Roy De Maistre C.B.E. (Australian / British 1894-1968) §
Two Figures
£12,600
Auction: 27 October 2023 from 11:00 BST
Description
oil on board
Dimensions
41cm x 33cm (16 1/8in x 13in)
Provenance
Provenance
Celia Broadbent (neé Keogh) and by direct descent to the present owner.
Literature
Johnson, Heather, Roy De Maistre: The English Years 1930-1968, Sydney: Craftsman House, 1995, p.27, plate 7, illustrated.
Footnote
Celia Broadbent was de Maistre’s cousin once removed, and his executor and friend; her older sister, Camilla Margery Keogh, was the subject of ‘La Folie', considered one of de Maistre’s major works
Roy de Maistre: ‘Fellas doing things to Fellas’
Described as ‘the man who taught Francis Bacon to paint’ (Ronald Alley interviewed by Heather Johnson 1988), Roy de Maistre moved from his native Australia to London in 1930, where he lived for the rest of his life. He had trained at Sydney Art School and the Royal Art Society, had spent two years travelling in Europe between 1923 and 1925 and had had two solo exhibitions, at the Macquarie Galleries in Sydney in 1926 and 1928. Despite this successful start to his career, de Maistre looked to London for a more progressive art world into which he was immediately admitted. In his first year in the English capital, de Maistre had a solo show at the Beaux Arts Gallery and a joint exhibition of paintings and furniture with Francis Bacon, held in the latter’s studio at 7 Queensberry Mews.
De Maistre’s friendship with Bacon was closest in the early 1930s, though they remained in contact until the former’s death in 1968. There is some debate as to whether they had studios in the same buildings but on different floors, but what is certain is de Maistre’s fascination with Bacon’s working spaces, which he painted on several occasions. As de Maistre’s biographer, Heather Johnson, has declared ‘the main importance of the association between de Maistre and Bacon is the influence on their respective work…in the early 1930s de Maistre had just as great or greater influence on Bacon.’ (Heather Johnson, Roy de Maistre: The English Years 1930-1968, Craftsman House, Roseville East, 1995, p.22).
The 1930s were a particularly fertile period in de Maistre’s career; his work featured in cutting-edge publications, such as Herbert Read’s 1933 Art Now and in group exhibitions including at the Zwemmer Gallery and Leicester Galleries. He had solo exhibitions at the avant-garde Mayor Gallery in 1934 and at the Calmann Gallery four years later. In 1934 he established the School of Contemporary Painting and Drawing with Martin Bloch, with its stated aim acting as a manifesto for his own work, namely ‘to help the pupils to give expression to their enjoyment of the beauty and significance of things seen and experienced; to understand and appreciate the materials they use and to recognise the logic of the laws of colour and composition’ (see Johnson, op.cit., p.82).
Two Figures dates from this important period. Johnson explained that in this painting, compared with other contemporary works, ‘de Maistre has…concentrated on a sensitive and intellectual rapport between the figures rather than a purely sexual one, the blending of the figures and their closeness is much more successful’ (Johnson, ibid., p.28). Two Figures is all the more significant given de Maistre’s instructions to his Executors that, following his death, ‘a large body of work, described as ‘fellas doing things to fellas’ be destroyed (see Johnson, ibid., p. 28). The two men are seen unclothed, caught in a moment of intimate relaxation – both have their eyes closed and are viewed in profile. Bold black outlining provides the structure of a pictorial design based on shallow depth, whilst a harmonious palette, direct technique and frank appreciation of the male form create an image which is at once sensual and bold.
In contrast, Crucifixion of 1945, whilst based on earlier notes and studies, was painted in response to the dropping of the first atomic bomb, on Hiroshima on 6 August of that year. By this point in his career, de Maistre was becoming known as a modernist religious painter, not least with the acquisition in 1944 of a work of the same Biblical scene to Iona Abbey. De Maistre formally converted to the Roman Catholic faith in 1951. The 1940s saw him receive solo exhibitions in Leeds and Birmingham and culminated in one at Adams Gallery, London in 1950.
The influence of Bacon’s working methods can arguably be detected in Man and Tree of 1959. Johnson posits that Bacon’s use of Portrait of Innocent X by Diego Velázquez in a series of works started in 1951, may have encouraged de Maistre to look to past masters for inspiration. Indeed, she established that Man and Tree is based on a work by Henri Matisse, reproduced in an article about Fauvism in the December 1934 issue of the D’Aci I D’Alla magazine, of which de Maistre owned a copy. (M. A. Cassanyes, ‘Fauvisme’, D’Aci D’Alla, no.179, vol. XXII, December 1934 see Johnson, ibid., pp.163 and 165). This work dates from the period during which de Maistre was preparing his retrospective exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, London, which opened in May 1960.
All three of the works by de Maistre presented here formerly belonged to Celia Broadbent (née Keogh). She was a daughter of the artist’s cousin, Camilla Keogh (1866-1948) who was one of his most significant patrons and muses. Celia went on to support de Maistre herself, not least in asking him to design tapestry versions of some of his paintings, which she then stitched (see Johnson, ibid., p. 112).
As de Maistre’s patron, Rab Butler, proclaimed: ‘His most impressive quality as an artist was his absolute integrity. He went through long periods of difficulty in earning his living from painting because he refused to conform to any standards other than those which he had rigorously laid down for himself.’ (quoted in Johnson, ibid. p.55)