Adams Important Irish Art 2nd December 2015 : You can Download a PDF Version from the Bottom Menu Down Arrow Icon

Motherhood

Crayon on card, 48 x 37cm (19 x 14½”)

Signed; inscribed with title on artist’s label verso

‘You Conor were the first of painting men

whose art persuaded my young eyes to see

the shapes and colours which give quiddity

to the strange bustling world about me then;

and if I recall those days again,

yours are the shadows which accompany me

the shawled girls linked and stepping measuredly

the heavy footed tread of Islandmen…’

(Extract from The Collected Poems of John Hewitt, Blackstaff Press, Belfast, 1991, 225)

In 1957, John Hewitt wrote of Conor’s ‘abundant humanity’, in his representations. ‘For, in an epoch in which art has been much

concerned with abstraction and fantasy, Conor has kept too the representation of human life and movement as “the main region

of his song”. (88, Art in Ulster I, 1977). Conor was an artist of the people to such an extent that he immersed himself in their midst

and was as subtle as possible in his observations of human interaction to get the most accurate and naturalistic representations

achievable. As John Hewitt has documented Conor was accustomed to making studies and sketches behind a folded newspaper

so ‘not to disconcert his subjects as he wandered around the streets. (88)

In ‘

Motherhood’

, Conor has captured an intimate moment between mother and child. Both figures are smiling while watching a

happening beyond the picture’s edge. The crayon employed upon the card takes on the appearance of oil paint in certain areas,

particularly on the mother’s clothes, where light and deep shadows are caught in the folds of her coat or shawl. The baby she

holds has a distinctive visage, full of personality and one that suggests an affable and engaging character. This baby appears to

be a little boy and he is the main focus of the composition. His demeanour in this work shares an affinity with a crayon drawing

by Conor entitled

‘The Joke

’. The drawing was featured in reproduction in The Tree published by the Ulster Society for the Preven-

tion of Cruelty to Animals, Belfast 1936. Both baby

in ‘Motherhood

’ and seated woman in ‘

The Joke’

have the same full beam, smil-

ing eyes and colour in their cheeks. The depictions are so natural that it must be assumed that Conor used his discrete technique

of making studies unobserved in both these works. There is no sense of the awkwardness often associated with conventional

portraiture. The outdoor setting of the scene of ‘

Motherhood’

is clear from the green foliage at the top and right of the work,

coupled with the natural light that bathes the composition from the right.

The artist’s treatment of the woman’s draperies is interesting and demonstrates Conor’s fascination with clothing. He observed

‘There are countless materials - materials so light and diaphanous that they would be more of an aura to a beautiful head…[The

shawl] is also very feminine. After all, is it not in a sense one symbol of motherhood…’ (43, Conor 1881-1968: The Life and Work

of an Ulster Artist, 1977). Brian Kennedy has written that Conor presents ‘a robust, optimistic outlook on life’, and it is this outlook

and the naturalism of the representations that ensure William Conor’s work stands the test of time. It is clear why Hewitt felt the

inclination to poeticise the artist’s impact on his consciousness.

Marianne O’Kane Boal, October 2015

€ 5,000 - 8,000