NZ & International Fine Art Wednesday, 19 November 2025 / 6:00 pm start
Douglas MacDiarmid - Landscape at Gignac
Lot Details
Douglas MacDiarmid (1922 - 2020) Landscape at Gignac oil on canvas signed & dated '58 lower right 585 x 785mm Short essay from Anna Cahill, MacDiarmid's niece and biographer By process of elimination, the Gignac of this autumnal painting is almost certainly a small hilltop village in the Vaucluse area of Provence. Douglas regularly returned to the Provençal region of ‘Le Sud’ (The South) to explore and capture the landscape, including his favourite mountain Montagne Saint-Victoire, near Aix-en-Provence. He was known to be sketching in the area in 1956 and again in September 1957. In 1958, Douglas had solo exhibitions in Paris at Galerie du Claridge (watercolours, March) and Galerie du Colisee (oils, November, under the patronage of the New Zealand Ambassador to Paris). The March exhibition was reviewed in 'Le Peintre' art journal, to this effect: Review in Le peintre (The Painter) 15 March 1958 Galerie du Claridge, Paris Mac Diarmid has limited this exhibition to only one aspect of his art. He is presenting only watercolour works. (His) Distinguished aesthetic , the rigorousness of his discipline and his architectural high standards do not diminish the delicate and even fresh nature of these works of art. They seem to be born from “a loose hand” despite the permanent control which tends to be the artist’s way of painting. It’s a good exhibition that has style. (J. Chabanon) Provenance: The painting is thought to have come to New Zealand for Douglas' one-man show in Christchurch at Gallery 91, Andre Brooke's new gallery at 91A Cashel Street, for which no catalogue has yet been found. The invitation states that the show was officially opened on 30 June, 1959 by Miss Ngaio Marsh O.B.E. The Grande Dame of crime writing and theatre was an old friend of Douglas' from his university and occasional Shakespearean acting days.
