Adam's IMPORTANT IRISH ART 31 MAY 2023

92 67 HARRY KERNOFF RHA (1900-1974) Gantries on a Sunday, Belfast 1936 Oil on board, 61.7 x 94cm (24 x 37”) Inscribed with the title verso in the artist’s hand Exhibited: Thought to be ‘Gantries from Victoria Park, Belfast’ RHA 1936 Cat. No. 78 Priced £50.0.0 ‘Harry Kernoff Exhibition’ Godolphin Gallery, March 1974 Cat No. 2 under title ‘Gantries On a Sunday, Belfast 1936’ where thought to have been purchased and thence by descent to the current owner. € 20,000 - 30,000 Louis MacNeice’s 1937 poem Carrickfergus opens with the line ‘I was born in Belfast between the mountain and the gantries / To the hooting of lost sirens and the clang of trams’, capturing the sound and landscape of the city and its industry. Similarly, in this painting, Harry Kernoff finds a moment of lei- sure in Victoria Park under the looming cranes of the Harland and Woolfe shipyard, framed by the mauve Belfast Hills. To the left of the painting, the distinc- tive Arrol Gantry is visible, built in 1908 and a cru- cial component in the ability of the company to build large liners like the RMS Titanic and RMS Olympic. Against this imposing backdrop, the game of two boys – setting their small toy boat to sail across the lake – adds a charming touch to the scene. Born in London in January 1900, Harry Kernoff moved to Dublin with his family in 1914. While work- ing as an apprentice cabinet maker with his father, the young artist attended classes at the Kevin Street Technical Schools, before moving to the Dublin Met- ropolitan School of Art. In 1923, Kernoff was award- ed the Taylor Scholarship and his first solo exhibition was held in the rooms of the Society of Dublin Paint- ers in 1927. Over the following decades, Kernoff dedicated his painting practice to the representa- tion of daily life in Ireland’s towns and cities, chiefly in Dublin, but extending to Killarney, London, Paris, and Belfast. He was elected to the Royal Hibernian Academy in 1935 and was a regular exhibitor there throughout his career. In 1936, Kernoff included Gantries from Victoria Park, Belfast among his sub- missions to the RHA Annual Exhibition: a catalogue price of £50 suggests that the work was a well-sized oil, perhaps the present work. There is a detailed preparatory sketch for this paint- ing in the National Gallery of Ireland (NGI. 7766.357). Part of the extensive collection donated by the art- ist’s sister, Lena Kernoff, after his death, the sketch is robust and meticulous in its depiction and anno- tation of the scene. Kernoff noted that he observed the ‘Gantry’s [sic] from Victoria Park, Belfast’ on the 11 July 1935. For the most part, the sketch aligns with the present oil, showing the latticed ironwork of the gantries, contrasting with the curve of the bridge and flowing water. A sauntering bird, however, has been replaced with a striding worker – a Belfast cousin of the artist’s characteristic Dublin dockers. Four sketches in this collection relate to this visit to Belfast, with the artist also capturing views of the Bellevue Steps at Belfast Zoo and two views from the top of Cave Hill. Paintings related to these sketches were exhibited at the Waddington Galleries in 1936, and at further Dublin exhibition in 1937. For artists interested in the urban landscape, Belfast’s harbour and shipping industry had long provided visual in- spiration: ranging from early nineteenth-century vedute to William Conor’s evocative street scenes and depictions of the city’s workers. This painting, filled with the colour and character of Kernoff ’s best urban paintings, is an important component of the artist’s oeuvre and a notable representation of the northern city. Kathryn Milligan April 2023