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Ron Ranson
Ron Ranson is a Welshman teaching art in Mullingar and Howth and
the author of several books on watercolour technique.
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Nano Reid (1900-1981)
Born in Drogheda, Co. Louth, Anne Margaret (Nano) Reid's artistic
career began with her winning a scholarship in 1920 to the Dublin
Metropolitan School of Art. Here she trained to be an art teacher,
studying under Harry Clarke - an influence she later cited as 'forceful'.
She first exhibited at the RHA in 1925 and continued to do so periodically
until 1968, showing forty-two works in all. She travelled and studied
art in Paris and London between 1928-1930. Upon returning to Dublin
she was associated with the Dublin Painters and held her first solo
show with them on St Stephen's Green in 1934. She exhibited at the
Dawson Gallery in Dublin several times, had solo shows at the Victor
Waddington Galleries in Dublin and St George's Gallery in London,
and was included in major survey shows of Irish art. In 1950 Reid
- along with Norah McGuinness - represented Ireland at the Venice
Biennale. Several retrospectives of her work have been held, including
one by the Arts Council in Belfast and Dublin in 1974 and another
by the Taylor Galleries, Dublin, in 1991.
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Elizabeth Rivers (1903-1964)
Wood engraver, figure painter and illustrator, Elizabeth Rivers
was born in Hertfordshire, and studied at Goldsmith's College, London
and later at the RA. She studied under André L'Hote in Paris,
whose influence led to a long association with Evie Hone's stained
glass studio in Dublin. She came to Ireland in 1935, and apart from
the war years and a short period in 1955 she spent the rest of her
life living and working in this country, finding inspiration among
the mountains and villages of Connemara.
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Thomas Roberts (1749-1778)
The eldest son of John Roberts, an architect in Waterford, Thomas
Roberts studied at the Dublin Society's School. He was patronised
by the Duke of Leinster and Lord Powerscourt. Best known for his
views of park-like scenery and country seats, some very fine examples
of his work can be seen in the NGI.
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Annie Robinson (b.1961)
Daughter of the internationally famed Irish painter, Markey Robinson
(1918-1999), Annie Robinson paints in a style similar to her father
and exhibits with the Apollo Galllery, Dublin.
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Emilie Roche (19th Century)
Emilie Roche studied at the Crawford School of Art and was a prize
winner in 1887.
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William P. Rogers (fl.1846-1872)
William Rogers studied art at the RDS Drawing School, winning prizes
there in 1850 and 1852. He exhibited a total of 38 works at the
RHA between 1848-1883, mostly of Wicklow and Wexford scenes.
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Rolli Luke Roland (fl.1940s-1950s)
A Swiss born artist, Rolli Roland exhibited regularly in Dublin,
London and Basle in the 1940s and 1950s. In Dublin he was included
in the 1944 and 1947 IELA and the 1945 Oireachtas. He also showed
three works with the Dublin Sketching Club (1943-1944) and two at
the RHA (1944-1945). An exhibition, "Recent Paintings by Rolli
L. Roland" was held at Dunsters Art Gallery, Lyme Regis, 5-19
November 1955.
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Florence A. Ross (1870-1949)
The cousin and childhood playmate of the writer John Millington
Synge, Florence A. Ross was a self-trained landscape painter. She
exhibited eight works at the RHA between 1929-1938 and had a solo
exhibition (simply entitled 'Irish Watercolours') in 1941 with the
Picture Hire Club (one of only eight artists - including Basil Rakoczi,
Dermod O'Brien, and Maurice MacGonigal - to do so). Her works rarely
appear at auction.
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George Russell 'Æ' (1867-1935)
Born in Lurgan, Co. Armagh, George William Russell moved with his
family to Dublin in 1878. He began to paint as a youth when on holidays
in the North of Ireland. In 1885 Russell enrolled in evening classes
at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art and later at the RHA, where
he won the prize for best painting from a living model. Among his
friends at the Metropolitan were George Moore and W. B. Yeats, who
encouraged him to write and to join the Theosophical Society. In
1905 he exhibited at the RHA and in 1907-1910 he was involved in
four exhibitions at the Leinster Lecture Hall, one of them including
no less than 63 of his works. In 1922 he showed three works in the
Irish Exhibition at Galleries Barbazanges, Paris. He gave lecture
tours in the USA and received an honorary degree at Yale university
in 1928. More than a dozen of his works are in the Armagh County
Museum. The National Gallery of Ireland has five of his portraits.
