Jack Butler Yeats, R.H.A. (1871-1957)

The Sisters

Details

Jack Butler Yeats, R.H.A. (1871-1957)
The Sisters
signed 'Jack B. Yeats' (lower right), inscribed 'Sisters' (on the reverse)
oil on canvas
18 x 24 in. (45.7 x 61 cm.)
Painted in 1944

Provenance

Purchased from the artist by Richard McGonigal in 1944.
Mrs. Mabel Waddington, London.
Mr. and Mrs. Guy de Keller, Dublin, 1970.

Literature

H. Pyle, Jack B. Yeats A Catalogue Raisonné of the Oil Paintings II, London, 1992, no.647, p.591 (illustrated), and III, p.363 (illustrated).

Exhibited

Dublin, National College of Art, Jack B. Yeats National Loan Exhibition, June-July 1945, no.118.
Venice, Irish Section of XXI Biennale, Jack B. Yeats Paintings, July-October 1962, no.5.
London, Waddington Galleries, Jack B. Yeats Paintings, February-March 1965, no.13 (illustrated).
Dublin, National Gallery of Ireland, Jack B. Yeats A Centenary Exhibition, September-December 1971, no.88 (illustrated): this exhibition travelled to Belfast, Ulster Museum; and New York, Cultural Center (April-June 1972).

Lot Essay

Hilary Pyle (loc. cit.) comments of this work 'A study of the Brontë sisters, standing by the open window of their drawing room, while Charlotte, on the right, reads from a book. The different personalities are delicately defined, even to the almost anonymous side view of the youngest and self-effacing sister, Anne. There is a view of moorland through the window.

Yeats may have conceived the idea for the painting from a play. The painting has much of the atmosphere of a stage set, and a sense of moment. Equally he may have been thinking of the famous portrait of
the sisters by their brother Patrick Branwell Brontë (National Portrait Gallery, London), probably seen in reproduction'.

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