Colin Crotty (b. 1974)At First the Infant

In At First the Infant, the artist Colin Crotty captures the visit of a community health nurse to a mother and newborn child. The nurse positioned sitting at the centre of the painting and the mother and child to the left. The mother is fixated on the infant in her arms as the nurse appears to offer advice or reassurance. The setting that the artist reveals could be that of a medical centre or home, a coffee table, rug and large painting are framed by house plants. The prevailing mood in the work, to the fore in all of Crotty’s paintings in this series, is the sense of compassion that the nurse shows to their patient or patients.