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John Ryan (1925-1992)
Born in Dublin in 1925, John Ryan studied at the NCA, but was largely
a self-taught painter through a practice of "careful intelligent
observation" combined with "a genuine and humorous love
of land, sea and human tradition" (Hilary Pyle, "John
Ryan exhibition in Cork", Irish Times, 23 October 1981). He
was a regular exhibitor at the RHA from 1946 onwards, and also showed
at the annual Oireachtas and the IELA. He designed theatre sets
for the Abbey, Gate, Olympia and Gaiety Theatres as well as for
the stage in London. He also acted in and produced several plays.
From 1949 to 1951 he edited the literary and arts journal, Envoy,
and from 1969 to 1974 was editor of The Dublin Magazine. Ryan was
also a broadcaster, being a long-time contributor to Sunday Miscellany
on Radio Éireann. In 1975 he published a book of his reminiscences
of literary Dublin entitled Remembering How We Stood, featuring
stories of his friends including Behan, Kavanagh, J. P. Donleavy
(q.v.) and Anthony Cronin, and the many Dublin characters who patronised
his famous pub, "The Bailey" in Duke Street.
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Thomas Ryan PPRHA (b.1929)
Thomas Ryan attended the Limerick School of Art, then the National
College of Art in Dublin, where he studied under Seán Keating
and Maurice MacGonigal (q.v.). In 1957 he first exhibited at the
RHA and became an associate member in 1968. He has had many commissions
for portraits and he is also well known for his Irish historical
scenes, especially those of the 1916 Rising, and for his sensitive
still-life paintings. He has exhibited at the Municipal Gallery
of Modern Art in Dublin and was President of the RHA from 1982 to
1993.
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Cecil ffrench Salkeld ARHA (1904-1969)
As a member of the Dublin Painters group, as well as a poet, playwright
and owner of the Gayfield Press, Cecil Salkeld was at the forefront
of the avant-garde in Irish arts and literature. He studied art
in Kassell in the early 1920s, coming under the influence of Otto
Dix and the New Objectivity movement. Upon returning to Dublin,
he aligned himself immediately with the modernists, showing works
with the New Irish Salon and the Radical Painters' Group among others.
Reviewing an exhibition of his at the Victor Waddington Galleries
in 1945, the Dublin Magazine commented on Salkeld's "original,
sombre palette, intellectually rather than emotionally conceived".
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Margaret E. Saunders (1851-1918)
Margaret E. Saunders was a regular contributor to the RHA in the
early 1900s. She appears to have mainly painted flower studies and
portraits of dogs. A friend of Walter Strickland, Saunders moved
to London c.1917, after which little else is known of her work.
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Robert Richard Scanlan (fl.1826-1864)
A Dublin resident in the 1820s, he exhibited portraits at the RHA,
and was later Master of the Cork School of Design.
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John Schwatschke (b.1943)
Born in Dublin to Austro-Irish parents, and trained in architecture
with the firm of Vincent Kelly. Later travelled to Munich to study
portrait painting under Franz Erhmer. In Europe he completed numerous
commissions to paint such well-known persons as HRH Prince Philip,
Bernard Shaw, and Ingrid Bergman. These works were painted in a
formal, or academic style, as opposed to his more recent, stylised
works which tend towards caricature. In 1981 he returned to Ireland,
and a retrospective of his work was held at the Carlow Arts Centre
in 1994.
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Michael Scott (1905-1989)
Born in Drogheda, architect and artist Michael Scott is best remembered
for his design of the new Abbey Theatre which led to his being awarded
in 1975 the Gold Medal of the Royal Institute of British Architects
- the only Irish architect ever to be thus honoured. He was also
on the organising committee of the IELA (1947-1950), served on the
Arts Council and was founder and chairman of Rosc. Scott's own artistic
career peaked in the 1960s and '70s when he exhibited through the
Dawson Gallery with artists such as Gerda Frömel, with whom
he held a joint exhibition in 1967.
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Patrick Scott HRHA (b.1921)
In her monograph on Scott, Dorothy Walker described the technique
used by the artist in his series of gold leaf paintings: "With
the help of the British Museum in 1964, he [Scott] evolved a method
of using an acrylic medium to fix gold leaf to unprimed canvas,
which has led him into an unprecedented wealth of visual invention.
