REIDAR AULIE (NORGE/NORWEGIAN 1904 - 1977),
ON THE HEATH
oil on canvas, signed and dated 1971
63cm x 51cm
Framed
Label verso: John Whibley Gallery Ltd, 22 Cork Street, London; showing the title and the purchaser as Mr Angus Ogilvy. Sir Angus Ogilvy (as he later became) was a noble born British businessman (Lonrho) and he married Princess Alexandra (cousin of HM The Queen) on 24th April 1963 at Westminster Abbey. The wedding ceremony was attended by the royal family and was broadcast worldwide on television, watched by an estimated 200 million people. The Queen had offered Ogilvy an Earldom on his wedding, which he declined. He also declined a grace-and-favour apartment at one of the Royal Palaces. Instead, he leased Thatched House Lodge, in Richmond, London from the Crown Estate for him and Princess Alexandra to live. Ogilvy was created a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order on 31st December 1988 by Queen Elizabeth II and was made Privy Counsellor in the 1997 New Year Honours. He died on 26th December 2004. The artist: Reidar Aulie graduated in 1927 and travelled to Paris in the autumn with fellow student, Bjarne Ness, who died of tuberculosis just before Christmas that year, only 25 years old. His death made a strong impression on the younger Aulie who had shared lodgings with Ness. Aulie debuted at the Autumn Exhibition (Høstutstillingen) in 1927. By the early 1930s he had already illustrated books by such authors as Ingeborg Refling Hagen and Martin Anderson Nexo. Aulie's paintings are full of symbolism and there is often room for several interpretations. He was always concerned with the common man and portrayed him with great enthusiasm. In the 1930s he became an artist for the Socialist movement. In 1932 he participated in the Anti-War Conference in Amsterdam and the same year and was elected chairman of the Anti-War Committee in Oslo and the surrounding area. In 1936 Aulie bought a house and studio on Maridalsveien Street in Oslo, which he kept for the rest of his life. Reidar Aulie is best known for the anti war art he produced during the Second World War but despite moving to a small farm owned by his in-laws in Eidsberg, Aulie was eventually arrested by the Germans in early 1945 and sent to Grini Concentration Camp. In 1950 he was commissioned to paint Arbeiderbevegelsens historie, a large fresco of the labour movement's history, for Oslo City Hall. His last two decades were marked by the teaching duties, first as Professor from 1958 and later as Rector from 1965 at the Norwegian National Academy of Fine Arts. In 1964, he received the Prince Eugen Medal, a Swedish medal awarded by the King of Sweden for outstanding artistic work.