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William Conor RHA RUA ROI (1881-1968) The Launch Wax crayon on paper, 48 x 36cm (19 x 14'') Signed Provenance: The Bell Gallery, Belfast, December 1964 (label verso) Provenance: The Bell Gallery, Belfast, December 1964 (label verso) This work is thought to date from around 1923 when the artist exhibited an oil called ''The Launch'' (Private Collection) at the Goupil Gallery in London and features on the front cover of the book by Judith Wilson on the artist. In the review of that exhibition in the magazine ''Colour'' the reviewer indicates a sympathy with, and understanding of Conor's approach to painting :- ''The reaction of the life struggle in a manufacturing community upon the individual is nearly always the basis on which his art is founded.This idea pervades the fine painting ''The Launch'' one of his most recent achievements. Here the interest does not center on the spectacle of the great ship sliding magnificently down the slip, but on the figures of the shipyard workers who watch intently the seal of final success set upon their labours .....'' In some ways we think that this current version of ''The Launch'' is even more atmospheric with a greater number of shipbuilders involved, the emphasis is on them and not on those up top. This work is very choreographic and has a striking sensual movement... the men at the base of the huge liner which is seen in semi-profile having a diagonal space in the work... the shipyard cranes... an incredible, perfect and daring composition - the workers wave good-bye to their long toil.Two other works that are very similar in composition to this one are also both called ''The Launch'', one in the collection of the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, the other in the UTV art collection. This work was included in his one man show in the new Bell Gallery - the exhibition spanned 60 years of work and in an interview with the Belfast Telegraph (9/12/64) Conor said ''Most of these have never been seen in public before''. Nearly all the people he has used are intensely real and vital and his representations of them are social history as much as distinctive works of art. Conor said ''I loved the working men in their dungarees and the factory girls in their shawls, I knew them well as I was one of them'' William Conor RHA RUA ROI (1881-1968) The Launch Wax crayon on paper, 48 x 36cm (19 x 14'') Signed Provenance: The Bell Gallery, Belfast, December 1964 (label verso) Provenance: The Bell Gallery, Belfast, December 1964 (label verso) This work is thought to date from around 1923 when the artist exhibited an oil called ''The Launch'' (Private Collection) at the Goupil Gallery in London and features on the front cover of the book by Judith Wilson on the artist. In the review of that exhibition in the magazine ''Colour'' the reviewer indicates a sympathy with, and understanding of Conor's approach to painting :- ''The reaction of the life struggle in a manufacturing community upon the individual is nearly always the basis on which his art is founded.This idea pervades the fine painting ''The Launch'' one of his most recent achievements. Here the interest does not center on the spectacle of the great ship sliding magnificently down the slip, but on the figures of the shipyard workers who watch intently the seal of final success set upon their labours .....'' In some ways we think that this current version of ''The Launch'' is even more atmospheric with a greater number of shipbuilders involved, the emphasis is on them and not on those up top. This work is very choreographic and has a striking sensual movement... the men at the base of the huge liner which is seen in semi-profile having a diagonal space in the work... the shipyard cranes... an incredible, perfect and daring composition - the workers wave good-bye to their long toil.Two other works that are very similar in composition to this one are also both called ''The Launch'', one in the collection of the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, the ot