ALOYSIUS O'KELLY | THE MARKET

Sotheby's, London, 13 May 2005, lot 33

The present work depicts a market in Brittany, with women and children in traditional Breton dress gathered around a clog stall. O'Kelly first visited Brittany in the summer of 1876, having earlier travelled to Paris to study. In France, he was inspired by the new naturalist plein air movement, evident in the bright and painterly manner of the present work. An adventurous artist-traveller, after returning from the United States O'Kelly returned to Brittany in 1902 and stayed there for prolonged periods over the next twenty years.