Incognito art sale: All pieces available for €60 as artists and celebrities combine to raise funds
Don Conroy, The Edge and Peter Curling are among those who've contributed to the Incognito sale.
Artist Peter Curling is accustomed to working on a large canvas, given that he is famed for his equine portraits. So painting on a 15 x 10cm postcard is quite the challenge, but a welcome one given that it is for a good cause. Curling has been involved in the Incognito fundraising initiative since its inception in 2017.
The online art sale raises money for the Jack and Jill Foundation, which provides home health care to seriously ill babies — one postcard equals four hours of specialist home nursing for a sick child. This year, 1,500 artists, from the emerging to the well-known to celebrities, have contributed over 3,500 original postcard-sized artworks on offer for €60 each — the unique selling point is the buyer doesn’t find out who has painted their postcard until they receive it.
“It is a challenge, because I am used to working on a much bigger scale,” says Curling. “It demands discipline but some artists are clever enough to be able to produce beautiful things which are loose and quite simple in the way they have been painted. It is a good exercise and something that does make you concentrate in a different way. It is such a terrific way of raising funds, and done in a simple way that has really caught on with the public.”
Curling was born in Waterford in 1955, and has lived in Co Tipperary with his family since 1978. He is highly regarded for his large atmospheric paintings of horses exercising, in the field and on the racecourse, as well as for his landscapes and portraits, and his work has been exhibited around the world. His love of drawing, and horses, was ingrained from an early age — he first exhibited his work at the age of 14.
“My father was musical and he acted in the Abbey Theatre — we were an artistic family. I started drawing when I was very young. My mother bought and sold paintings and prints of a sporting style and that got me interested in horses. I loved the whole colour and atmosphere, the movement and the character and link between horse and rider. I love the whole pageant of the racecourse, the riding out in the mornings, there are lots of different areas in the subject that you can try and portray.”
Curling studied drawing in Italy and France, learning from artists including John Skeaping, a well-known English equine painter and sculptor. He says that while there are particular skills required in the depiction of horses, it all comes down to how an artist feels about his subject.
“Anatomy and draughtsmanship are very important but it is just basically knowing your subject. There has to be excitement. You have to really want to paint what you are painting, that has to come across in the work. If you are painting something that you yourself find boring, it is quite hard to get any excitement into it.”
Curling has no shortage of subjects living in Tipperary, which is home to many in the horse-racing industry, and it also helps that his son Sam is a trainer. He says he has missed the excitement of point-to-points and race meetings since the onset of the pandemic.
“I’m lucky enough that I have horses on my doorstep here but I would go to point-to-points most weekends, I get lots of inspiration from that. Certainly it is a big gap not being able to do that, not having the opportunity to get out into the country and see the variety of landscapes and all the usual things that would give you inspiration.”
Instead, Curling has been observing race meetings rom afar and derived much pleasure in particular from the success of his fellow Waterfordian, trainer Henry de Bromhead, and stable jockey Rachael Blackmore, who had a historic double victory at the Cheltenham Gold Cup and the Grand National.
“Rachael is a Tipperary girl, and she rode point-to-point winners for us, we have known her a long time. I would normally go to Cheltenham, I didn’t go last year either because of Covid. Hopefully it will all get back to normal and we will get to go. It is sad that nobody was there to join in the celebrations. It was a bit strange, the empty stands and all of that, but the horses still gave their very best.”
- The Incognito sale goes live on Thursday, April 22 at 10am. Interested buyers can browse the catalogue of paintings online, and register in advance for the sale, at www.incognito.ie
The Incognito art collection is now live at www.incognito.ie with the online art sale taking place on Thursday April 22 at 10am sharp.
The identity of the artists behind the 3,000 postcard-size artworks is kept secret until the sale closes. Among the artists and celebrities who have contributed pieces for the sale are Robert Ballagh, The Edge, Bob Geldof, Paul Costelloe, Mo Kelly and Tommy Tiernan.
Each original artwork costs €60, and the identity of the artist will remain a mystery until the piece is delivered! Last year's sale sold out in minutes.
