56 / 114
56
47
George Russell Æ (1867-1935)
Woods at Raheen
Oil on canvas, 52 x 81cm (20.5 x 31.9”)
Signed with monogram
Painter, poet, journalist, theosophist and activist, George Russell, aka AE
(from Æ’on), was born in Lurgan in Co. Armagh in 1878. He first started
to paint whilst on holiday in Donegal. And continued to paint there and in
the West of Ireland. The woods at Raheen in Co. Galway were a particularly
favourite location. In fact, he was painting there when W.B.Yeats informed
him of the 1916 Easter Rising. A leading figure in the Irish Literary Revival,
he was particularly close to W.B. Yeats and, later, James Joyce, who features
him in Ulysses. He claimed to be a clairvoyant and many of his poems and
paintings are of a spiritual nature. A Renaissance man, gifted in many fields,
he nonetheless rated the time spent painting as the time best spent. He wrote :
‘Painting is the only thing I have any real delight in doing. Nature intended
me to be a painter. I was never taught. I went into an office and wrote po-
etry. Then because I wrote good poetry I was taken from the office and sent
out over the country to organise farmers. When I wrote one or two articles
about farmers and their lives I was taken from organising and put to editing an
agricultural paper. When I had learned to do this I was dragged into politics,
and now I edit a weekly review dealing with politics, literature and economics.’
€5,000 - 8,000