Beschreibung:

OLD GEORGIAN HOUSE OPPOSITE TOWNHALL, KILLARNEY, KERRY, 1943 Harry Kernoff RHA (1900-1974)
Signature: signed and dated lower left; inscribed with title, dated and numbered [(6) and (9)] on reverse Medium: watercolour Dimensions: 27 by 37cm., 10.7 5 by 14.7 5in. Provenance: Provenance:Purchased by the present owner c.1970-71 directly from the artist at his studio in 13 Stamer St., Dublin The son of Jewish parents of mixed Russian and Spanish descent, Kernoff was born in London but moved to Dublin at an early age when his father opted to begin a cabinet-making business there. Kernoff’s... s artistic training began with night classes at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art. Upon winning the prestigious Taylor Scholarship in 1923, he became a day student and henceforth devoted all his energies to art, working also for a time on designing stage sets in the company of actors such as Mícheál MacLíammóir and Hilton Edwards. Some time after this he visited Paris, staying for a month painting and sketching. In 1926 Kernoff began exhibiting at the RHA, continuing to do so nearly every year for the next five decades. He joined the Dublin Society of Painters in 1927 and held many solo exhibitions at their studio in no. 7 St. Stephen’s Green. He also had two solo exhibitions with the Victor Waddington Galleries in 1936 and 1937 and numerous shows abroad in London, Glasgow, Paris, Amsterdam, New York, Chicago and Toronto. In 1930 he visited Russia and later published on article on his experiences there prior to the Stalinist regime. At home, from his Dublin studio at no. 13 Stamer Street, Kernoff supported himself largely through selling woodcuts; three books of these were published, the first in 1942. He also contributed to other publications such as James Stephen’s Crock of Gold and A Broadside (Cuala Press) among others. His depictions of working-class Dublin and smaller towns across the country are much sort after by collectors, as are his portraits of Ireland’s leading literary and theatrical figures, some of which now hang in the Dublin Writer’s Museum among other public collections. The scene shows two nuns in their traditional habits walking up a wet street in Killarney away from the square. A moustached man leans against the wall of the Townhall with a parked red cart and resting blinkered donkey by a lamppost opposite. Towards the end of the street a couple pass a lady in a yellow coat pushing a pram. The white awning of Michael Moriarty's drapery store can be seen clearly to the left of the scene more