Important Irish Art
,
wednesday !"th May !#$% at &pm
169
173
Patrick Leonard HRHA (1918-2005)
Figures on a Moonlit Beach
Oil on panel, 50 x 60cm (19" x 24”)
Signed
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174
Fergus O’Ryan RHA (1911-1989)
Repairing Nets, Peñiscola
Oil on board, 20 x 27.5cm (7$ x 10$”)
Signed and inscribed with title
Peñiscola is a small town on the Costa del Azahar on theMediterranean
coast of Spain. It is known locally as the ‘City in the Sea’ as it is joined
to the mainland by a narrow strip of land.
!e subject of this work is unusual for O’Ryan; here he depicts everyday
life in a small &shing village in Spain on a very intimate scale. Local
women sit casually doing their daily work, mending &shing nets beside
white washed buildings.!e two woman to the background engage in
chit chat while working and a rich Mediterranean light %oods through
the middle ground and top right corner.
!roughout his career O’Ryan rarely exhibited foreign landscapes
concentrating primarily on views of his homeland. In 1969 he travelled
to Greece via France and Italy on a painting holiday with fellow RHA
members Brett McEntagart and James Nolan; however he did not
produce any work on the three month trip. He said of this that there
was no market for foreign subject matter in the Dublin galleries.
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