O'BRIEN, DERMOD, P.R.H.A. (Irish, 1865-1945) [President, Royal Hibernian Academy] "Landscape: Malahide Castle, Co. Dublin" Signed and dated 1926, L.C. Oil on canvas, 10" x 14" (sight); 14˝" x 18˝" (framed). Price Category: B

One of Ireland's most prominent painters in the early part of the 20th Century, Dermod O'Brien worked in portraits, landscapes, and figures and was well connected among Ireland's artists and intellectuals during a momentous period in Irish history (the poet William Butler Yeats was a friend). He was born in 1865 in County Limerick and studied at Harrow and Trinity College, Dublin. In 1887 he traveled to the continent and decided to make painting his profession. In that year he entered the Antwerp Academy and studied under Charles Verlat, making friends with the Irish painter Walter Osborne from Dublin and winning a first prize for drawing. An early painting from that period, The Fine Art Academy, Antwerp, is in the Ulster Museum. In 1891 he moved to the Académie Julian in Paris, then studied in 1894 at the Slade School of Fine Art; that year he exhibited for the first time at the Royal Hibernian Academy. By the early 1900s he was already established as a successful portrait painter in Ireland, and for many years he was known principally for his work in that genre. In 1905 O'Brien began a long association with the Royal Hibernian Academy. In 1910 he was elected president of that body and served for 35 years until his death. During his tenure as president, he showed regularly at RHA exhibitions, supported Hugh Lane's attempt to found a gallery of modern art in Dublin, and played a leading role in promoting younger artists. O'Brien's work was hung at exhibitions of the Royal Society of British Artists in 1924, 1925, and 1929. Until the 20s, his style might be characterized as formal and academic, tending toward darker tones and careful drawing, but travels in France during that decade brought him into contact with the impressionists, and thereafter his light touch with small landscapes won him praise from many quarters. According to Lennox Robinson, his biographer: "One can see a distinct break in his landscape work about 1924. . . .the fact remains that the small landscapes painted during the last ten years of his life are perhaps his most delightful work. . . . . from France he would come back and see the falls of the Liffey or Howth Hill from the North Bull. His Dublin landscapes were small, they never had the tremendous sweep of Nathaniel Hone, but they are, nearly always, little masterpieces." (Pallette and Plough.) Similarly, Ireland Today wrote that he was now painting better than ever, adding: "His small landscapes are executed more freely, surely and honestly than ever before. He has attained to a high degree of technical perfection." This painting of Malahide Castle on the coast just north of Dublin is representative of O' Brien's mature style. Painted in 1926, it shows the artist's recent mastery of impressionist techniques and the ease and fluidity of an experienced painter working at the height of his powers. O'Brien died at his home in 1945. A small memorial tribute of his works was included in the 1946 RHA. A retrospective exhibition was held at the Cynthia O'Conner Gallery, Dublin, 1983. This work was included in that exhibition. The painting is offered with a first edition of Lennox Robinson's biography of O'Brien, Palette and Plough: A pen-and-ink drawing of Dermod O'Brien, P.R.H.A. Provenance: Oriel Gallery, Dublin, 1998. Exhibited: Cynthia O'Conner Gallery, Dublin, 1983. Museums: Ulster Museum, Belfast Crawford Municipal Art Gallery, Cork Abbey Theatre, Dublin Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery of Modern Art, Dublin National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin Royal Irish Academy Trinity College Gallery Art Gallery Society, Killarney Town Hall, Limerick County Museum and Art Gallery, Sligo Municipal Art Collection, Waterford

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