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Frank McKelvey RHA RUA (1895-1974)
Camlough Fair, the Clinching Bid
Oil on board, 33 x 39cm (13 x 15"”)
Signed and dated 1924, inscribed with title verso. Bell Gallery label verso
Provenance: From the estate of the late James Gibson
Camlough, meaning ‘Crooked Lake’ in Irish, is a few miles from McKelvey’s wife
Elizabeth Murphy’s homeplace, a farm, at Bessbrook, Co. Armagh and this work
was painted the year that they got married (6th Feb 1924) at Craigavad, Co. Down.
In their time, the fair towns were very important, places the population concen-
trated on, and people walked for miles on a fair day to sell their produce. Camlough
is one of thirty towns listed in Co. Armagh as fair towns in Wilson’s Directory of
Ireland, 1834. ‘
Camlough Fair, the Clinching Bid’
is a superb work by the artist. It
channels some of the principal motifs of impressionism - the play of light, the
%eeting moment, a general mood - into a perfectly rendered composition. Every
element is carefully orchestrated and the result is a pleasure for the eye to peruse.
!e &gure group in the left foreground initially draws the viewer’s gaze. !ese
men in their coats are treated in a manner akin to the early work of Jack B Yeats.
!ey are depicted on a neutral backdrop to highlight the point of the handshake,
the deal being struck. !is action is observed by the lady in pro&le and the man
adjacent, and the composition naturally invites the viewer to look on from the side-
lines. !e light in this painting shows McKelvey at his best, capturing the essence
of a summer’s day and the event of the Fair Day; the sheep practically glow as do
the cattle beyond as these animals are bathed in light. To further demonstrate the
bustle and activity in Camlough, McKelvey introduces a range of colours before the
terraced houses to indicate the crowds of people enjoying the proceedings. Shafts
of light again streak across the terraced facade and enliven the painting further. !e
trees are much looser than in McKelvey’s other work of the time, but this is a well-
informed deviation as the composition is already su(ciently developed. !is is a
key work in the artist’s oeuvre. McKelvey has made another work on this subject
Fair Day at Camlough, Co. Armagh
, a &ne watercolour on paper of a similar scene
from another angle. It also comprises of two principal groups, one to fore, and one
to the left, to unify the composition. In his work ‘
Market Scene
’ c1935, painted a
decade after the featured painting, the work is looser and is concerned with portray-
ing an overall mood of a market town, rather than a de&nitive place or transaction.
McKelvey continued to capture this subject on occasion, his latest known work ‘
!e
Cattle Fair’
painted in 1971.
Marianne O’Kane Boal
!&',### - &),###
