Works York Festival Triptych

York Festival Triptych

1956

oil on canvas

130.8h x 196.2w (cm)

Private Collection (UK)

Recto: signed and dated lower right: R. Eurich. 1956.


Tags:
Bicycles / Ladders
Birds Eye View
Bonfires / Flames / Smoke
England
Gatherings / Festivities
Harlequins / Pierrots / Clowns
Historical / Biblical References
Motifs
Music / Theatre
Narrative
Rainbows
Sets
The North
Themes
Towns / Town Life / Buildings
Umbrellas / Hats
View through a Window or Door
York
Yorkshire

Subject
Biggs & Son
Cat
Dog
E L Shuttleworth
Figures
Flowers
Gough
Noah's Flood
Twaite Bros
actors
animals
architecture
audience
bakers
bakery
balloons
bicycle
bicycles
bike
bin
boats
bobby
boxes
bridge
building
cake shop
cathedral
cello
cemetary
cemetery
cermony
children
chimneys
churches
city
cobble stones
cobbles
cooling tower
costumes
cricket
crowd
crowds
dogs
dolls
dustbin lorry
dustman
fairground
ferris wheel
fish shop
flower pots
graveyard
hats
helter skelter
high viewpoint
hills
horse
instruments
ladder
lost sign
market
medieval
minster
musical
nun
paddle steamer
parfumier
performance
perfumerie
pierrot doll
play
policeman
power station
punts
rider
rides
river
rocking horse
roof
rooves
rowing
rowing boat
rubbish
rubbish bin
rubbish men
rubbish truck
ruin < building
ruins
shoe shop
shoes
shops
smoke
spectators
sport
streets
swans
tableware
teddy bear
theatre theatrical
topographical view
toy shop
traditions festivities gatherings
trash
trash bin
urban
urban landscape
view through a window
window

Medium
Oil

Eurich takes familiar York landmarks and reimagines the city. The Ouse and Foss Bridges span the same river seeming to go nowhere and the buildings to the right and left act as ‘wings' to a triptych composition. On Ouse Bridge a pageant-waggon performance of The Flood takes place, staged for the 1954 Festival of Arts and Mystery Plays. The cycle of the Mystery Plays were revived in 1951 as part of the Festival of Britain after almost 400 years and still run every four years. In the Museum Gardens to the left, a performance of The Judgement is also underway before St. Mary's Abbey.

- York Art Gallery label

From the Richard Eurich interview by James Mellen done in 1978 for the Imperial War Museum "Artists in an Age of Conflict" series of sound recordings

"Some of the paintings which I painted not so very long after the war and which have been stored up in my loft are now being sought after and being purchased. It’s rather a curious sensation. And some quite large paintings which I thought I should never get rid of . . .

In fact, one large painting which I did of a festival at York, . . .  it was a 7 foot affair, I hadn’t room for it in my cottage and I lent it to a school for several years. And then the school changed hands and the master thought that the painting had better be sent back to me. And I thought, 'Well I don’t know what to do. Shall I cut it up into little bits and things, and pieces?’

But I asked a dealer who had a gallery not so far [away in Petersfield] . . . whether he would like to see it and have it. And he was willing to do so. And oddly enough he sold it at an incredible price I thought. And this has happened several times recently with rather largish pictures I’d done which I wondered what on earth to do with. Some of them [had] been up in my loft for quite a long time and suddenly found customers, which is rather gratifying. And one can only sort of say that things do go round in circles."

- IWP

Provenance & Events

COMMISSIONED • 1955

commissioned by the Lord Mayor of York

EXHIBITION • 5th May to 19th Aug 1956

"Summer Exhibition 1956"

Royal Academy of Arts

Cat 329

WITH • 1957

the Vice-Chancellor of the University of York until 1970, on loan from RE after the city of York rejected the painting

WITH • 1970

Ash Barn Gallery, Petersfield, Hampshire

ACQUIRED • 1970

purchased from Ash Barn Gallery by D. M. Jacobs

WITH • [date unknown]

Southampton City Art Gallery, on loan from D. M. Jacobs

SOLO SHOW • 28th Jan to 13th Mar 1994

"The Edge of all the Land: Richard Eurich 1903-1992"

Southampton City Art Gallery

Cat 54

AUCTION • 26th Jun 2014

"Modern British & Irish Art Day Sale"

Christie’s

lot 179, illustrated

Sold for £104,500
EXHIBITION • 2015

"Leeds Art Gallery"

Leeds

on loan from the collector

IN COLLECTION • 2016

Private Collection (UK)

References:

Catalogues

  • "Edge of All the Land” Southampton (1994)"; Southampton City Art Gallery / Nicholas Usherwood. [Figure 54]

Books

  • "Rediscovering Richard Eurich's "York Festival Triptych"', Medieval English Theatre, Volume 23"; by Margaret Rogerson, pub. Lancaster University, 2001; ISSN 0143 3784 [pp. 3-16]

Other

  • "Red Bubble"; Old Masters [reproductions on clothing and prints]
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