- 47
BEATRICE CAMPBELL, LADY GLENAVY, R.H.A. | The Vain Suit
Estimate
30,000 - 50,000 GBP
bidding is closed
Description
- Beatrice Campbell, Lady Glenavy
- The Vain Suit
- signed with monogram l.r.
- oil on canvas
- 63.5 by 76cm., 25 by 30in.
- Painted circa 1932-33.
Provenance
The Leicester Galleries, London;
Lawrences, Crewkerne, 23 May 1996, lot 53;
Gorry Gallery, Dublin, 1996
Lawrences, Crewkerne, 23 May 1996, lot 53;
Gorry Gallery, Dublin, 1996
Exhibited
Dublin, Royal Hibernian Academy, 1933, no.44;
London, Leicester Galleries, Exhibition of Drawings, Paintings and Sculpture by Modern Artists, 1933;
Dublin, Dublin Painters’ Society Gallery, Solo Exhibition, 1935;
Dublin, Gorry Gallery, An exhibition of 18th, 19th and 20th century Irish Paintings, Dublin, 12 - 28 September 1996, no.49, illustrated p.25;
Phoenix, Phoenix Art Museum, A Century of Irish Painting: Selections from the Brian P. Burns Collection, 3 March - 29 April 2007, illustrated p.33
London, Leicester Galleries, Exhibition of Drawings, Paintings and Sculpture by Modern Artists, 1933;
Dublin, Dublin Painters’ Society Gallery, Solo Exhibition, 1935;
Dublin, Gorry Gallery, An exhibition of 18th, 19th and 20th century Irish Paintings, Dublin, 12 - 28 September 1996, no.49, illustrated p.25;
Phoenix, Phoenix Art Museum, A Century of Irish Painting: Selections from the Brian P. Burns Collection, 3 March - 29 April 2007, illustrated p.33
Literature
‘Lady Glenavy’s Pictures,’ The Irish Independent, 26 February 1935, p.11;
‘Women’s Able Work in this Year’s Academy,’ The Irish Press, 25 April 1938, p.5;
Nicola Gordon Bowe, ‘The Art of Beatrice Elvery, Lady Glenavy (1883-1970)’, in Irish Arts Review Yearbook, vol.11, 1995, pp.168-175;
Nicola Gordon Bowe, ‘The Vain Suit,’ An exhibition of 18th, 19th and 20th century Irish Paintings, Dublin, Gorry Gallery, 1996, p.24;
Anne Crookshank and the Knight of Glin, Ireland's Painters 1600-1940, Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2002, no.393, illustrated p.285
‘Women’s Able Work in this Year’s Academy,’ The Irish Press, 25 April 1938, p.5;
Nicola Gordon Bowe, ‘The Art of Beatrice Elvery, Lady Glenavy (1883-1970)’, in Irish Arts Review Yearbook, vol.11, 1995, pp.168-175;
Nicola Gordon Bowe, ‘The Vain Suit,’ An exhibition of 18th, 19th and 20th century Irish Paintings, Dublin, Gorry Gallery, 1996, p.24;
Anne Crookshank and the Knight of Glin, Ireland's Painters 1600-1940, Yale University Press, New Haven & London, 2002, no.393, illustrated p.285
Condition
Original canvas, on a new stretcher offering stable support. There are a few hairline cracks in the foreground, by the lady, by the dogs, the statue of cupid and in the upper left and upper right corners, which appear stable and only visible upon close inspection. The work appears in very good condition overall. Ultraviolet light reveals a spot of retouching in the upper right corner and some infilling to some of the above mentioned hairline cracks. Held in a gilt plaster frame.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."
Catalogue Note
'She belongs, with her aunt Phoebe Traquair and an old friend like AE, in the company of "the last romantics", those who "chose for theme/ Traditional sanctity and loveliness"'.
(Nicola Gordon Bowe citing W. B. Yeats' lines from 'Coole Park and Ballylee', 1931, in 'The Art of Beatrice Elvery, Lady Glenavy', Irish Arts Review, 1995, p.175) Born into a cultured and comfortable Dublin family Beatrice Elvery’s prodigious artistic talents brought her, aged just thirteen, to Dublin’s Metropolitan School of Art and from there to some of the most prestigious art schools in Europe. Her subsequent work as an artist falls into two distinct periods. The first is dominated by a sweet, illustrative Arts and Crafts style deployed across a variety of media (painting, sculpture, book illustration, furniture decoration and stained glass). She was especially influenced by the work of her maternal aunt, the versatile Phoebe Traquair, who had once been a protégé of John Ruskin.
