Contemporary Art

Capturing the Zeitgeist : John Byrne's 'Patrick' Era

11 March 2025

Charlotte Riordan

This Spring we were proud to present the finest group of early works by iconic artist John Byrne to have been seen on the market. The collection - which was 100% sold and reached over £90,000 - showcased the diversity of Byrne’s talent and his distinctive stylistic voice.

The ‘Patrick’ era pieces all come from the same private collection - that of the family of Byrne’s local priest, Father Tom Jamieson of Renfrew Parish. Here we look back to the early years of Byrne's art career - to the artist from Paisley called ‘Patrick’, who became recorder-in-chief of the cultural zeitgeist in 1970s Scotland - discovering a very special, very personal collection of artworks that give us an unprecedented insight into this chapter of Byrne’s story.

Contemporary Art

featuring The Jamieson Collection: Significant Works by John 'Patrick' Byrne

Capturing the Zeitgeist : John Byrne's 'Patrick' Era with Celie Byrne

Join Artist & John Byrne's eldest daughter Celie Byrne here, as she recalls this period of their lives in vivid detail.

Byrne's Early ‘Faux-Naive’ Style

“My father doesn’t know I’m sending this to you as he paints for his own enjoyment and does not exhibit his work…”, began the letter Byrne sent to London’s Portal Gallery in 1967. So commenced the infamous ruse in which he got his foot in the door of the London art world by pretending to be a "primitive" self-taught artist named Patrick, a 71-year-old retired labourer from Govan. Though he confessed the truth to the directors before it could spin too far out of hand, the gallery continued to collude with Byrne to present him to their buying audience as a fashionable so-called “Primitive Painter”… until he was ultimately outed in The Observer as an alumni (of above average sophistication) by the Glasgow School of Art itself. He had several successful exhibitions with Portal between 1968 and 1971.

“His doll-like children…occupy a fantastical world that implies nostalgia for a Victorian childhood – although the cats and monkeys that inhabit this Rousseauvian landscape have a sharp-toothed menace. But the Victoriana is as contemporary as the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper, part of the repertoire of British Pop Art established by Peter Blake’s fairground wrestlers or Joe Tilson’s wooden constructions.”

Robert Hewison in ‘John Byrne: Art & Life’ 2011

The work, 'Homage A Hockney', is accompanied by an inscription by Byrne on the reverse:

“HOMAGE A HOCKNEY by John Byrne /Patrick. On the Occasion of David Hockney’s Major Retrospective Show at the Whitechapel Gallery, London covering the period 1961-70 with 46 paintings, 45 drawings and 47 prints. In this painting some Hockney paraphernalia is included (the T.V. set, the Palm Tree, the Spectacles and a paraphrase of Tired Indians, Rocky Mountains, 1965, and the graffiti) in a bid to chronicle the painting scene (Hockney’s) over the past ten years. The Ty-Phoo tea pack, the swimming pools, the latter realist (totally representative) paintings have all been referred to by implication in this simple turning out of Hockney’s cerebral drawers. John Byrne, April 1970.”

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

HOMAGE A HOCKNEY – 1970

Signed ‘Patrick’ lower right, inscribed with title, bears inscription by Byrne verso, oil on board

Music & Art

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, musicians were to feature heavily in Byrne's output. This was a period that saw an amazing explosion of musical talent emerging from the industrial centres in the West of Scotland at this time. Through a shared love of music and Pop culture, Byrne was well networked into the scene, and friends with the key protagonists. From Gerry Rafferty and Billy Connolly’s ‘Humblebums’ to Donovan, Byrne was the go-to designer for their album artwork.

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

H.M.S. DONOVAN (ARTWORK PERTAINING TO THE RECORD)

Signed ‘Patrick’ lower left, oil on panel laid on block board

Byrne would work closely with Donovan, another famous Glasgow son, who commissioned him in 1971 to design a cover for HMS Donovan, an album of children’s songs. They also worked on an animated film together – Donovan’s answer to Yellow Submarine - relocating for a month to Los Angeles together. The project never came to full fruition, however. In 2015, the two friends reunited to stage an exhibition dedicated to Donovan's career at Glasgow's House For An Art Lover which was curated by Byrne and featured many works pertaining to their artistic collaborations.

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

UNTITLED (MUSICIAN), C.1973-75

Signed ‘Patrick’ lower right, initialled ‘JB’ to head of instrument, oil on board

The largest oil in the collection is heavily influenced by this trip to America – the country Byrne had been enthralled by since his childhood. During the trip Byrne became disillusioned with his glimpse behind the Hollywood façade, instead developing a fascination with the characters he encountered in the music scene of LA’s dive bars. When he returned to Scotland he produced a series of monumental oils inspired by these experiences. The subtext of many of them are critical of black exploitation and the Vietnam War. The clothing of the musician here is redolent of American Civil War uniform, which potentially alludes to a darker undercurrent of symbolism.

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

THE BEATLES - C.1969

Signed ‘Patrick’ lower left, oil on board

In 1969 Byrne, still under the guise of ‘Patrick’, created a painting of The Beatles for his December show at the Portal Gallery that year. This was a reference and reaction to the fact that Portal attracted a starry clientele, with some of the biggest names in British showbusiness of the day becoming frequent visitors, including Michael Caine, David Niven, David Bailey and The Beatles.

The painting was purchased by the art director and graphic designer Alan Aldridge, who went on to use it as the frontispiece to The Beatles Illustrated Lyrics, published in 1969. It was later used as the cover of The Beatles Ballads LP twelve years later.

Rumours suggest the original largescale work was lost by EMI records, and so this work is a rare surviving early version.
In the image, Byrne represents each Beatle seated beside a sort of ‘spirit animal’, perhaps which he felt best approximated their nature. Yoko Ono can be glimpsed in the crystal ball held by John.

OTHER WORKS FROM THE COLLECTION

SOLD FOR £8,190

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

PORTRAIT OF CELIE

SOLD FOR £1,890

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

CHILD, BIRD, AND MONKEY - 1972

SOLD FOR £1,512

JOHN BYRNE R.S.A. (SCOTTISH 1940-2023)

'PATRICK' ANGEL

This significant collection of artworks has remained in Father Jamieson’s family by descent, and it is with great pleasure that Lyon & Turnbull presented these works on the open market for the first time in our Contemporary Art sale on 02 April 2025.

02 April 2025 From 10:00 BST

Contemporary Art

About the Artist

John Byrne

Scottish 1940 - 2023

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Contemporary Art

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