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I
rish
& I
nternational
A
rt
A
uction
M
onday
5
th
D
ecember
2016
at
6.00
pm
35
33 Hughie O’Donoghue RA (b.1953) Red Earth VI (1995)signed, titled & dated 1995 on reverse
oil on canvas
218.5 x 195.5cm (86 x 77in)
Provenance:
Archeus / Post Modern Gallery, London;
Private Collection
Exhibited:
Andata e Ritorno: British Artists in Italy 1890-1996;
Royal Albert Memorial Museum , Exeter, 6th July - 3rd August 1996;
€25,000-35,000 (£21,739-30,434)
O’Donoghue’s work is concerned with history, and he has presented this concern variously throughout his career. His
early, monumental series’ Sleeper and Red Earth interpret the history of the ground itself, exploring what the soil may
hold and why: examining the bodies placed in it or that may have fallen or otherwise come to be there. His father’s expe-
riences throughout the Second World War became a starting point for a prodigious consideration of that period through
the medium of richly surfaced paint. History as memory is another facet of this muse..