Artist Details

Maurice Canning Wilkes

Wilkes (1910 – 1984) is a familiar name on the Irish art scene.
An exhibitor at the Royal Hibernian Academy for half a century, he was a landscape and portrait painter who found much of his inspiration in the west of Ireland, including Donegal.

Wilkes was born in Belfast and studied at the city’s School of Art. J Humbert Craig, another of the great Irish landscape painters of the last century, was a considerable influence on his development.

He exhibited consistently in Ireland and abroad, including solo shows in Boston and Montreal. One of his last exhibitions was a retrospective at the Oriel Gallery in Dublin in 1984.

The ‘Irish Times’ described his work as having “a fine romantic spirit and considerable feeling”.