Female Irish artists in the picture this season

There's a strong showing by Irish female artists at Whyte's spring sale, writes Des O'Sullivan

Norah McGuinness - Self-Portrait 1942 at Whyte's.

No fewer than seven works by Norah McGuinness, including an arresting self-portrait, come up at Whyte's spring sale of Important Irish Art next Monday, March 6. The enduring popularity of the artist should ensure plenty of bidders.

During a long career, Norah McGuinness found a balance between painting and her design work (she designed theatre sets and costumes, illustrated books and the sales windows of Altmans in New York and Brown Thomas in Dublin for over 30 years). Influences from each field were brought into the other. 

Unlike her contemporaries, Mainie Jellett and Evie Hone, who also studied in Paris under André Lhote, McGuinness did not fully adopt the Cubist approach but rather fashioned elements of it with a Fauvist appreciation of colour to create her own unique reading of her subject.

Avila Spain c1920's by Mainie Jellett at Whyte's.

The seven works in this sale include November on the Liffey from 1948 (€8,000-€12,000), Self-Portrait painted in 1942 (€5,000-€7,000), and Coastal Town by Moonlight, painted in 1962 (€7,000-€9,000).

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Other works by Irish female artists of the same period include The Businessman by Mary Swanzy (€6,000-€8,000) and a 1920s work by Mainie Jellett titled Ávila, Spain (€6,000-€8,000). This was painted on one of her first visits to Europe and subsequently gifted by the artist to Sarah Purser, and later gifted to the artist Rosaleen Davey.

Old Houses, Pau by Daniel O'Neill at Whyte's.

The top lot of the auction is an iconic west of Ireland scene by Paul Henry which is estimated at €100,000-€150,000. Old Houses, Pau by Daniel O'Neill is estimated at.€20,000-€30,000 and his Mother and Child has an estimate of €15,000- €20,000.

Colin Middleton also had a design background and there is an emphasis on texture in his 1976 painting titled Dark Lady (€25,000-€35,000). 

Dark Lady by Colin Middleton at Whyte's.

Marmara Dawn by Stephen McKenna is a large work painted in 2009, his final year as president of the RHA. It is estimated at €15,000-€20,000. Strange Days by Jim Fitzpatrick features Sinead O'Connor in a painting in the style of The Rokeby Venus by Velazquez, but featuring the Pigeon House in Dublin through the window. The estimate is €20,000-€30,000.

There are three works by Donald Teskey, Docklands VII, (€30,000-€40,000), Autumn Coastline (€20,000-€30,000) and Downpatrick Head II (€15,000-€20,000). Among the other artists featured are Louis le Brocquy, William Leech, Grace Henry, Jack Yeats, Maurice MacGonigal, Lilian Lucy Davison, Patrick Hennessy, Patrick Collins, Arthur Maderson, Pauline Bewick, Liam O’Neill and Peter Collis. 

There is sculpture by James McKenna, Patrick O’Reilly and Olivia Musgrave. The sale is at Freemason's Hall, Molesworth Street, Dublin, and online and is on view at Whyte's this weekend and up to 4pm next Monday.