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Colin Middleton MBE RHA (1910-1983) MISS KITT signed in monogram lower right mixed media on board...

Currency:EUR Category:Everything Else / Other Start Price:NA
Colin Middleton MBE RHA (1910-1983) MISS KITT signed in monogram lower right mixed media on board...
Colin Middleton MBE RHA (1910-1983)
MISS KITT
signed in monogram lower right
mixed media on board
64 by 76cm., 25 by 30in.
Unlike a number of his close contemporaries such as Nevill Johnson, Gerard
Dillon and Arthur Armstrong, Colin Middleton appears to have used collage very
rarely, which makes it all the more remarkable that it is handled here with such
skill and confidence. Middleton builds up layers of painted and glazed newspaper
that integrate well with the heavily worked and highly abstracted image of the
two figures. These are flattened and broken down into loosely geometric shapes
in a manner typical of his innovative and experimental approach to the figure
from the later 1950s. This was very much of its time; artists such as William
Scott and Louis le Broquy were producing work in the later 1950s and early 1960s
that is not dissimilar.
Middleton’s own depictions of the figure were often dominated by a Picasso-esque
visual playfulness and the pieces of newspaper cut up and used here, while
possibly an accidental choice, do create an unusual and light-hearted
atmosphere, carrying a variety of political news, sports reports, film listings
and more unexpected and amusing messages, such as "This is Miss Kitt / The Girl
/ Who Likes / To Travel", which is in a part of one of the figures and perhaps
related to it.
Dickon Hall
Killinchy, August 2003
€15,000-€20,000 (£10,500-£14,000 sterling approx.)