Life in Connemara, A Market Day — Walter Osborne

Those scarlet headscarves catch the light the way you remember from stories told at the kitchen table.

Walter Osborne RHA painted this scene at Roundstone harbour in 1898 — women in vivid scarlet headscarves moving through a Connemara market day, the light catching the colour of their work and their presence. The painting sold from the Royal Academy exhibition the year it was made, and at Christie's London in 2021 it achieved £450,000 — 80% above estimate. It hangs in the National Gallery of Ireland.

Osborne (1859–1903) was one of Ireland's finest painters. Born in Dublin, trained in Antwerp and Brittany, he came back to Ireland and found his subject in the everyday life of the people around him — their faces, their labour, their colour. By 1898 his brushwork had loosened and his palette had opened up. This painting is that maturity fully arrived.

Sizes & Format

• 40 × 50 cm / 16 × 20″
• Available framed (black, white, wood) or unframed

Print & Frame Details

Archival matte paper, 250gsm (110lb), acid-free and FSC-certified — off-white, uncoated. Framed prints: solid oak or ash wood frame, 20mm thick, with shatterproof protective glazing. Ready to hang, hanging kit included. Unframed prints up to A4 ship flat; larger sizes ship rolled in a protective tube.

Free Worldwide Shipping

Framed prints are packed with protective corners and wrap, boxed with reinforced edges, and braced with internal supports for extra rigidity (max 3 frames per package). Every order ships free, made to order and delivered from the hub closest to you: Ireland 3–7 business days · UK 4–8 · USA 5–10 · Canada 6–12 · Australia 7–14.