Roderic O'Conor
, Irish, 1860-1940
Title
The Majestic TreesDate1893
MediumEtching and aquatint on paper
Dimensions
Plate: 33.5 × 30.7 cm
Sheet: 54 × 41.7 cm
Credit LinePurchased, 2025
Object numberNGI.2025.13
DescriptionThis is a rare impression of one of O’Conor’s most ambitious etchings. It shows his enthusiasm for recording, through expressive lines, the rural landscape of Brittany. It is one of only two life-time impressions recorded, and may be the print Armand Seguin referred to as ‘the large black tree’ in a letter of 1898. In that letter, he encouraged O’Conor to revisit his ‘old’ plates and make further prints from them. The fact that this impressive print was made on a copper plate rather than a rough piece of zinc (as was more usual for O’Conor) may indicate that it was printed in a master-printers workshop in Paris rather than in Le Pouldu where most of his etchings were produced with Seguin’s help. The very expressive and rhythmic lines of this etching point to O'Conor’s style and way of working.ProvenancePurchased, Pierre Fabius, Druout's Studio Sale, 1956, Lot 66; Purchased, previous owner, 1st November 2006; Purchased, 2025