Colin Middleton RHA RUA MBE (1910-1983) Paysage des Rêves Mauvais (1940) Oil on canvas, 45.75 x 61cm (18 x 24") Signed, inscribed with title and dated '40   Provenance: From the...

  Colin Middleton RHA RUA MBE (1910-1983) Paysage des Rêves Mauvais (1940) Oil on canvas, 45.75 x 61cm (18 x 24") Signed, inscribed with title and dated '40   Provenance: From the Collection of George and Maura McClelland and on loan from them to IMMA from 1999-2004; Private Collection, Dublin   Exhibited: -Colin Middletion: Paintings and Drawings from the McClelland Collection, IMMA, Dublin, Jan-June 2001 -Northern Artists from the McClelland Collection, IMMA, Dublin, 2004-2005; Droichead Arts Centre, Drogheda, 2005 -The Surreal in Irish Art, F.E. McWilliam Museum, Banbridge, May-Sept 2011; The Highlanes Gallery, Drogheda, Sept-Nov 2011   Literature: The Hunter Gatherer, IMMA 2004, illustrated fig. 61 page 53 The Surreal in Irish Art, F.E. McWilliam Museum 2011 (used as the invitation image for the exhibition), fig. 6 page 11   The world of the dream, presenting a parallel reality to our own that operates by entirely independent rules, is a staple of surrealism. The landscape of nightmares Middleton creates here is full of drama and movement; perhaps the suggested fragility of the world he depicts is a reference to the wartime environment in which it was painted, where the threat of violence undermined the normal rules and logic of life. The dynamic and contorted form of the semi-clothed figure, with its broad contours of rich colour and shadow that is typical of Middleton's early work, is dramatically set against the harsh angularity of three tall sticks that lean against each other. She falls back against a tiny ladder; pieces of material bind her to these three sticks which seem inexplicably to support her weight, as if this is a moment frozen in time. This world is both primitive and also disturbingly mechanised; parts of the figure almost seem to dissolve into unravelling lengths of steel. An impossibly extended finger points over the top of the sticks and towards a dressing table with a broken mirror, adding a sense of violence or threat to the vast desert landscape, whose hostility is increased by the sudden gorge that seems to be at the very front of the composition, in dangerous proximity to this figure. The emotional impact of this painting is arguably as consistently strong and visceral as Middleton achieved in his surrealist work. His strength in design and illusionistic painting is very apparent here but it never undermines the uneasy and threatening immediacy of the work. Dickon Hall, March 2014  

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