The Harry and Margery Boswell Art Collection: Artworks
- John Bellany, Woman of the North Sea.
- Elizabeth Blackadder, Untitled.
- John Byrne, Juggling Harlequin.Steven Campbell, Portrait of Tom Normand.
- Calum Colvin, Mute Swan.
- Ken Currie, Age of Uncertainty.
- Ken Currie, Reprisal.
- Alan Davie, Zurich Improvisations XII.
- Paul Furneaux, Black Madonna.
- John Houston, Untitled.
- Ian Howard, Drago.
- Callum Innes, XI
- Elspeth Lamb, The Gift.
- Patricia Macdonald, Braided river and ancient pines, Glen Feshie, Cairngorms.
- Patricia Macdonald, Lochan Uaine (The Green Lochan) below the Angel's Peak of Carn an t-Sabhail, Cairngorms.
- Will Maclean, Bird Altar.
- Will Maclean, The Tanera Suite.
- William McCance, Machine Moloch or Machine Gods.
- William McCance, The Engineer, His Wife and Family.
- William McCance, Tree Trunk Composition.
- June Redfern, Early Morning Mist.
- Elaine Shemilt, Image in a Bell Jar.
- Alison Watt, Untitled.
- Adrian Wiszniewski, For Max.
John Byrne (born 1940)
Juggling Harlequin
1998
Hand-coloured etching on paper
HC2005.19
John Byrne has enjoyed success as both an artist and playwright. Born in Paisley in 1940, he studied painting at the Glasgow School of Art from 1958 to 1963 and worked initially as a book designer for Penguin. In 1967, Byrne produced and exhibited a series of works in London under the pseudonym of 'Patrick', claiming they were by his seventy-two year old father. Much to Byrne's amusement, the paintings attracted real interest, and helped promote his career as an artist.
During the 1980s, Byrne wrote the cult television series 'Tutti Frutti', starring Robbie Coltrane, Richard Wilson, Maurice Roeves and Emma Thompson. This was followed by 'Your Cheatin' Heart', which used country and western music as a backdrop to a comedy of Glasgow life. In both his writing and his painting Byrne portrays humorous, 'larger than life' characters. The Juggling Harlequin is certainly a colourful figure, with his oversized, angular body and distorted arms, and it seems fitting that Byrne with his strong theatrical links should choose to depict the timeless joker, Harlequin. Both the subject matter and the cubist style of this etching relate to the earlier work of Cezanne and Picasso, who had a similar interest in theatrical subjects.
