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Gerard Dillon (1916-1971)
AFTER THE BLITZ BELFAST
oil on canvas laid board
12 x 15in. (30.48 x 38.10cm)
Provenance:
Family of the artist
Gerard Dillon’s paintings of war-torn Belfast were among those exhibited at his first exhibition held
in Dublin and opened by Mainie Jellett at the Country Shop in St. Stephen’s Green on 23 February
1942. James White describes how Jellett, “ recognised his possibilities. She instantly responded to his
sincerity and intensity and his uncompromising manner of expressing his distaste for photographic
representation.”(1) In her opening address Jellett pointed out, “ what courage a young man required
‘to launch out on a painting career at a time like this, with the forces of destruction rampant, whilst the
forces of construction were struggling for life’. Among the works on this theme shown in Dublin were:
Result of a Raid, Bombed Street and Blitzed Landscape. White continues, ‘All of his pictures produced at
this time reflect his gift of reportage, combined with his eye for significant shapes, both of people and
places...’. (2)
The Belfast Blitz comprised four attacks by the German Luftwaffe on strategic targets in the city in April
and May 1941 during WorldWar II. In the present example Dillon paints his emotional response to the
destruction of the city seen in the crumbling red bricked walls, rubble and toppling electricity wire.
The dark figures of the shawled women and the bleakness of the almost post-apocalyptic scene are
highlighted by the inclusion of a small boy dressed in a red cap and coat holding his mother’s hand.
The green, white and orange (tricolour) painted against the exposed end wall in the top right of the
composition provides the only other source of colour and is perhaps a nod to Dillon’s Catholic Nationalist
upbringing and the area of Belfast depicted.
1.
White, James, Gerard Dillon, An Illustrated Biography, Wolfhound Press, Dublin, 1994, p.41
2.
Ibid., p.41
€12000-€15000 (£10260-£12820 approx.)
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