Boyle grew up in a family business of ecclesiastical decoration and restoration, entering Glasgow School of Art to study sculpture. He taught at Glasgow and established a practice as a painter, printmaker and sculptor in Scotland for some years before moving to Australia in the 1980s. Taking up a lecturing post at the then Darling Downs Institute of Advanced Education he eventually retired from the University of Southern Queensland as a Senior Lecturer. He lives in Toowoomba, and is the Director of the Toowoomba Art Society, where he currently runs a weekly class.

This is a very early work that stands in stark contrast to the later paintings of Boyle’s Australian period. A very fine example of post war abstract painting, presumably executed during his time at Glasgow School of Art. Unique in the canon of Boyle’s painting on the market and much more consciously aware of international movements than much of the painting produced in Glasgow at the time.