Theodore, A Pirate

Details

Jack Butler Yeats, R.H.A. (1871-1957)
Theodore, A Pirate
signed 'JACK B/YEATS' (lower right), signed again 'Jack B Yeats' (on the reverse)
pen and ink
6 x 4¾ in. (15.2 x 12.1 cm.)
Executed in 1905. Reproduced in Broadsheet, January 1909.

Provenance

Purchased by Tom Kelly at the 1905 exhibition.
Theodore P. Donahue, Kildare; and by descent to the present owner.

Literature

H. Pyle, Jack B. Yeats His Watercolours, Drawings and Pastels, Dublin, 1993, p. 145, no. 573, illustrated.

Exhibited

London, Baillie's Gallery, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches by J.H. Donaldson, Jack B. Yeats, Elinor Monsell and Mrs Norman, February - March 1905, no. 98.
Dublin, Rotunda Rooms, Gaelic League Exhibition, March 1905, no. 35.
New York, The New York Culture Centre, Yeats, no. 6.

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price plus buyer's premium.

Lot Essay

Pyle comments, 'Theodore was an imaginary invention of Masefield and Yeats, a graceful effeminate young pirate ... Yeats made numerous drawings of him, and he appears in A Broadside, August 1908, January 1909, May 1920 and in Treasure, A Broadside, April 1911. Here, dressed in a typically elegant fashion, head bared, he strikes a haughty pose. Behind him a shadowy man walks the plank' (see H. Pyle, Jack B. Yeats His Watercolours, Drawings and Pastels, Dublin, 1993, pp. 145-6).

More from The 10th Anniversary Irish Sale

View All