Whyte's IMPORTANT IRISH ART 6 MARCH 2023 AT 6PM

70 53 Daniel O’Neill (1920-1974) MOTHER AND CHILD oil on canvas laid on board signed lower left 16 by 20in. (40.6 by 50.8cm) Frame Size: 23 by 27in. (58.4 by 68.6cm) O’Neill was a consummate figurative artist often drawing upon the Italian tradition for his stylistic treatment of female figures; ‘Mother and Child’ is a recurrent theme in his work. He regularly painted females, taken out of time in historical and exotic clothing in both interior and landscape settings. The two figures in this painting have the appearance of native Americans, as their style of dress and dark complexion would imply. Gone are the richly textured displays of flowers and turbulent foreboding skies as in other works. In this painting everything is pared back to an essential presence. As far as I know O’Neill never visited North America, although Waddington exhibited his work in Montreal and Boston. It seems likely the composition of this painting was based on a travel photograph where the sitters originally posed for a photographer and O’Neill, in turn, saw the painterly possibilities and adopted and transformed it accordingly. The resulting work, at first, appears untypical of the artist, but on closer examination there are the characteristic stylised faces and the oval-shaped eyes. There is, too, the depiction of light on the mother’s legs and arm, by way of his favoured tones of blue. We are no longer in a northern temperate climate which dissipates form and where skies are often in constant flux, as in Ireland, but in a climate that emphasises form. There is a stark contrast here between light and shade. The composition is simply rendered and structured. The horizon line is set low below a cloudless uniformly blue sky, allowing for focus on the two figures. Both figures are protected from the strong sunlight on an elevated desert-like, arid and sparse foreground. They sit under an awning with supporting poles which frame and shelter the central subjects in the composition. The mother wears a plain dress and head band and the child a more decorative dress. Both retain a dignified reserve, also typical of O’Neill, looking directly at the viewer - culturally rooted, proud and assured. Prof. Liam Kelly February 2023 €15,000-€20,000 (£13,270-£17,700 approx.) Click here for more images and to bid on this lot53