Beschreibung:

Artist: Basil Blackshaw HRHA RUA (1932-2016) Title: Coat (2000) Signature: signed top right and dated 2000 Medium: oil on canvas Size: 183½ x 153½cm (72.2 x 60.4in) Framed Size: 186.4 x 155.7cm (73.4 x 61.3in) Provenance: Gormley's Fine Art, Belfast (label verso); Private Collection Exhibited: Belfast, Ulster Museum, 'Basil Blackshaw Paintings 2000-2002' Literature: 'Blackshaw' edited by Eamonn Mallie, plate 163, p.360. a#morebtn { color: #de1d01; } a#morebtn:hover { cursor: pointer;} Coat, and a companion piece, Coloured Rain, featured in Basil Blackshaw's outstanding 70th birthday exhibition at the Ulster Museum in 2002, a show curated by SB Kennedy. One might have expected the event to serve as a tribute to the artist's considerable achievements over many decades but, to their... Read more Basil Blackshaw Lot 34 - 'Coat (2000)' Estimate: €40,000 - €60,000 Coat, and a companion piece, Coloured Rain, featured in Basil Blackshaw's outstanding 70th birthday exhibition at the Ulster Museum in 2002, a show curated by SB Kennedy. One might have expected the event to serve as a tribute to the artist's considerable achievements over many decades but, to their great credit, neither Kennedy nor Blackshaw saw it that way. In any case, there had been just such a retrospective several years before, and this was a chance to display what the artist had been doing in the interim. Throughout his career, Blackshaw, his own harshest critic, recurrently assessed and significantly overhauled his approach to painting. The paintings in the birthday show, essentially produced over a two-year period, were exceptional for their classical poise and economy. They were the work of an artist who no longer felt he had anything to prove: he had arrived at the point he was aiming for. The palette was spare, but telling. Coat is a close, frontal view of a figure in a buttoned coat, arms outstretched. The figure becomes a canvas within a canvas in a virtuoso demonstration of pure painting. Blackshaw was firmly rooted in a rural world, a world he never abandoned and a world that provided his subject matter and inspiration throughout his life. Precociously talented, he achieved acclaim early on and retained the respect and admiration of his peers throughout his life. He never flagged in his pursuit of his obsessive concerns: the landscape, horses, dogs and other animals, including the human figure. He was also an exceptional portrait painter. Aidan Dunne, September 2021