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Lot #3 - Roy De Maistre

  • Auction House:
    Deutscher and Hackett
  • Sale Name:
    Important Australian + International Fine Art
  • Sale Date:
    04 May 2022 ~ 7pm (AEST)
  • Lot #:
    3
  • Lot Description:
    Roy De Maistre
    (1894 - 1968)
    The Pines, 1921
    oil on cardboard
    29.0 x 27.0 cm
    signed and dated lower left: R. de Mestre / 1921
  • Provenance:
    Mrs Ronnie Dangar, Sydney (bears inscription verso); Thence by descent; Private collection, Sydney; Christie’s, Sydney, 3 – 4 October 1972, lot 266; Joseph Brown Gallery, Melbourne; Mr Alan Greenway, Australia and USA, acquired from the above; Thence by descent; Private collection, California, USA
  • Notes:
    In August 1919, Roy de Maistre (then known as Roi de Mestre) and his colleague Roland Wakelin held Australia’s first modernist exhibition at Gayfield Shaw’s Art Salon in Sydney. It was a show full of vibrant colour matched to a musical scale of the artists’ devising. Of the fourteen works shown, eleven were Cubist-informed scenes of the harbour’s foreshores and boatsheds, but the remainder were non-objective abstractions, a genre never seen before in this country. Titled Colour in Art, the event still generates fascination and comment over a century later but it needs to be emphasised that this was only a starting point for both artists, and their subsequent careers took many divergent paths as the years progressed. Indeed, within a year Wakelin and de Maistre began studying the controversial ‘tonalist’ theories presented by the Scottish-born artist Max Meldrum, an approach in apparent opposition to the ideas proposed through Colour in Art. In December 1919, Meldrum’s student Colin Colahan published a book entitled Max Meldrum: his art and views, centred around a key lecture from 1917 which argued that ‘tone and proportion gives us what is generally called ‘a perfect work of art’, without any relation to the actual amount of time which the Artist has bestowed upon his picture.’1 Meldrum believed that the careful perception and analysis of tone and tonal relationships would produce an exact appearance of the thing seen. The gallerist and framer John Young purchased several copies of the book which he gave to his artist-friends, including de Maistre, who subsequently attended a lecture when Meldrum visited Sydney for six weeks in 1921. Such was his powers of persuasion that other Sydney artists were also intrigued by his theories, including Wakelin, Grace Cossington Smith, Elioth Gruner, and Lloyd Rees. The Pines, 1921, is one of a small number of Meldrum-esque works painted by de Maistre and it most likely depicts a scene near his family home in Sutton Forest in the southern highlands of New South Wales. It is a testament to his strong self-belief that de Maistre’s does not completely abandon colour, as evidenced by the deep green of the two pines counterbalanced by patches of soft violet within the shadows and the surface of the road, strategies which give greater intensity to the more muted tonal phrasing championed by Meldrum. Related paintings that fall within this sequence depict Government House in Sydney, other views of Sutton Forest and floral bunches of which Still life (also known as White Roses), 1922 in the Art Gallery of New South Wales became his winning entry into the Society of Artists’ Travelling Scholarship, allowing for his first overseas journey in 1923. Despite its assured touch and pleasing subject, it appears that The Pines was never exhibited by de Maistre and only came to light when the famed dealer, Joseph Brown, was given access to the artist’s Estate after his death in London in 1968. Subsequently sold at auction in 1972, the painting has not been seen publicly during the interceding five decades and represents an exciting re-appearance for the artist’s catalogue. 1. Meldrum, M., ‘The invariable truths of depictive art’, 1917, in Colahan, C. (ed.), Max Meldrum: his art and views, McCubbin, Melbourne, 1919, p. 43. ANDREW GAYNOR
  • Estimate:
    A$40,000 - 60,000
  • Realised Price:
    *****

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  • Category:
    Art

This Sale has been held and this item is no longer available. Details are provided for information purposes only.



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