WHYTE'S IRISH & INTERNATIONAL ART 6 JUNE 2022 AT 6PM

56 40 Jack Butler Yeats RHA (1871-1957) THE READING ROOM, 1935 oil on panel signed lower left; titled on reverse 9 by 14in. (22.9 by 35.6cm) Frame Dimensions: 15.5 by 20.5in. (39.4 by 52.1cm) Provenance: Sold by the artist to Miss Mary Rynne, Greystones, 1941; Thence by descent. Exhibited: ‘Recent Paintings’, Dunthorne, London, 19 March to 15 April 1939, catalogue no. 28; ’Paintings and Drawings’, Kenny Art Gallery, Galway, April 1976, catalogue no. 21 Literature: Pyle, Hilary, Jack B. Yeats, A Catalogue Raisonné of The Oil Paintings, André Deutsch, London, 1992, Vol. I, no. 453, p. 411 The Reading Room, a portrayal of three figures seated in an elegant interior, evokes rest and quiet companionship. The grand table, around which the readers convene, is littered with papers while two large windows open onto expansive views of lawns and the sea with sailing boats in the distance. Yeats told the former owner of the painting that the scene was based on the reading room at a yacht club at Cowes in England. (1) Yeats was exploring interiors in several major paintings of these years including A Room in Sligo (1935), which represents a Victorian chamber with a large window facing onto the street. About to Write a Letter (1935, National Gallery of Ireland) features a dramatic interior of vivid reds and greens in which a man stands over a large table with writing materials to hand. As in The Reading Room, the walls are decorated with framed works of art. The Reading Room most directly anticipates the epic work, An Evening in Spring (1937, Private Collection) (2) , which was acquired by the former IRA commander, Ernie O’Malley. This has a similar composition with a large table surrounded by seated figures and a vast window opening onto a view of the surrounding countryside. The predominantly pink tones of The Reading Room denote calm and silence, its soothing sensations accentuated by the relaxed attitude of the figures in the work. Yeats experimented extensively with colour combinations in his paintings of the mid 1930s, corresponding on its science with Felix Hackett, Professor of Physics at UCD. The men in the painting barely interact with each other or with the literature on the table. One figure, in the left-hand foreground, sits with legs crossed reading his newspaper while the others are not reading at all. One gentleman in a dinner jacket, to the left, holds his head in hand and gazes down at the tabletop. On the other side of the bureau the third guest sits with arms crossed and head bent and appears to be snoozing. The capacious scenery outside the windows behind him may suggest his dreams or the world of imagination beyond the journals and newspapers provided in this space. The build up of form is evident through the visible brushstrokes and the incisions made into its surface in parts. This creates a vibrant painting, full of movement that seems to emanate from the world outside and which gently impedes on the slumbering aura of the reading room and its inhabitants. Dr Roísín Kennedy May 2022 1. H Pyle, Jack B. Yeats. A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, I, p. 411. 2. Sold at Whyte’s & Christie’s as Lot 30, 25 November 2019 for €1.3 million. €70,000-€90,000 (£59,830-£76,920 approx.) Click here for more images and to bid on this lot40