On and Off the Wall is a series of brief reflections on or about works in the collection, including those that may not often make an appearance on the gallery walls. Deborah Spanich is the museum registrar. She compiled the digital database and fell in love with many of the works in the collection.

Here is a secret: some of the works in the collection have double lives. While on display in the gallery Healy’s Young Woman shows no sign of what is hidden behind her. Unnamed and unfinished, the face of a bearded man gazes from the reverse side of the board. His face is detailed, if rather monochromatic, but below his collar nothing grounds him. Lines furrow his forehead (perhaps in puzzlement over why the artist chose not to continue his painting?) On the front, a vibrant young woman enjoys the full attention of both artist and viewer.

In Prendergast’s painting, bathers take pleasure in the sun and spray as they occupy rough outcroppings. In the foreground but not prominent, the figures seem part of the scenery. On the reverse side is a similar seascape, containing only rocks and sea. In the finished scene the figures add a sense of scale, but in light of the work on the back, it appears that the artist may have considered leaving them out. The rocks dominate, and speak for themselves.

We don’t know the reason Healy and Prendergast chose not to complete the paintings on the hidden sides of these canvases. Nor did they paint over the images. These works have both public faces, and private:  Prendergast’s vibrant, unpeopled place; and the man destined to spend eternity with his face to the wall.