23

Daniel O'Neill (1920-1974) - RUTH

Currency:EUR Category:Art / General - Paintings Start Price:NA Estimated At:25,000.00 - 35,000.00 EUR
Daniel O'Neill (1920-1974) - RUTH

Bidding Over

The auction is over for this lot.
The auctioneer wasn't accepting online bids for this lot.

Contact the auctioneer for information on the auction results.

Search for other lots to bid on...
Auction Date:2011 Oct 10 @ 18:00 (UTC+1)
Location:Royal Dublin Society, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4, Dublin, Dublin, ., Ireland
Artist: Daniel O'Neill (1920-1974)
Title: RUTH
Medium: oil on board
Signature: signed lower left; with title inscribed on reverse; also with partial inscribed label on reverse
Dimensions: 46 by 61cm., 18 by 24in.
Provenance:
Exhibited:
Literature:
Note: In the work of O’Neill we often find the imaginative, often haunting interaction between figure and environment; mood and circumstance – an imagery which is clearly concerned with the dignity of the individual. Portraits of women always remained an important subject for the artist. The biblical story of Ruth and Boaz was the source of inspiration for several works by O'Neill. While other depictions have shown her alongside her future husband, in this work O'Neill chooses to show her alone, a stoic outsider in the field prior to Boaz' proposal of marriage. Their future son, Obed would be the grandfather of King David.
In this painting moonlight bathes a cornfield. Ruth, with corn sheaf in hand, cuts a brooding figure in peasant clothes that dictates a mood linking the figure with the landscape and teetering on the surreal. Her pose is sculptural in disposition – solid and firm against a luminous sky. Her Greco-Italinate profile stares into the far off distance. The uncut field perhaps signifying what lies ahead and work to be done. O’Neill’s work falls stylistically into two categories – one richly and at times heavily painted, gestural and expressionist in style; the other somewhat lighter in colour and smoothly rendered. In both light, is an important protagonist. This is a fine example of his work demonstrating characteristics of both stylistic tendencies.
Prof. Liam Kelly
Belfast, September 2011.