Mary Swanzy
, Irish, 1882-1978
Title
Nude Study, SamoaDate1924
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions
45.7 × 54.6 cm
Credit LinePurchased, 2024
Object numberNGI.2024.76
DescriptionIn the summer of 1923, Swanzy embarked on an extraordinary voyage west, leaving Europe and travelling across both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans to reach Hawaii. Staying with her aunt and cousins in Manoa, a small suburb of Honolulu, she spent several months exploring the island, creating a series of vibrant compositions that capture the lush landscape, and the dynamics of life among its inhabitants. In March 1924, she ventured even further, sailing 2,600 miles south to reach the islands of Samoa. Though she had no family connections there, nor any knowledge of the language or local customs, Swanzy was drawn to the remote archipelago and its extraordinary landscape, which left her “stunned by how many greens there were in the world”. She sketched and painted more than a dozen canvases in the three months that she was there.Nude Study, Samoa is a rare and important work from this pioneering trip, depicting an unknown Samoan woman as she poses for the artist in what appears to be her makeshift studio. The young woman appears relaxed, resting on a blanket and cushions as she gazes at something beyond the picture plane. In this work, Swanzy celebrates the inherent strength of the female body, capturing the suppleness of her form in delicate layers of finely variegated brushstrokes.
ProvenanceThe artist, then by descent to Mary St Clair Tullo, 1986; acquired by previous owner, September 1986; Purchased, 2024Exhibition HistoryAn Exhibition of Paintings by Mary Swanzy, Pyms Gallery, London, September - October 1986, no. 22
Mary Swanzy, Voyages, Irish Musuem of Modern Art, Dublin, October 2018 - February 2019, p. 84-85; Crawford Art Gallery, Cork, March 2019 - June 2019; City Gallery of Art, Limerick, June 2019 - September 2019
Championing Irish Art: The Mary and Alan Hobart Collection, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, April 2023 - July 2023, p. 48-49