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WHYTES
SINCE 1783
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Aloysius C. O’Kelly (1853-1936)
FISHING BOATS AT CONCARNEAU, FRANCE
oil on canvas
signed lower right
17 by 21.75in. (43.18 by 55.25cm)
Provenance:
Family of the artist
The most prolific subject of O’Kelly’s career was Brittany.This painting was set in Concarneau, the most
important fishing village of Cornouaille, just outside the fortified walls of the Ville Close, to which O’Kelly
returned over and over from the 1880s to the 1920s. He was drawn time and again to the working
harbour, and his paintings of Breton peasants display empathy with the hardworking fishermen and
sardine factory workers of the region, just like his paintings of Irish peasants of the west of Ireland.
This painting exudes spontaneity, especially in the handling of the blue and madder sails, and the
reflections in the translucent water; it is nonetheless carefully structured on the axis of the foreshortened
fishing boats.
Professor Niamh O’Sullivan, Dublin, October 2014
€
5,000-
€
7,000 (£4,000-£5,600 approx)