46
62
Paul Henry
KEEL VILLAGE,
oil on canvas
signed lower le
18 by 20in. (45.
Provenance:
Private collecti
Adam’s, 28 May
Whence purcha
Exhibited:
‘Paintings by M
Russell (AE), Lei
Literature:
Kennedy, S.B.,
P
London, 2007, c
In original Waddi
The form of the si
signify that this c
August 1911.The
seen from the hig
the middle distan
moderate impast
painting at this ti
blues and greys t
influence that wo
foreground, is ch
composition of t
is larger, althoug
excitement at his
Dr SB Kennedy
February 2013
!
50,000-
!
70,0
WHYTES
SINCE 1783
,
114
William Crozier HRHA (1930-2011)
MIDNIGHT IN SUMMER, 1989
oil on canvas
signed lower left; signed again, titled and dated on reverse
42 by 45in. (106.68 by 114.30cm)
Provenance:
West Cork Arts Centre, Cork;
Private collection
Midnight in Summer is one of a group of powerful works executed by the artist in 1989 that were notable for
a bravura drawing style and visceral juxtapositions of colour, anchored in a rigid, formal structure. With these
formal means William Crozier created a new and wholly distinctive approach to the painting of the Irish
landscape in the 1980s.
At this period the artist divided his time between studios in West Cork and in Hampshire. Two years before,
Crozier had given up his teaching responsibilities as Professor at Winchester School of Art to devote himself
exclusively to his painting, and this, together with the recent purchase of a house and studio in West Cork, and
a settled domestic life, led to a reinvigorated, concentrated period of art making. These were the circumstances
that gave Crozierʼs painting of the late 1980s and 1990s a new freedom and assurance and the results were
some of the most iconic Crozier landscape images, of which Midnight in Summer is one.
This painting, like The Ripe Field (1989) in the Crawford Art Gallery permanent collection, though the result of
a dynamic relationship with the landscape is, paradoxically, no naturalistic image. As the artist wrote of his
work at this time, ʻThe thing seen must be the detonator which explodes the imagination and creates the
energy to sustain a singular passion.ʼ
1
A further influence on the artist discernible in this painting, came from
his assimilation of icon painting. Earlier in the 1980s, in 1982 and in 1985, Crozier had visited Moscow and St
Petersburg, where he had been overwhelmed by the transcendental power of Russian icon painting. “Icons
changed my view of everything” he wrote, “Itʼs like looking through an emotional mirror, like the mirror in
Cocteauʼs film of Orphee.”
2
We are grateful for the assistance of Professor Katharine Crouan in cataloguing this work.
1
Stet. No 8 Winter 1991
2
ʻBebop and the Bullfightʼ William Crozier in conversation with Emily Mark Fitzgerald, in Collaborations and Conversations
Stoney Road Press, Dublin, 2007. P 31-32
€
12,000-
€
15,000 (£10,080-£12,610 approx.)
