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Gerard Dillon (1916 - 1971)
Aran Woman and Child
Oil on board, 38 x 28cm (15 x 11”)
Signed
Living in Dublin during the War, Dillon frequented The Country Shop, where he held his first solo exhibition in
1942, opened by Mainie Jellett. The artist would have seen Aran scenes by Elizabeth Rivers and Basil Rákóczi, which
may well have prompted him to travel to the area sometime towards the end of summer 1944.
Dillon’s fascination for the West of Ireland began years earlier when he saw Sean Keating’s illustrations for The Play-
boy of The Western World, which he claimed were the first things that made him want to paint.
A label on the reverse of this work suggests the painting was executed in 1942 but we know that Dillon didn’t make
any trip to Aran before 1944. The dominant figure in the foreground, and diagonal brush strokes in the sky area are
characteristics of Dillon’s style from this period. In the 1940’s and 50’s another typical feature of Dillon’s works depict
old style farmhouses, the long low buildings with white walls and roofs of brown or yellow thatch.
In 1944 Dillon wrote a long letter to his close friend Madge Connolly in London with illustrations of the Pier and
the Village pub, Kilronan, Inishmore, adding, “I got to Aran Islands…my god it was the most glorious holiday I’ve
ever had… What a change away from the world completely and absolute peace living a very natural almost primitive
life from day to day not knowing what day of the week it is. Hearing no news except a scrap every day the boat arrived
from Galway once a week.”
Living with Pat Mullen on Frenchman’s Beach, Dillon became a familiar figure in the community. He observed the
innocence of the children in works “
Little boy Playing God
, “
Playing Games, Inishmore”
and here, a stranger to his sub-
ject, a child expresses coyness towards him. Aran Boys and girls wore clothes similar to their Mothers until they were
teenagers, which may be related to the folklore superstition that fairies stole young boys thus Mothers dressed their
sons as girls. Another explanation may have been a more practical one; a standard size flannel frock fitted every child
and Mothers generally made their children’s clothes from her cut down cast-offs.
With a forlorn expression, a mother holds her child’s hand with sea and cottages in the distance. Wearing a heavy
woolen shawl, the mother’s head is covered thus giving the shawl an appearance of a cloak, which acted as protection
against prevailing winds and rain showers. The Islanders were hardy, wild and independent folk who had developed a
survival system of total self-sufficiency. Dillon has depicted the life of this Aran mother and child as he expressed in
his letter “in a very natural almost primitive life.”
Although Dillon’s style changed in the late 1940’s, 50’s and 1960’s he always retained a keen interest in the narrative
in his West of Ireland paintings. With the decline of families speaking the Irish language in the 1960’s, Dillon’s Aran
paintings are a record of another era where Islanders lived without gas heating, modern technology and daily boat
visits from tourists.
Karen Reihill, March 2015
€6,000 - 8,000