The Studio and Private Collection of Paintings by Robert Taylor Carson RUA 1919-2008
September 16, 2016 – September 30, 2016
The Studio and Private Collection of Paintings by Robert Taylor Carson RUA 1919-2008. Preview is Friday 16th September 2016 from 6.00pm to 8.00pm. An illustrated catalogue with forward by Eamonn Mallie will be available at the gallery. Over one hundred paintings, selection from the 1950’s, 60’s and 70’s. Prices from £650. Exhibition to be opened by Eamon Mallie at 7pm.
Movies have been made about some individuals who enjoyed only a fraction of the experiences attaching to the life of artist Robert Taylor Carson.
He went to The Downings in Donegal on a cycling holiday in 1947 with fellow artist Maurice Wilks, stayed in the Beach Hotel and ended up marrying the owner Ruby McElhinney. That is style!
Taylor Carson who left school at fourteen was fortunate to get a scholarship to Belfast College of art where his contemporaries were Maurice WIlks and Rowel Friers.
He was spotted sketching by a US Airforce pilot based in Northern Ireland during the Second World War. He ended up a war artist and accompanied the local 'War brides' with their husbands when the US troops were returning home.
Through these contacts in America Carson secured some significant portrait commissions of political and literary figures like writer AJ Cronin and actor Nigel Bruce.
Taylor Carson was today's equivalent to Colin Davidson.
Carson and his wife Ruby lived the life of Travellers from 1949 to 1958 touring around Ireland with their two children in a caravan.
Winters were spent in hotter climes, in Spain and France. Baby Michael Carson tells me "I learned how to walk in Mallorca. My parents chose to live there for a year."
Taylor Carson's contacts were boundless. He regularly went on trips with people like poet Louis MacNeice....Achill Island being a favourite spot.
Dunchaoin in County Kerry had a special magnetism for Robert and Maurice Wilks. They painted there and spent time on the Blasket Islands to capture the simplicity and rawness of island life there - the hens roosting on the half door etc. ....
No other Irish artist made such a contribution to documenting life over half a century in Donegal.