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13
Seán O’Sullivan RHA (1906-1964)
The Emigrants Return
Oil on canvas, 71 x 91.5cm (28 x 36”)
Signed
Provenance: Commissioned by John P. Reihill Sr. directly from the artist c.1962; Deepwell, Blackrock, Co. Dublin
Exhibited: RHA Annual Exhibition, Dublin, 1963, Cat. No. 27, under the title ‘Interior, Gaeltacht ‘
O’Sullivan was an extraordinarily talented artist who could
turn his hand to any medium. Although perhaps bet-
ter-known as a portrait painter, he was a keen observer of life
on the western seaboard of Ireland. He painted the landscape
and people, both young and old, of Connemara and Kerry.
Here we have a companion piece to
The Old Couple
(Sold
these rooms Important Irish Art Sale December 2012 Lot 52
for €40,000) which had been commissioned from the artist
20 years earlier. We again have a humble cottage interior but
taking centre stage is the young daughter home from Amer-
ica with her smart emerald green dress and silk stockings .
This work had been commissioned by John P. Reihill Snr
and the story according to his son is that he paid O’Sulli-
van on the drip with John Jr calling to the artists studio to
inspect the painting on a weekly basis; and if he felt there
had been sufficient work completed in the previous week he
was to hand over a stipend. Of course there were many weeks
when nothing had been done as O’ Sullivan notoriously dis-
appeared off to local establishments with his previous weeks
stipend. A row ensued and out of pure devilment O’Sullivan
exhibited the work , incomplete as it is today , in the annual
Royal Hibernian Academy Exhibition in 1963 titled
Interior,
Gaeltacht.
Another commission that exhibited at the RHA
that year was a portrait of John P. Reihill Snr’s daughter
Mrs
Tempany
(Cat. No. 93).This is thought to be the final subject
painting completed by O’Sullivan before his death in 1964.
Like
The Old Couple
O’Sullivan completed a number of stud-
ies for this work several of which were included in the “Sean
O’Sullivan” sale in these rooms May 2012 including Lot 22
which was a study for the old woman on the left.
O’Sullivan was born in 44 St Joseph’s Terrace, South Circular
Road, and later raised in 126 St Stephen’s Green in Dublin,
where his father, John, ran a business as a carpenter and joiner.
He was educated with the Christian Brothers’ at Synge Street.
Measuring over six feet, he was a good boxer, a fencer, a squash
player and an enthusiastic sailor. He was also a keen reader and
was fluent in both Irish and French. O’Sullivan entered the
Dublin Metropolitan School of Art in 1926 where one of his
teachers was Seán Keating. His student days were intermittent
but while at the school O’Sullivan came to the attention of the
then Headmaster, George Atkinson, who arranged for him to
undertake a three month training course in lithography at the
Central School of Arts and Crafts in London under Archibold
Standish Hartrick.
While in London, O’Sullivan met and later married a young
Anglo-Dutch art student, Rene Mouw, and the pair spent their
early married years studying in Paris. He then worked as a li-
thographer with Frank Brangwyn having returned to London
in the late 1920s. The couple returned to Dublin in the early
1930s and in 1936 O’Sullivan took a studio at Molesworth
Street where he remained until he moved to 6 St Stephen’s
Green in 1939. He remained in that studio until his death in
1964. Working in the centre of Dublin meant that O’Sullivan
was well-connected in the social scene at the time. He was
on friendly terms with many of Ireland’s best-known writers,
actors, poets and painters including Keating, Hilda Van Stoc-
kum, Maurice MacGonigal, Harry Kernoff, Patrick Kavanagh,
Myles na gCopaleen, F.R. Higgins and John Ryan.
Our thanks to Dr Éimear O’Connor HRHA on whose writ-
ings much of this note is based.
€4,000 - 6,000
