Roderic O'Conor Paintings

Biography

Born 17 October 1860, in Roscommon; died 18 March 1940, in Nueil-sur-Layon (Maine-et-Loire), France.

Painter, engraver (wood). Landscapes.

School of Pont-Aven.
Roderic O’Conor studied at London University, then in 1880 entered the Academy of St Luke in Antwerp. He went to Paris and became a pupil of Carolus-Duran. In 1893 he began to receive guidance from Gauguin in Pont-Aven. He was particularly close to Armand Séguin. He painted in the Pont-Aven area and gathered around him several of his compatriots under the banner of Symbolism. Since he was extremely well off, he never sought to make money from his painting, but instead bought paintings by Gauguin, Cézanne, Bonnard, Manet, Renoir and Toulouse-Lautrec. He helped Séguin financially until his death; moreover, the two artists built up an interesting correspondence between them (unpublished). Despite his instruction from Gaugin, the paintings he made in Brittany between 1892 and 1893 are more indicative of a knowledge of the Pointillist technique, as practised by Seurat, than the simplifications and flat colour blocks of Gauguin’s Cloisonnism.

O’Conor exhibited in Paris, at the Salon des Artistes Indépendants from 1890 onward, as well as the Salon d’Automne and the Salon des Tuileries, showing mostly paintings of Breton subjects. In 1925 he took part in the Trinational Exhibition between France, the UK and the USA.

Museum and Gallery Holdings

Brisbane (Queensland AG)
London (Tate Collection): Still-life with Bottles (1892, oil on canvas); Red Roofs (c. 1894, oil on canvas)
Paris (BNF): four etchings