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Mary Swanzy HRHA (1882-1978) FIGURES AT A MARKET, CZECHOSLOVAKIA signed lower right oil on canvas...

Currency:EUR Category:Everything Else / Other Start Price:NA
Mary Swanzy HRHA (1882-1978) FIGURES AT A MARKET, CZECHOSLOVAKIA signed lower right oil on canvas...
Mary Swanzy HRHA (1882-1978)
FIGURES AT A MARKET, CZECHOSLOVAKIA
signed lower right
oil on canvas
30 by 41cm., 12 by 16in.
One of the most original of Ireland’s early modern artists, Mary Swanzy was
strongly influenced by French modernism, particularly by Cézanne’s experiments
with structure and form and by the bold colours of the Fauves. She also worked
early on as a poster designer and illustrator, which gave her an understanding
of the visual potency of the drawn line. The present work dates to shortly after
World War One, when the artist visited her sister St Clair Swanzy, who was doing
war relief work in Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia. A number of paintings and
sketches resulted from this trip and Eastern European landscapes featured in
Swanzy’s exhibition at the Mills’ Hall, Dublin, in March 1919. In these
paintings, Swanzy adopted a technique of "drawing" with oil paint, dragging a
lightly loaded brush over small sheets of canvas, as if it were a stick of
charcoal or a pencil. In the present case the canvas is unstretched – possibly
as this provided a flat, transportable surface analogous to a sheet of paper (it
may alternatively have been cut from the stretcher at a later date). A very
similar composition, A Czechoslovakian Market Scene, was exhibited at Pym’s
Gallery, London in Autumn 1989 and May 1998, whilst another work of the same
period, Czechoslovakian Street Scene, formerly in the collection of Dr Eileen
MacCarvill (Mainie Jellett’s biographer), appeared for sale at De Vere’s in
December 1991.
€7,000-€9,000 (£4,900-£6,300 sterling approx.)