JUSTIN O'BRIEN

Smith & Singer are delighted to offer Justin O'Brien's Nude Against Landscape (1971-1972) for private sale.

For Justin O’Brien, even in a painting as personally immediate and naturalistic as Nude Against Landscape (1971-1972), there is a feeling of calm and grace.  The subject is one of several exquisite depictions of window views inspired by O’Brien’s time spent on the Greek Island of Skyros in the summer of 1971:

‘Sykros is an enchanting island … figs, pomegranates, vast vineyards, mulberry trees heavy with fruit … All this side by side with great stark mountains and Cyclonean walls.  It has a biblical aura and a sense of mystery … I have tried to catch some of the extraordinary lushness and the exotic splendor of the unforgettable view.’

A myriad of feelings are conveyed through compositions such as Nude Against Landscape.  The carefully posed nude figure leaning against the door frame acts as a mediator between the internal and external worlds – the shaded interior of the domestic villa and the sweeping landscape of the hilltop town set against the sparkling waters of the ocean below.  The setting steeped in beauty and history is both realistic and symbolic.  As O’Brien hinted, ‘the religious experience should not be confused with the spiritual experience, for the latter can be expressed through many subjects, like a vase of flowers.’

This remarkable, delicately drawn and sensitively coloured slice of light and life is not only a tour de force of naturalistic painting, but also a picture of spiritual serenity, of a man and an artist entirely content with his place in the world.