Mildred Anne Butler RWS (1858-1941) Cattle grazing, Kilmurr...

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€8,000 - €12,000

Mildred Anne Butler RWS (1858-1941) Cattle grazing, Kilmurry Oil on canvas, 66 x 96.5cm (26 x 38'') Signed and dated indistinctly Provenance: With Val Dillon mid 1980s, from whom acquired by the present owner The Georgian walls and idyllic gardens of Kilmurry House outside Thomastown, Co. Kilkenny have been faithfully recorded in watercolour countless times by its resident artist Mildred Anne Butler. The artist's father, Captain Henry Butler, bought the estate from the Bushe family in the 1840s and the young family led what appears to be charmed lives in its abundant walled gardens and unspoilt estate grounds, as evidenced by the astonishing number of watercolours completed by Butler throughout her lifetime. Mildred outlived her older siblings and with no further family she inherited the estate where she continued to live for the rest of her life. The young artist, being of considerable privileged upbringing, benefited immensely from the opportunity to attend classes under the Guernsey-born draughtsman and watercolourist Paul Jacob Naftel RWS (1817-1891). She continued to credit her time with Naftel as crucially inspirational, and his influence can be seen throughout her oeuvre. Butler's predilection towards animal painting as seen here was likely galvanised by her time studying in the studio of William Frank Calderon (1865-1943) who is known for his animal portraiture and hunting scenes. Butler spent a significant amount of time in Cornwall painting with the Newlyn School of Art – no doubt employing the plein-air approach to painting as well as a preoccupation with light, similar to the Barbizon School in France. Butler enjoyed painting from life and often used photography and taxidermy to aid her animal studies when plein-air painting didn't allow her enough accuracy. Her approach to animal painting is therefore imbued with an innate understanding of the physiology and anatomy of her subjects and yet a lightness of touch that rejects sentimentality. Butler's paintings are no saccharine, watery spectacle of the rural idyll. They are preoccupied with depth, atmosphere and at times evoke a sense of strange, best evidenced by her studies of crows in flight for which she is well known. ''The young lady knows how to look at her subjects with the eyes of a well trained artist; she can make good pictures out of simple and indeed trivial material; and all her …[…]… contributions are extremely interesting and even beautiful; although there is not a shred of story, anecdote, incident or an atom of pathos beyond that which always attends really artistic representations of homely nature… these pictures command attention by the massing and breadth of chiaroscuro, and the solid way in which they have been handled'' Critical Response, Atheneum, 5th May 1897 The painting of cattle grazing here presented is an exceptionally rare and large example of an oil painting by the artist. It presents the critical viewer with the opportunity to appreciate the extent of Butler's ability to conjure atmosphere in a different medium. The broad slick strokes of the paddock's coniferous foliage is deftly punctuated by soft mauves, pinks, warm greys and indigo to create a sense of distance and also movement. We are struck by the 'Irishness' of the day, a clouded patch of sky peaks out from downswept branches of the trees. The cattle lead our eyes instinctively towards it, their necks each bent towards the clearing encouraging the viewer to follow this trajectory. The artist's choice to exclude the skyline here is an unusual one which lends the scene a faintly eldritch atmosphere, so different to the familiar rustic pastoral scene it could have easily been. The resulting picture benefits from her experience as a watercolourist and ensuing ability to create depth and shadow with a delicate touch. Note the absence of black in this composition. Butler has found other means of creating shadow through a combination of burnt umber, indigo, mauve and olive hues, masterfully manipulated to create alternative tonal values without relying on black. This is a typical approach of watercolour painters as it commonly believed that black lacks vibrancy and can flatten the scene if not used cautiously. Certainly, Butler rarely used it except in her scenes of crows and magpies where the black flutter of birds creates striking contrast against the skeletal boughs of a winter landscape. 'Cattle Grazing, Kilmurry' offers the viewer a very rare opportunity to examine Butler's painterly approach in a different medium and benefits immensely from Butler's extensive experience as a watercolourist. Mildred Anne Butler maintained a level of critical and popular recognition throughout her lifetime, exhibiting consistently with the 'Irish Fine Arts Society of Ireland' from 1882 (later the 'Watercolour Society of Ireland') and also exhibited with the RHA, the RA, The Ulster Academy and The Royal Watercolour Society. The apex of her career was the purchase of her painting 'The Morning Bath' by the Chantrey Bequest Fund for the British Nation in 1896 - an honour shared with Sir John Everett Millais, J. W. Waterhouse, Sir F. Leighton Bart PRA and John Singer Sargent. After the artists' passing in 1941 the Kilmurry Estate was bequeathed to a distant cousin - equestrian expert Doreen Archer-Houblon (1899-1977). The latter enjoyed the estate for the remainder of her life. It was a few years later that the artist's studio contents was revealed publicly in a landmark sale at Christie's in October, 1981. The extent of the artist's private meditative depictions of Kilmurry captured the imagination of a modern, post-war public, only too eager to acknowledge the beauty of an unspoiled Irish landscape once more. Stephanie Brennan, April 2026