Man Creating Bird, 1948
To celebrate this event, the Hunt Museum is
curating a major exhibition of his works entitled
Allegory and Legend. Le Brocquy was born in Dublin
and is considered Ireland’s most important living
artist. His reflections on historical themes, mythical
stories and folk rituals express deeply felt reactions
to our past, through contemporary eyes.
Le Brocquy’s career spans 70 years of creative
practice. He left Ireland in 1938 to study the major
European art collections in London, Paris, Venice and
Geneva. Rather than receive formal training, he
preferred to learn by direct contact with the great
artists of the past. In 1946 le Brocquy moved to
London and became prominent in the contemporary
art scene. He began to exhibit internationally and in
1956 he represented Ireland at the Venice Biennale,
where his painting A Family won a major award. In
1958 the artist married Anne Madden and settled in
Carros in the south of France.
Acknowledged by museum retrospectives worldwide,
le Brocquy’s work is represented in numerous
public collections, from The Guggenheim, New York, to
The Tate, London. In Ireland, he is honoured as the first
and only living painter to be included in the permanent
collection of the National Gallery of Ireland.
The paintings from the ‘Tinker’ series that feature in Allegory and Legend, have never before been assembled for an exhibition. In 1945 whilst in the midlands, near Tullamore, le Brocquy became interested in the travellers and developed concerns relating to their marginal lives.
Le Brocquy’s tapestries give viewers a chance to see the artist’s exploration of mythical consciousness. In 1948 Edinburgh Tapestry Weavers invited le Brocquy and three other painters working in London, to design tapestries. His first tapestry continued his preoccupation with the travelling people. Travellers (1948) was exhibited originally by the Arts Council in London in 1950.
Among his many collaborations with Irish writers, le Brocquy is perhaps best known for his lithographic brush drawings for Thomas Kinsella’s renowned translation of the Táin in 1969. Táin means the gathering of people for a cattle raid and this tale forms the centerpiece of the cycle of Ulster heroic stories. The interplay between Kinsella’s text and le Brocquy’s images underlines the integral role of the illustrations. Le Brocquy explains that the illustrations form “an extension of the text”. Le Brocquy’s ink brush drawings are sympathetic with a literary text. They allow the reader to perceive both text and image without being distracted by the intrinsic, graphic qualities of the drawings.
Louis le Brocquy is recognised as Ireland's leading living artist speaking with a new voice, he has re-interpreted ancient forces with fresh vitality. In curating this exhibition, the Hunt Museum seeks to capture the artist's individual perspectives of the past. By bringing work of international significance to newer audiences in a regional location the Museum aims to provide access to a unique patrimony and complement the work of local partners - the Irish Chamber Orchestra, Daghda Dance Company, ev+a and RTÉ Lyric fm.
