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Paul Henry RHA (1876-1958)
WEST OF IRELAND ROAD THROUGH THE BOG, c.1932-1935
oil on board
signed lower right
13 x 15in. (33.02 x 38.10cm)
Provenance:
In the ownership of the present family for approximately fifty years
The overall light tone of this painting suggests a date of c.1932-5. The mountain seen in the background,
given this date, is likely to be in Co. Kerry, rather than Connemara. The scene might even have been painted
on the Dingle Peninsula, which Henry visited in 1935 (cf. The Mountain Road, S. B. Kennedy, Paul Henry:
with a catalogue of the Paintings, Drawings, Illustrations, Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2007,
p. 270, catalogue no. 856) to work on his Iveragh pictures (Kennedy, ‘Paul Henry’s Iveragh Pictures’ in John
Crowley & John Sheehan, The Iveragh Peninsula, Cork University Press, 2009, pp. 441-4.)
The use of very fluid paint on the roadway and elsewhere also suggests a date of the early 1930s when the
artist’s mood - which is clearly reflected in his work - was lighter than it had been for most of the previous
decade. The mountain, with its shoulder to the left, is also similar to The Mountain Road picture. In charac-
teristic Henry fashion almost half of the picture plane is given to the sky, with its mixture of heavy cumulous
clouds, which are not yet ominous, and the lighter cirrus clouds which are much higher.
West of Ireland Road Through The Bog is numbered 1304 in S. B. Kennedy’s ongoing cataloguing of Paul
Henry’s oeuvre.
Dr. S.B. Kennedy
April 2016
€50,000-€70,000 (£39,370-£55,120 approx.)
Large Image & Place Bid Lot 22