Colin Middleton MBE RHA RUA (1910-1983) Rain (1944) Oil on ...
Hammer
€10,000
Colin Middleton MBE RHA RUA (1910-1983) Rain (1944) Oil on canvas 51 x 61cm (20 x 24") Signed, Inscribed with partial title and date.
Provenance: Collection of the late Patrick Pye RHA; with Peter Nahum, London, transport label verso; with Ib Jorgensen, Dublin,label verso with title Rain and Lightening
Rain appears to be the painting of the same name shown in Middleton's 1945 exhibition at the Grafton Gallery in Dublin. Despite only one sale from his first one-person show in Dublin, Tom Nisbet wrote to Middleton that 'most of the people who know anything have come and been unfeignedly enthusiastic' (letter from Tom Nisbet to Colin Middleton, 8th May 1945, Colin Middleton Archive, National Museums Northern Ireland). Two years earlier, Middleton's first one-person exhibition at the Belfast Museum and Art Gallery had confirmed him as arguably the city's most progressive painter, but it remained a frustrating period for Middleton, when he was still having to work as a linen designer to support his young family.
While some paintings in the Grafton exhibition had already been shown in Belfast in 1943, and dated from the late 1930s or very early 1940s, Rain was one of those that demonstrated Middleton's subsequent development. These works were more aligned with symbolism than the surrealism with which Middleton had become widely associated, and often explored a connection between the natural world and the female archetype, which became clearer in the body of work Middleton showed with CEMA (the fore-runner of the Arts Council) later in 1945.
Rain is strongly dramatic, with a sense of momentary connection between the female figure and the mysterious, overarching figure in the sky, who seems to send the storm to earth, a dark and empty landscape with occasional highlights of colour picked out in the light. While the painting, and Middleton's symbolism of the time, would suggest the rain is a source of nourishment and regeneration, the mood of the work perhaps indicates the artist's own sense of frustration and urgency, only three years before he was to leave Belfast and his career as a linen designer to move to England in an attempt to be able to paint full-time.
Dickon Hall, August 2026
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Hammer
€10,000
Colin Middleton MBE RHA RUA (1910-1983) Rain (1944) Oil on canvas 51 x 61cm (20 x 24") Signed, Inscribed with partial title and date.
Provenance: Collection of the late Patrick Pye RHA; with Peter Nahum, London, transport label verso; with Ib Jorgensen, Dublin,label verso with title Rain and Lightening
Rain appears to be the painting of the same name shown in Middleton's 1945 exhibition at the Grafton Gallery in Dublin. Despite only one sale from his first one-person show in Dublin, Tom Nisbet wrote to Middleton that 'most of the people who know anything have come and been unfeignedly enthusiastic' (letter from Tom Nisbet to Colin Middleton, 8th May 1945, Colin Middleton Archive, National Museums Northern Ireland). Two years earlier, Middleton's first one-person exhibition at the Belfast Museum and Art Gallery had confirmed him as arguably the city's most progressive painter, but it remained a frustrating period for Middleton, when he was still having to work as a linen designer to support his young family.
While some paintings in the Grafton exhibition had already been shown in Belfast in 1943, and dated from the late 1930s or very early 1940s, Rain was one of those that demonstrated Middleton's subsequent development. These works were more aligned with symbolism than the surrealism with which Middleton had become widely associated, and often explored a connection between the natural world and the female archetype, which became clearer in the body of work Middleton showed with CEMA (the fore-runner of the Arts Council) later in 1945.
Rain is strongly dramatic, with a sense of momentary connection between the female figure and the mysterious, overarching figure in the sky, who seems to send the storm to earth, a dark and empty landscape with occasional highlights of colour picked out in the light. While the painting, and Middleton's symbolism of the time, would suggest the rain is a source of nourishment and regeneration, the mood of the work perhaps indicates the artist's own sense of frustration and urgency, only three years before he was to leave Belfast and his career as a linen designer to move to England in an attempt to be able to paint full-time.
Dickon Hall, August 2026
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