Using 8cm squares of gold leaf applied to raw canvas, with a thin
white tempera the only other colour, he produced a series of large
abstract works in which the three textures of gold, canvas and tempera
are exquisitely balanced to a synthesis of each element. The geometric
abstraction of the circle and its segments, combined with rectilinear
interlaced bands of white, not only returns to his pure architectural
composition but also relates directly to ancient Irish gold objects
of the pre-Celtic era". (Dorothy Walker, Patrick Scott, The
Douglas Hyde Gallery, TCD, 1981, p.26).
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William Scott OBE RA (1913-1989)
William Scott was born in Greenock, Scotland, and came to live with
his family in his father's home town, Enniskillen, Co. Fermanagh
in 1924. He studied at the Belfast College of Art and the RA school,
London. Scott lived in France in 1938-1939, then briefly in Dublin
before settling in England. His work of the 1930s and 1940s was
predominantly still life but in the 1950s he turned to abstract
painting, and he slowly and methodically developed his style to
produce the critically acclaimed masterpieces of the height of his
career in the 1960s and 1970s. He exhibited throughout the world
and was honoured with many international awards. The Tate staged
a major retrospective exhibition in 1972. His work is included in
most major collections in Europe and America and he is regarded
as one of the world's foremost twentieth century artists.
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Sir James Jebusa Shannon RA (1862-1923)
Born in Auburn, New York, of Irish parents, James Jebusa Shannon
went to England in 1878 where he studied at the South Kensington
School of Art. He had intended returning to America to make a career
as a portrait painter there but he was so much in demand as a painter
in England and Ireland he stayed. Within a short space of time he
had become one of the leading portrait painters of the British Isles
and his commissions included many of the landed and moneyed classes
including royalty and nobility. He exhibited at the RA from 1881,
though it took until 1909 for him to be elected an academician.
Shannon's style was different from his most of his fellow English
portraitists in that he adopted the more broken brushwork of progressive
French painting. Also, like his fellow American portrait painter,
John Singer Sargent, he often used the compositional devices of
eighteenth century aristocratic portraiture.
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Neil Shawcross RUA ARHA (b.1940)
Born in Kearseley, Lancashire, Shawcross studied at the Bolton College
of Art (1955-1958) and the Lancashire College of Art (1958-1960).
In 1962 he came to Belfast as a part-time lecturer at the then Belfast
College of Art and became full-time at the Ulster College of Art
and Design in 1968. The following year he exhibited at the RUA for
the first time, and in 1975 won the Academy's Conor Award. He then
proceeded to win the Academy's Gold Medal no fewer than five times,
between 1978 and 1997. He was made an academician in 1978, and,
more recently, an associate member of RHA in 2002. Shawcross is
particularly admired for his portraits, which often appear ingenuous
and child-like, despite the artist's rigorous training. Major commissions
include portraits of fellow artist Colin Middleton (q.v.), novelist
Frances Stuart (now in the Ulster Museum), and Alderman David Cook
for the Lord Mayor's Gallery at the Belfast City Hall. He has exhibited
extensively, with one-man shows in London, Manchester, Dublin, and
Belfast. He has also lectured in the USA at Pennsylvania State University.
Examples of his work can be found in every major public collection
in Ireland.
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Noel Sheridan (b.1936)
Originally an actor and dancer, Sheridan was for many years an abstract
painter. In the early 1970s he was the only Professor of Conceptual
Arts in the world, teaching in Sydney, Australia. He was subsequently
made Director of the National College of Art and Design, Dublin.
A survey show of his work was held at the RHA Gallagher Gallery
in 2001.
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Kevin Simms WCSI (b.1932)
Kevin Simms was born in Kilcock, Co. Kildare, and is a self taught
artist, although as a friend of both George Campbell (q.v.) and
Arthur Armstrong, he received help and encouragement from them both.
He is best known for his scenes of old Dublin buildings, exhibiting
these works regularly with WCSI and the RHA.
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Samuel Skillen (c.1819-1847)
A native of Cork, Skillen was encouraged in his art by Richard Sainthill,
the early patron of Maclise (q.v.). He exhibited at the RHA in 1842
and 1843, and then went to London and on a tour of the continent.
He appears to have contracted an illness abroad to which he succumbed
on his return to Cork.
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Piet Sluis (b.1929)
Dutch born, Sluis came to Ireland in the 1950s and had a distinguished
career as a graphic designer. In recent years his paintings have
become widely known and are much sought after. He calls himself
a colourist and in his own words likes "to push the transparency
of oil paints, to give them weight and opacity" (in conversation
with Paul O'Kelly). Sluis is also an accomplished jazz musician.
