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WHYTES
SINCE 1783
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39
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SIN E 1783
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Colin Middleton MBE RHA (1910-1983)
THE WITCH OF MULLAGHDERG (WESTERNESS CYCLE FROM
FINNEGAN’S WAKE), 1975
oil on board
signed lower right; signed again, dated and inscribed with title
on reverse; with David Hendriks framing label also on reverse
24.25 by 24.25in. (61.60 by 61.60cm)
Provenance:
Collection of Mrs Irene Calvert MP since 1952;
Thence by descent
Exhibited:
‘’Colin Middleton Exhibition’’, David Hendriks Gallery, March-
April 1976, catalogue no. 13
‘’Personal Choice Exhibition’’, Butler Gallery, Kilkenny, May-June
1982
Literature:
‘Living with Art: David Hendriks’’, edited by Gordon Lambert
(1985), full page illustration p.46.
The Witch of Mullaghderg was painted in 1975 and formed part of the
Westerness Series in which Colin Middleton revisited many of the ideas
and themes that had dominated earlier periods of his work. After the
very international vision of the Wilderness Series that preceded it,
inspired by Middleton’s travels to Spain, Australia and South America,
the Westerness paintings found their inspiration in Irish literature,
landscape, myth and legend.
Within these works Middleton integrated certain elements of the
surrealist playfulness of the Wilderness paintings, their combination of
creating drama within a shallow area while suggesting a vast empty
space behind, and the carefully prepared boards on which he had
begun to paint.The conception of the work appears to be quite
different, however; the title of the Westerness series is drawn from
Finnegan’s Wake and throughout the relatively small cycle of paintings,
Middleton returns to the female archetype to explore ideas around the
duality of human nature, the difficulty of rationalising the co-existence
of the material and spiritual within our lives, as well as our own
relationship to the landscape we live in, both its physical terrain and its
power in myth and memory.
In the present painting, the highly abstracted figure of the witch
dominates the painting entirely, the highly abstracted folded material
of her long train reaches across the picture space as she appears to
hover, barely touching the ground, offering a playing card towards the
viewer. Although The Witch of Mullaghderg does refer to a specific
place, it has less sense of the landscape or the natural world than some
of the other Westerness works and its ambiguity and playfulness recalls
Middleton’s earlier surrealist paintings.
Dickon Hall, Belfast, November 2014.
Dickon Hall is a Belfast based art dealer and writer. Since completing an
MA at the Courtauld Institute of Art he has curated numerous
exhibitions in London, Belfast and Dublin. He has published
monographs on Colin Middleton and Nevill Johnson and has written
extensively on twentieth century and contemporary art.
€
20,000-
€
30,000 (£16,000-£24,000 approx)