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

82 62 Louis le Brocquy HRHA (1916-2012) LEMON GROWING, 1993 oil on canvas signed lower right; signed, dated and numbered [615] on reverse; also with Taylor Galleries label on reverse 10.75 by 14in. (27.3 by 35.6cm) Frame Size: 19 by 22.25in. (48.3 by 56.5cm) Provenance: Taylor Galleries, Dublin; Private collection; Whyte’s, 29 September 2008, lot 51; Private collection Exhibired: ‘Louis le Brocquy: Studies of Fruit’, Taylor Galleries, Dublin, 16 December 1993 to 15 January 1994, catalogue no. 16 “I once came across a Chinese acupuncturist on French television who seemingly could alter the metabolism of a growing lemon as effectively as that of a human being. I was fascinated. For years I had myself been trying to realise the interiority of lemons and other fruit throughout the ‘Presence’ period and beyond - trying to discover some image of their inner reality. It would seem that life, in its multiplicity of forms, is one.” 1 The present painting, Lemon Growing, 1993, belongs to the Life and Still-Life series (c.1981- 1992) a period which lies between the Portrait Head (c.1975-2005) and the later Procession series (1984-1992) within the artist’s oeuvre. The 1980s, however, was not the artist’s first time to explore the genre, in fact it would appear le Brocquy pursued the subject throughout his career from as early as the 1940s, through to the 1960s when single pieces of fruit were explored against dark backgrounds. This approach progressed and developed into the 1970s all in tandem with his other bodies of work. Like with his Presences and Heads series, in Lemon Growing, the artist employs a variety of techniques to convey the inner reality or the essence of his subject. The act of painting appears more like a journey of discovery, an excavation rather than a composition, with areas of the canvas - particularly, in this case, to the left and foreground - giving the appearance of being barely painted. Dynamic brushstrokes add to this and create translucent layering across the canvas. Apart from the punchy, dash of yellow to the lemon and its deliberate outline in blues, greens and purple the paint strokes elsewhere appear more like watercolour stains rather than an application of the robust medium of oil paint. This delicate handling of the medium and the fluid use of line reinforce the sense that the subject is not static but rather existing in a continuum. Other significant examples from this series can be found in the collection of the Crawford Art Gallery, Cork and Glebe House and Gallery, Donegal. The present work is numbered 615 in the artist’s oeuvre and was included in a major solo exhibition by le Brocquy at the Taylor Galleries, Dublin in 1994. Adelle Hughes, February 2023 Footnote: 1 Louis le Brocquy quoted by Caoimhín Mac Giolla Léith, ‘The Human Image Paintings of Louis le Brocquy’, Notes, le Brocquy Archive, 2002. €20,000-€30,000 (£17,700-£26,550 approx.) Click here for more images and to bid on this lot62