Richard Kingston, R.H.A.

The Solomon Gallery, Dublin;
Sotheby's, London, 24 October 2006, lot 39;
Private collection

Dublin, Royal Hibernian Academy, Richard Kingston, Causeway, 2001

The board appears to be sound. Some minor ware to the lower corners otherwise the work appears in good overall condition. Under ultraviolet light there appear to be no signs of retouching. Float mounted in a white wooden box frame.
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'...I was fascinated when the tide went out leaving behind saucers of light which have been hollowed out by years of erosion...' (Kingston, exh. cat. 2001, p.6)

Kingston first visited the Giant's Causeway in Co. Antrim in 1982 and like most others before him, 'was stunned when I saw it' (op.cit., p.34). Created around 65 million years ago by basalt intrusions cooling into hexagonal columns, it is not surprising that the Causeway's formidable and surreal landscape inspired one of Ireland's most famous legends of the giant Finn mac Cumhaill building a causeway to link Ireland with Scotland.  Kingston himself was particularly struck that although 'there seems to be a lot of order in it, you gradually realise that is is completely chaotic' (op.cit., p.34). Indeed, it is the artist's exploration of these two themes, order and chaos, that have inspired his entire series of paintings related to the causeway and which occupied him from 1982 - 1999. 

Aidan Dunne has aptly concluded that 'it seems fair to say that in the long term the Giant's Causeway works will stand as his finest achievement' (op.cit., p.35).