Lot 25: Nick Nicholls (1914-1991) A View of Dublin from

Nick Nicholls (1914-1991) A View of Dublin from the Phoenix Park Gouache and ink on paper, 32 x 39cm (12½ x 15'') Signed and dated '40 Victor Waddington framing label verso Provenance: Acquired directly from the artist by the current owner's family in the 1940s This work is thought to be after the well known painting by William Ashford (1746-1824) of the same title painted between 1795-98 (which can be found in the National Gallery of Ireland's collection). Born in Salisbury, Wiltshire, the son of an English father and an Irish mother. As a child he spent a good deal of time with relatives in County Cavan. A quantity surveyor by training, in 1935 he turned to painting, in which he was self-taught. His early pictures are conventional watercolours, but later he embraced surrealism and other forms of abstraction, being influenced by Cézanne, Picasso, Klee and Miró. While living in London he took a studio in Fitzroy Street and exhibited at the influential Spectrum Gallery. With the approach of war he moved to Dublin along with Georgette Rondel and remained there until 1946. He was introduced to the White Stag Group by Basil Rákóczi, whom he met in Dublin. In 1946 he experienced a deep religious conversion and henceforth religion played an important part in his thinking. In 1953 he gave up painting and began to study philosophy and religion, but he returned to painting in the 1960s, being by then influenced by native African art and the work of the French painter Jean Dubuffet (1901-85), with its emphasis on images derived from graffiti and children's art. During his years in Dublin he also wrote and published poetry. Nick Nicholls died in London in 1991.