Strauss & co - 26 September 2011, Cape Town

128 270 Dorothy Moss KAY SOUTH AFRICAN 1886–1964 Self Portrait with Red and White Scarf signed, signed and inscribed ‘Self Portrait’ on a fragment of a label attached to the reverse oil on canvas 60 by 44,5cm R350 000 – 450 000 LITERATURE Marjorie Reynolds, Dorothy Kay, A Biography, Everything You Do Is A Portrait Of Yourself, Alec Reynolds, Rosebank, 1989, page 230, illustrated Dorothy Kay, née Elvery, was born at Greystones, County Wicklow, Ireland, in 1886. At the age of 14 she began studying figure painting at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art and the Royal Hibernian Academy School, and later in Paris. She came to South Africa in 1910 to marry Dr Hobart WA Kay FRCS who later became District Surgeon of Port Elizabeth. Her exhibitions included the Royal Hibernian Academy (1902), the Young Irish Artist’s Exhibition (1902), the British Empire Exhibition in London (1924), the Royal Academy Exhibition in London (1940), numerous international and local exhibitions as well as a retrospective at the South African National Gallery in 1982. Kay’s training laid the foundations for her sound draughtsmanship and assured skill in figure painting. She was a much sought- after portraitist, receiving numerous portrait commissions from private sitters as well as 23 mayoral portraits commissioned by the city of Port Elizabeth. It was very gratifying then that her excellence was recognised at Strauss & Co’s inaugural auction in March 2009 when a record price of R1 448 200 was achieved for a portrait. Here the artist has consciously posed herself in front of what is regarded as her greatest painting, The Elvery Family (A Memoir) , now housed in Iziko South African National Gallery’s permanent collection and selected for the cover of her retrospective exhibition catalogue. That complex group portrait The Elvery Family, Dorothy Kay © Estate of Dorothy Kay Ayres. All Rights Reserved, DALRO 2011 Dorothy holding a palette, photographed by Hobart