181 YEATS, Jack B. “Tumblers at the Circus”. 1912 AN ORIGINAL DRAWING BY A SIGNIFICANT IRISH ARTIST One of the artist’s trademark circus scenes, published within A Broadside for December 1912 (number seven of the fifth year of publication). Jack B. Yeats provided four drawings to the December 1912 issue of A Broadside of which “Tumblers at the Circus” is the important full-page illustration. From boyhood to old age, Yeats was captivated by circuses; they feature in his earliest diaries and sketchbooks and were depicted in some of his final oil paintings. In his essay, “Jack B. Yeats: Promise and Regret”, Brian O’Doherty identified the artist’s “repertory companies of character and themes” as consisting of “tinkers, gypsies, sailors, circus performers, actors, travellers, tramps, jockeys, gamblers”. A Broadside was published between June 1908 and May 1915 by the two Yeats sisters. There were 84 issues in total. As described by Hilary Pyle, “Yeats’s practice was to published one or two ballads or poems with two small line block illustrations by himself, and fill in the third page with a single illustration, often a drawing dating from years before”. Yeats exhibited this drawing on three occasions: 21 May–29 June 1913, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, “Summer Exhibition of Irish Art” (group exhibition); October 1913, Black and White Artists’s Society of Ireland, Dublin (group exhibition); and 31 May–21 June 1919, Little Art Rooms, London, “Drawings and Pictures of Life in the West of Ireland” (solo exhibition). Hilary Pyle records the drawing as item number 1907 in her catalogue of Yeats’s cartoons and illustrations. She notes a previous owner as the American collector Martin Haley-Ryan. Original drawing (244 × 169 mm) on artist’s board (266 × 190 mm with “Reeves’ Black & White Board” stamped on right margin), pen and ink, signed (“Jack B. Yeats”) lower right and titled lower centre, additionally inscribed “tumblers at the circus By Jack B. Yeats” on reverse, mounted, framed, and glazed (framed size 430 × 350). Pin holes at corners below mount, some light toning to card; fine and unfaded. ¶ Brian O’Doherty, “Jack B. Yeats: Promise and Regret”, Jack B. Yeats: a Centenary Gathering , 1971; Hilary Pyle, The Different Worlds of Jack B. Yeats: His Cartoons and Illustrations , 1994. £20,000 [154959]
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All items are fully described and photographed at peterharrington.co.uk
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