Adam's IMPORTANT IRISH ART Auction Wednesday 29th September 2021

84 76 BASIL BLACKSHAW HRHA RUA (1932-2016) Exercising Race Horses Oil on canvas, 45 x 60cm (17¾ x 23½’’) Signed Provenance: The Robert Workman Collection. € 20,000 - 30,000 Horses, in particular those of a sporting nature, appear frequently in Blackshaw’s work, a direct influence of spending significant periods of time around the animals due to his father’s and brother’s work as trainers. Horses were a way of life in the family homes at Boardmills and Culcavy, Hillsborough and Blackshaw’s exceptional talent as an equine painter is born out of this early familiarity with the animals. The composition, divided in two halves, creates a vibrant sense of movement in the image, one horse and rider enter from the right while the other exits on the left. There is a distinct sense that Blackshaw was observing the scene, sketching out in the open field. One of the trainers appears to acknowledge his presence, turning to face us. Their body language appears relaxed, suggesting the horses are in a slow trot rather than a more intense exercise. It differs from the much more dramatic scenes he paint- ed of mid-race falls of the Grand National. It is an unusual composition, in which Blackshaw has left the central section of the canvas largely vacant save for the two whitewashed tree trunks. This empty space, into which the horses are walking suggests a stillness, a pause before the activity commences. The grain of the canvas surface is visible under quite thin layers of paint and there appears to be some pentimenti, marks left over from when Blackshaw may have changed his mind in how to arrange the scene. In the centre there is a suggestion of legs, potentially the original placement of another horse, or the thick grey brush- strokes behind the body of the horse on the left covering up an earlier figure. This visual expression of the artist’s process adds another layer to the work, creating a transient atmosphere. Niamh Corcoran, August 2021