34
WHYTES
SINCE 1783
,
40
A
Cecil ffrench Salkeld ARHA
(1904-1969)
MOTHER AND CHILD
oil on canvas laid on board
signed lower right
17
by 14.25in. (43.18 by 36.20cm)
Provenance (lots 40A and 41):
Collection of Lady Nelson;
Collection of Cyril McKeown;
Private collection
As a member of the Dublin Painters group, as well as a
poet, playwright, dramatist, broadcaster, philosopher and
owner of the Gayfield Press, Cecil Salkeld was at the
forefront of the avant-garde in Irish arts and literature.
He was a Renaissance man of his time who interlinked the
arts in a way which he had observed in Germany but which
was entirely forward-thinking for Ireland at the time.
Salkeld’s mother was an actress with the Abbey Theatre as
well as a poet and playwright. His daughter Beatrice was
married to Brendan Behan while his other daughter also
pursued a career on the stage. He was producer of radio
programmes on the arts, director of cultural events for An
Tostal as well as director of the Irish National Ballet. Salkeld,
who was born in India, studied art in Germany at Kassell
Kunstchule in the early 1920s under Ewald Dülberg, whose
style was in the manner of the Rheinland Primitives.There
he also came under the influence of Otto Dix and the New
Objectivity movement and upon returning to Dublin, he
aligned himself immediately with the modernists, adapting
his style to contemporary life in the Irish capital. He
exhibited with the New Irish Salon and the Radical
Painters’ Group among others.
Both lots in this sale are painted in the artist’s usual austere
manner and demonstrate his unique style and smooth
handling of paint.While lot 40A demonstrates his fondness
for feminine subject matter, the latter shows his ties to the
stage. Reviewing an exhibition of his at the Victor
Waddington Galleries in 1945, the
Dublin Magazine
commented on Salkeld’s “original, sombre palette,
intellectually rather than emotionally conceived”.
The artist’s best known work is his mural, a triptych
completed in 1942, in Davy Byrne’s pub, Dublin.
€
2,500-
€
3,500 (
£2,000-£2,800 approx)
41
Cecil ffrench Salkeld ARHA
(1904-1969)
THE AUDITION
oil on canvas board
signed lower left
17.25
by 21.25in. (43.82 by 53.98cm)
The location for the scene is thought to be the Abbey
Theatre, Dublin.
€
3,000-
€
5,000 (
£2,500-£4,000 approx)