Paul Henry RHA (1877-1958) An Early View of Pullough Bay, A...

Hammer

€42,000

Paul Henry RHA (1877-1958) An Early View of Pullough Bay, Achill, c.1912-13 Oil on board, 24.4 x 31.7cm (9¾ x 12½'') Signed
Provenance: Hector Boyd Hanna (1886-1982), Belfast; thence by descent, their sale, these rooms, 31/05/2017, lot 31; Private collection.

Hector Hanna attended the Royal Belfast Academical Institution (Inst.) from 1900 to 1905. Paul Henry also attended 'Inst.' for two years, from September 1891. After graduating from Oxford in 1909 Hanna became assistant to Professor Robert Henry, Pauls brother, in the Department of Latin at Queens University in Belfast. He returned to Inst. as a master in 1916 and was appointed Headmaster of the Classical Department in 1930. The Hanna family believe that their grandfather, Hector Hanna got to know Paul Henry through Pauls brother Robert and that having lent the young artist some money was offered in return a small selection of paintings. They have remained in the Hanna family since then.

Henry is known to have been living in 1912-13 at Pullough, Achill Island. This picture certainly bears out the typography of the area. The handling of paint, especially in the sky and the sea is characteristic of his early work, the paint having been applied with bravura of brushwork.

After graduating from Oxford in 1909 Hanna became assistant to Professor Robert Henry, Pauls brother, in the Department of Latin at Queens University in Belfast. He no doubt acquired this picture at an early date. An early view of Pullough Bay, Achill, is numbered 1318 in the late S.B. Kennedys previously on-going cataloguing of Paul Henry's oeuvre.