Following her marriage to Gordon Campbell in 1912, and the birth of her three children, Elvery ceased working so prodigiously. She became Lady Glenavy in 1931 when her husband succeeded his father’s title. About this time, she returned to painting almost exclusively and contributed, with a group of other distinguished women artists, to the introduction of modernism into Irish cultural life. Her first solo show, held in 1935, contained over fifty paintings. Critics agreed that ‘she worked like a daemon’ and that she was ‘an artist of undoubted originality–originality of conception and of treatment–and a wholly devastating cleverness’ (The Irish Independent, 26 February 1935, p. 11). The sculptor Albert Power (see lots 38 and 44) described Lady Glenavy's painting as '...romantic, absurd, theatrical and exhilarating...' (quoted in T. Snoddy, Dictionary of Irish Artists. 20th Century, 1996, p.143).
The Vain Suit belongs to this later period in which Glenavy’s enigmatic paintings of pastoral landscapes populated by symbolic figures and objects evoke a sort of Freudian dreamscape that are beguilingly beautiful if they sometimes proved shocking to the public in the conservative Irish Free State. One of four works that Glenavy’s showed at the annual Royal Hibernian Academy exhibition in Dublin in 1933 this painting (priced at £35) was subsequently exhibited in London at The Leicester Galleries. Influenced by the art of Venice, where Glenavy visited in August 1932, The Vain Suit is considered a sort of ‘sequel’ to Glenavy’s much larger painting, The Intruder, that stirred some controversy when first exhibited in Dublin and London. Even though Glenavy’s later paintings were rebuked as possessing an ‘outlook [that] is peculiarly feminine suggesting the naïve storytelling of mediaeval tapestry’ her male contemporaries, such as Seán Keating and Jack B. Yeats, kept a close, guarded eye on her work (The Irish Press, 25 April 1938, p. 5). Although little remembered today during the heyday of the Irish Revival and the foundation of the modern Irish nation Glenavy’s beauty and vitality, like that of her art, were legend.
Dr. Joseph McBrinn
(Nicola Gordon Bowe citing W. B. Yeats' lines from 'Coole Park and Ballylee', 1931, in 'The Art of Beatrice Elvery, Lady Glenavy', Irish Arts Review, 1995, p.175) Born into a cultured and comfortable Dublin family Beatrice Elvery’s prodigious artistic talents brought her, aged just thirteen, to Dublin’s Metropolitan School of Art and from there to some of the most prestigious art schools in Europe. Her subsequent work as an artist falls into two distinct periods. The first is dominated by a sweet, illustrative Arts and Crafts style deployed across a variety of media (painting, sculpture, book illustration, furniture decoration and stained glass). She was especially influenced by the work of her maternal aunt, the versatile Phoebe Traquair, who had once been a protégé of John Ruskin.
Following her marriage to Gordon Campbell in 1912, and the birth of her three children, Elvery ceased working so prodigiously. She became Lady Glenavy in 1931 when her husband succeeded his father’s title. About this time, she returned to painting almost exclusively and contributed, with a group of other distinguished women artists, to the introduction of modernism into Irish cultural life. Her first solo show, held in 1935, contained over fifty paintings. Critics agreed that ‘she worked like a daemon’ and that she was ‘an artist of undoubted originality–originality of conception and of treatment–and a wholly devastating cleverness’ (The Irish Independent, 26 February 1935, p. 11). The sculptor Albert Power (see lots 38 and 44) described Lady Glenavy's painting as '...romantic, absurd, theatrical and exhilarating...' (quoted in T. Snoddy, Dictionary of Irish Artists. 20th Century, 1996, p.143).
The Vain Suit belongs to this later period in which Glenavy’s enigmatic paintings of pastoral landscapes populated by symbolic figures and objects evoke a sort of Freudian dreamscape that are beguilingly beautiful if they sometimes proved shocking to the public in the conservative Irish Free State. One of four works that Glenavy’s showed at the annual Royal Hibernian Academy exhibition in Dublin in 1933 this painting (priced at £35) was subsequently exhibited in London at The Leicester Galleries. Influenced by the art of Venice, where Glenavy visited in August 1932, The Vain Suit is considered a sort of ‘sequel’ to Glenavy’s much larger painting, The Intruder, that stirred some controversy when first exhibited in Dublin and London. Even though Glenavy’s later paintings were rebuked as possessing an ‘outlook [that] is peculiarly feminine suggesting the naïve storytelling of mediaeval tapestry’ her male contemporaries, such as Seán Keating and Jack B. Yeats, kept a close, guarded eye on her work (The Irish Press, 25 April 1938, p. 5). Although little remembered today during the heyday of the Irish Revival and the foundation of the modern Irish nation Glenavy’s beauty and vitality, like that of her art, were legend.
Dr. Joseph McBrinn