Adam's IMPORTANT IRISH ART 1 MARCH 2023

40 25 PAUL HENRY RHA (1877-1958) Cottages by the Lake, Outer Killary, Connemara, c.1933-36 Oil on canvas, 30.5 x 40.5cm (12 x 16”) Signed Provenance : Sale, these rooms, 24th March, 1977, lot 6 Literature: S. B Kennedy, Paul Henry, Paintings, Drawings, Illustrations Yale University Press, 2007, page 268, catalogue no. 848 € 120,000 - 150,000 A quintessential West of Ireland work by Paul Henry, which the late Dr S.B. Kennedy in his 2007 catalogue raisonne, dates to 1933-36. This work is one of a small number of paintings from this period with a similar composition. De- scribed by Dr Kennedy as a fine ‘set piece’ composition, it depicts two lake-side thatched cottages nestling close to one another and with gables of stacked turf. The handling of the paint with brisk, fluid brushstrokes is typical of the artist’s work of the mid 1930s with the foreground water reflecting the pale blue sky but treated in an impressionist fashion. The sky-blue mountain range, on two planes beyond, provides an atmospheric backdrop to the isolated cottages. The painting bears a hand-written label, not in the artist’s hand, with its current title but Dr Kennedy sug- gests that the work is possibly a scene in Co. Kerry. This is consistent with the date ascribed but also to many named views painted about this time in the south-west.