depicting an inlet with fishing boats, signed lower left, oil on canvas, 42cm x 58cm
| Estimate: | £8,000 - £15,000 |
Frank McKelvey (1895-1974) was an Irish painter from Belfast whose work bridged a representational tradition and a lyrical, impressionistic engagement with landscape, farm life, and coastal scenes. Born in 1895, he was the son of a painter-decorator, and his talent for art showed early: at the Belfast School of Art he won the figure drawing prize in 1912.
He first exhibited at the Royal Hibernian Academy in 1918 and went on to do so nearly every year for half a century. In 1930 he was elected a full member of the RHA. At the same time he became associated with the Royal Ulster Academy (RUA), affirming his place in both Northern Irish and Irish art circles.
His early work was more strictly representational, with careful detail and a focus on portraits as well as domestic and rural subjects. Over time, McKelvey’s style softened: his palette lightened, brushwork loosened, and he increasingly captured the effects of light, atmosphere, and his beloved natural settings. He frequently painted scenes of everyday rural life - cottages, farmyards, children, poultry, and coastal vistas, especially in counties Donegal, Down, Armagh and along the Antrim coast.
McKelvey’s subjects often display his affection for the Irish countryside. He lived for a long period in Co. Down (the Maze) from 1924, and used that and his in-law’s home in Bessbrook, Co. Armagh, as frequent settings in his work.
His paintings of farmyards - women or children feeding chickens, rustic gates, whitewashed walls, cottages in dappled light - are among his most recognisable and beloved motifs.
McKelvey’s works are held in numerous public and private collections. Among these are Queen’s University Belfast, the Crawford Gallery in Cork, the Royal Palace at Soestdijk, the Royal Ulster Academy, and the Masonic Hall in Dublin.
He is often considered, with contemporaries such as James Humbert Craig, part of a “national school” of Irish landscape painting - deeply rooted in observation, in place, in light, and in a gentle attention to the mood of scenes.
