a treatment of the landscape where pictorial structure and technique is also driven by more transitory effects of light and weather. These would become even more central in Middleton's paintings around Lough Erne later in the decade.Early Morning: Dundrum demonstrates the manner in which Middleton was exploring this changing language. A diverse range of repeated marks leading the eye towards the horizon expresses the scale and texture of the landscape around the Mournes, while the lighter palette almost recalls Middleton's paintings of the 1950s, as does the impasto in the sky. Dickon Hall, November 2019.
Medium
oil on board
Signature
signed with monogram lower right; signed, titled and dated on reverse
Provenance
Tom Caldwell Gallery;Estate of the purchaser
Exhibited
'Colin Middleton', Hendriks Gallery, Dublin, December 1965, catalogie no. 18
