Geraldine O'Brien's forthcoming exhibition at Hamilton Osborn King's
Fine art galery in 20 Dawson Street, Dublin..

<http://www.hokfineart.com/>

The exhibition is in aid of The friends of St Luke's Hospital and part of the sale proceeds will go there. All the paintings are up on the web in the above link.

Below is a biography written by Aubrey Flegg.

Geraldine OBrien, the Limerick-born flower-painter extraordinaire, has produced wonderful pictures for over sixty years. This exhibition is a celebration of her work, and there are over 35 canvases for sale. One-third of the proceeds are going to the Friends of St. Luke’s Hospital, Rathgar, which develops and delivers cancer services to patients from all over Ireland. Hamilton Osborne King Fine Art have made this exhibition possible through their generous sponsorship.

Geraldine showed her talent while still at school in Dublin, twice winning prizes in prestigious Royal Drawing Society (London) international competitions. In 1939, aged 17, she went to study for a year with the Dublin-born plein air artist Stanhope Alexander Forbes in West Cornwall. Inter alia, she was allowed to wash his brushes, “a great privilege!” Her progress must have been rapid because she exhibited at the Royal Hibernian Academy for the first time the following year (Anemones, £10 10s and 5d). She exhibited regularly at the RHA up till the 1990s.

Her artistic studies were interrupted by the Second World War, and with characteristic adaptability she turned her talents to mechanical drawing. As part of the war effort, she found herself making meticulous drawings of unidentified bits of weapons.

Geraldine’s art education also included a course in portraiture at Heatherley’s in London, and early commissions included portraits of bishops, “lots of them”. Geraldine’s skill as a portrait painter can be seen in the utterly charming portrait of her daughter Fiona aged about four. When asked about her self-portrait in the National Self-portrait Collection in the University of Limerick, she chuckles, remembering the dogs which she included “to dilute the effect.” These dogs were members of a continuous tribe of waifs and strays whose successors continue to rumpus noisily in the kitchen.

From an artistic family, her OBrien relations and connections include Dermod OBrien, PRHA; Kitty Wilmer OBrien, RHA and President of the Watercolour Society; Brigid Ganly RHA; and Kitty Clausen, daughter of Sir George Clausen, RA. Her mother, Cicely OBrien, was a distinguished artist.

In 1948 Geraldine married David Hely-Hutchinson, and they settled in her family home in Co. Clare, where she still lives. They travelled regularly in the west, and we can see from her pictures of the Burren that she enjoyed working en plein air. She also loves her garden, both as a gardener and as a painter of flowers.

Now, in the heart of winter, she stands knee deep in a garden of her own making, laughing at the very idea. Against every chair in the room are stacked flower paintings and landscapes ready for this exhibition, four seasons captured in a riot of colour and restraint. Michaelmas daises burst upwards like rockets; majestic arrangements of summer flowers draw one into another season and another time. But one is never overwhelmed because these are real flowers seen with a gardener’s eye. Sometimes she paints them in situ, sometimes posing her arrangements against an outdoors background. Often, however, she uses a studio setting as, true professional that she is, she does not let rain stop play.
Aubrey Flegg

Solo Exhibitions

Goodwin Gallery, Limerick
Frank Lewis Gallery, Killarney
James Gallery, Dalkey
Gallery 75, Limerick
Kilakee Gallery, Dublin
Country Choice, Nenagh, Co. Tipperary

Group Exhibitions

Royal Hibernian Academy – group exhibitions 1940s – 1990s
Goodwin Gallery, Limerick
James Gallery, Dalkey
Frank Lewis Gallery, Killarney
Gallery 75, Limerick
The Arts Club, Limerick
Chelsea Flower Show Art Exhibition
Country Choice, Nenagh, Tipperary
Also exhibited in Paris, Biarritz, Boston and Australia

Collections

National Self-portrait Collection, University of Limerick
Municipal Gallery Collection, Limerick

Printed works

Medici Collection reproductions