Lot 39
JOHN WILLIAM BEATTY, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1869-1941)
Lot 39 Details
JOHN WILLIAM BEATTY, O.S.A., R.C.A. (1869-1941)
UNTITLED (BEECH WOODS), 1927
oil on panel
signed; signed, dated "Nov 26th/27" and inscribed on the reverse:
"This painting passes today from my hands to those of a dear student of mine whose progress I have watched for some time & who I know does appreciate it as much for its associations as for its merits the latter of which I pray that it may possess".
10.375 ins x 13.75 ins; 26.4 cms x 34.9 cms
Estimate $10,000-$15,000
Additional Images
Provenance:
Private collection, Ontario
Note:
J.W. Beatty’s cropped views of dappled light in forest interiors are classic images in the history of Canadian landscape painting. Senior to the members of the Group of Seven, Beatty opened a path for them in the 1910s when his Evening Cloud of the Northland was exhibited at the Ontario Society of Artists’ 1910 annual exhibition, and acquired by the National Gallery of Canada the next year.
Beatty forged his own iconography of the Canadian landscape, illuminated with a distinct palette and quality of light and shadow. All of these characteristics are in Untitled (Beech Woods). His yellows and reds heighten the sun-struck trunks and dappled ground, contrasting dramatically against smaller trunks in silhouette and deep browns and greens of the foliage and terrain. Unequivocally a representational painting, Untitled (Beech Grove) is charged with the energy one would later see in mid-century abstraction.