Jack Butler Yeats RHA (1871-1957) Horsemen (1947) Oil on c...

Estimate

€500,000 - €800,000

Jack Butler Yeats RHA (1871-1957) Horsemen (1947) Oil on canvas, 46 x 61cm (18 x 24'') Signed Provenance: Sold to R. McGonigal at the Victor Waddington Galleries exhibition in 1947; G. Marriott, London; with Victor Waddington, London; Collection Vincent and Jacqueline O’Brien, Ireland 1971, thence by descent. Exhibited: Dublin, Victor Waddington Galleries, Paintings, 3-16 October,1947 cat. no.6; London, Victor Waddington Galleries, Paintings, 11 Feb - 13 Mar 1965, cat. no.20 (Illustrated); Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland, on loan from 2017 to 2024. Literature: Hilary Pyle, Jack B. Yeats, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings, Andre Deutsch, London, 1992, cat.no.834, p.752 (illustrated) Set against the dramatic view of Benbulben and the coastline of county Sligo, a man on horseback looks out over the extraordinary scenery. He holds the reins of a second bare backed animal which seems to be equally engaged in looking out towards the strand. Below them in the distance another rider on horseback gallops to the water’s edge. The work relates to several paintings of horses and their riders made by Yeats in 1947. Among Horses (1947, PC) also has a view of Benbulben in the background. Freedom (1947, PC) shows a horse galloping away from its owner. Others include Wind from the Sea, The Race and The Wild Ones and the theme is developed in such late masterpieces as Singing Horseman (1949, NGI) and My Beautiful, My Beautiful, (1953, PC). Yeats’s love of horses began in his childhood in county Sligo and is evident in his early depictions of race meetings and fairs in the West of Ireland in which the horse featured prominently. Its inclusion served to heighten the emotional content of the paintings where a direct connection between man and animal is manifest. Writing of Yeats’s work Thomas MacGreevy noted that ‘There are no lovelier horses in all painting than Jack Yeats’s. They have a miraculous elegance and he has always loved to paint them when they looked as though mere existence was sufficiently exhilarating, …’. [1]In Horsemen the stiff pose of the old man who watches intently is subtly counterbalanced by the relaxed and patient pose of his mount. The almost transparent body of the other horse is formed out of bright orange, white and yellow paint, making the beast appear almost like a phantom. Its legs are delicately moulded out of pigment. The noble animal seems tense and spirited and absorbed in watching the horse and rider below. The juxtaposition of men, horses and spectacular scenery marks the West of Ireland out as an exceptional place where the bond between humankind and nature is exceptionally close. The entire surface of the painting is full of shimmering movement caused by the diversity of brushstrokes and the pulsating application of colour throughout the work. The sky is filled with deep blue and white shapes that turn to dark misty cloud just above the head of the old man. In the centre of the composition the white sand of the beach appears to have been made using a form of decalcomania, a technique whereby a smooth object such as glass in pressed into wet paint and pulled away to create a vivid surface. Elsewhere in the ground beneath the horses’ hooves the paint seems to have been applied by swirling the brush into the canvas creating a visceral plane. Dr. Róisin Kennedy, October 2024 [1] Thomas MacGreevy, Jack B Yeats: An Appreciation and an Interpretation. Dublin: Victor Waddington, 1945. Dr. Róisín Kennedy, October 2024