Nathaniel Hone

St. George's Head, Kilkee, County Clare

The seascape of St. George's Head depicts a wholly different aspect of the sea shore. As in Gathering Seaweed on the Strand, Malahide, Hone again blurs the elemental boundaries between sea, sky and shore. In this painting, however, the elements are shown in the throes of a storm, with a battered strip of land floating between the two. Sea and sky are rendered in the same tones of steel grey churned to white, the chaotic pattern of the storm clouds reflected in the turbulent curl of the breaker at the left of the painting. The short, curved brushstrokes of the agitated sea and sky contrast with the longer, horizontal strokes which render the land. This visual contrast, as well as the stark solidity of the rich earthtones, anchors the horizon in a painting where it would otherwise become lost in an elemental blur of air and water.