WHYTE'S IRISH & INTERNATIONAL ART 29 MAY 2023 AT 6PM

52 30 Basil Blackshaw HRHA RUA (1932-2016) PRATIE FIELD, NEAR MAGHERAFELT, COUNTY DERRY, 1953 oil on board signed and dated upper left 22.75 by 29in. (57.8 by 73.7cm) Frame Size: 25 by 31in. (63.5 by 78.7cm) Provenance: Acquired directly from the artist, circa 1956; Collection of Ronald Cooper, Auckland, New Zealand; Thence by descent Ronald Cooper was married to Jospehine Cooper (neé Blackshaw), the artist’s first cousin. Cooper writes in his autobiography: ”There were two paintings that I particularly liked. Both were executed in various tones of brown and ochre colours with lighter highlights. One was of an old, bent over man walking along a long country road with a tethered goat trailing behind him. They were walking to the light and but for a light horizon, the rest of the sky was heavy and stormy. The other was of a large freshly ploughed potato field, a ‘pratie field’ as the locals described them, moving out towards a small hillock with two groups of windswept trees on it. There was a crack of light on the horizon but the rest of the sky was like in the other painting, heavy and stormy. Basil described them both as powerful paintings, in fact, that was a favourite expression of his and I wholly agreed with him......…[he] offered me four small paintings and one large oil painting and asked if I would like to take them back with me. Wow! Would I ever! I almost got on to my knees to thank him, for the large painting was actually the one of the ploughed potato field (a pratie field) that I had really liked when he showed it to me earlier on in the week […] The fourth picture was an oil painting of a horse inside an old stable” €10,000-€15,000 (£8,770-£13,160 approx.) Click here for more images and to bid on this lot30