Arthur Power (1891-1984), Eve and the Serpent

Arthur Power (1891-1984) was an Irish writer, art critic and artist. A regular visitor to Paris in the 1920s, he associated with James Joyce and family, Samuel Becket and in literary / artistic circles.. He met and interviewed Modigliani just two weeks before his (Modigliani's) death and owned at least one piece of Modigliani's work.

While in Paris he became the art critic for the New York Herald and moved in artistic and literary circles. He returned to Ireland after inheriting a family estate, Bellevue, in Co Waterford. Later moving to Dublin, he worked as an art critic for the Irish Times newspaper. From the 1950s he focussed increasingly on painting, becoming a regular exhibitor at the RHA (Royal Hibernian Academy), later becoming an honorary member.

This striking work is full of religious ionography, in a Celtic-meets-South-American folk art style. It is one of the larger and more elaborate of his works that we have come across. His work was reviewed as being in a "faux-naïf" style with a "sharply etched focus" bordering on surrealism by the art critic Brian Fallon.

Charcoal and gouache on paper. 55 x 37cm excluding mount and frame. Signed bottom right. Excellent condition. Newly framed with acid free materials, UV protecting low reflection glass.  Original Dawson Gallery label preserved on reverse.

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