Aidan Hickey's Homage to Whistler's "Nocturne in Blue and Gold".

Nocturne in Blue and Gold - Whistler

A Variation on Whistler’s Old Battersea Bridge.

The painting’s full title is Nocturne in Blue and Gold: Old Battersea Bridge.The image is almost monochrome, but the tiny flashes of gold harmonise with rich blues and greys to create the painting’s main attraction. The picture is also loved for its elegant composition ... one soaring vertical, a curving horizontal above, a straight horizontal below and the muffled dynamism of the boat’s diagonal... all integrated by an enveloping mist.

I decided to use what I understand of these elements to create a painting of present-day Dublin. Naturally, I first looked at the Liffey. But those old bridges are too stolid. Even if one could get down to muck level, right below them, it’s unlikely that they’d offer any convincing vertical energy.  

The modern Beckett bridge is rich in possibilities. But the one thing it’ll never provide is an uncomplicated design... So, I decided to look elsewhere.

Reading about the bridge that Whistler painted, I discovered that it was built of wood. I live in Clontarf, within walking distance of the Bull Island Wooden Bridge – immortalised in Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist. 

In mid November, on a day when low-tide coincided with sunset, I descended to the mud flats, wearing a pair of borrowed sailing boots. It’s possible to walk (slowly) to the narrow channel, within 20 meters of the centre of the bridge.     I made some small sketches and took photographs.  It was a calm evening.    The bridge’s hefty supports were so perfectly reflected in the water that they seemed to double in height. With only a small amount of manoeuvring the ESB towers in Ringsend could be seen through the woodwork. However, they are too far away to usefully echo the vertical lines of the bridge. So, later, when it came to doing an I-pad sketch, I brought the towers closer.    I expect that, when I paint it on canvas, I’ll further increase their size.

This project is not about an attempt to “paint a Whistler”. A rather obvious gap, between his talent and training and mine, make that idea delusional. However, what he did... and what I am trying to do... is to capture - with thin layers of paint - the mysterious and slightly menacing beauty of broad expanses of water shaped by an urban setting.

I-Pad Sketch by Aidan Hickey

The completed painting can be seen at the forthcoming annual show
in Dun Laoghaire,  in April 2014.  Please watch our Facebook Page for details.
 https://www.facebook.com/dublinpainting.sketchingclub

Read more about the original controversy this painting caused by looking up the Tate Blog http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/whistler-nocturne-blue-and-gold-old-battersea-bridge-n01959/text-summary

Aidan Hickey Aidan Hickey studied painting at the National College of Art and English and History at UCD. After college he exhibited paintings in the Ely Place Gallery, the Carroll Building, the Davis Gallery with the Living Art group and the Municipal Gallery’s 1966 celebration of 1916. Having taught for six years, he took a Postgraduate Diploma in Animated Film-making at Hornsey College of Art. Back in Dublin he worked as a free-lance illustrator. From 1979 he produced animated films for RTE, winning numerous festival prizes. He wrote and directed “The Boy who had No Story”, winner of Best Children’s Film and Best Animation at the 2004 Irish Film and Television Awards. AH has always admired the work of Magritte and de Chirico. Despite its incongruity, Surrealism is realistic. The best teachers of realistic painting are the Old Masters. For AH, the masterworks of the 15th to 18th centuries are an invaluable source of technical knowledge and of inspiration. His current paintings set out to juxtapose ideas from the classical era with imagery and concepts from 20th century art. The results are not always incongruous. Since returning to painting in 2005, AH has exhibited in Airfield House with former fellow students from NCA and in the Kilternan Gallery with the Animated Painters group In Dec 2008, he and Desmond Downes held a two-man show, also in Kilternan.  He is a member of the Dublin Painting and Sketching Club since 2007. His work is available at the DOORWAY Gallery, South Frederick Street, Dublin 2.    Aidan Hickey can be contacted here by email.