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Stephen Catterson Smith RHA (1849-1912)
Son of Stephen Catterson Smith PRHA (1806-1872), he followed his
father into the profession of portrait painter. He was also known
for his landscapes, mainly of Scotland.
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Camille Souter HRHA (b.1929)
In the 1950s Souter ceased working as a nurse and embarked on a
career in painting. She travelled extensively throughout Italy,
exhibiting her work occasionally in various Dublin pubs and restaurants.
Although her early work was abstract, the titles were invariably
autobiographical or else suggested actual objects, names and places.
Anne Crookshank has characterised Souter's work of this period as
having paint which was "dripped and dragged and spilt and thrown",
much in the manner of the then-in-vogue Jackson Pollock (ref. Camille
Souter, The Douglas Hyde Gallery, TCD, monograph and catalogue,
1980, pp.7-8). In 1959, the artist settled on Achill Island, off
the coast of Co. Mayo. In Achill she began to use aluminium and
enamel paints, which were not only cheap and readily available,
but allowed her to experiment with their unusual viscosity and fluidity.
By 1962 Souter had left Achill and moved to Calary Bog, Co. Wicklow.
At around the same time her work came to the attention of a number
of serious collectors such as the late Sir Basil Goulding, who began
to acquire her work. Since then, numerous retrospectives of Souter's
career (the most recent one being held at the RHA Gallagher Gallery
in 2001) have resulted in her being hailed as one of the foremost
living artists in Ireland.
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Samuel Spode (fl.1825-1858)
Tantalisingly little is known about Spode due primarily to the fact
that he never exhibited any works during his own life-time, restricting
himself to private commissions. Indeed, it is unknown whether he
was born in England or Ireland, although he certainly painted in
both countries, executing a number of portraits of race horses and
their riders on the Curragh as well as members of the Anglo-Irish
ascendancy with their favourite hunters. He was a racehorse owner
and trainer himself and seems often to have named his animals after
members of his family; there are known examples of his wherein the
horse is called either Mr Spode or Mrs Spode! Two of his works were
reproduced in The Sporting Magazine and they appear quite regularly
at auction houses in London. His depiction of horses and dogs are
widely regarded as being among the best of his era. See also Stella
Walker, Dictionary of Equestrian Artists.
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Sir Robert Ponsonby Staples RBA (1853-1943)
Born in Scotland to a family whose main residence was at Lissan
House, Cookstown, Co. Tyrone, he studied at the Louvain Academy
of Fine Arts from 1865-1870. He exhibited at the RHA between 1875
and 1928. In 1875 he showed at the RA and sketched the Prince of
Wales later King Edward VII. In 1888 he was represented at the Irish
Exhibition in London. He produced portraits of W. G. Grace, Lord
Randolph Churchill and William Gladstone, among others. In addition
to the Royal Academy and the Royal Society of British Artists his
works appeared in the Grosvenor Gallery and the Royal Institute
of Oil painters.
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Desmond Stephenson ARHA (1922-1963)
A student of the NCA from 1939 to 1946, Stephenson won the Henry
Higgins travelling scholarship in his final year, thus allowing
him three years of study in Spain, France, Italy and London. He
was represented abroad in the Contemporary Irish Art Exhibitions,
and had works purchased by the Haverty Trust (1955), the Gibson
Bequest (1956) and the Arts Council (1959).
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Evelyn Street
Evelyn Street trained at the Cork School of Art in the 1950s, later
moving to England where she taught at the South Devon School of
Art. She is best known for her semi-abstract paintings which refer
to geological strata and natural forms and which she exhibited in
numerous solo exhibitions in London during the 1960s.
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Ivan Sutton (b.1944)
Born in Kilmore Quay, Co. Wexford in 1944, Ivan Sutton is a self-taught
artist. Sutton exhibited in the RHA Summer Exhibition in 1994 and
his works are in private collections in the USA, Canada, Belgium,
France, Great Britain and Ireland.
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Mary Swanzy HRHA (1882-1978)
Dublin born, Mary Swanzy received art tuition from May Manning and
occasionally from Jack B. Yeats. She first exhibited at the RHA
in 1905 and continued regularly showing there until shortly before
her death. A strong advocate of modern art, Swanzy studied in Paris
and was highly influenced by impressionism. In 1949 she was elected
an honorary member of the RHA. She moved to London shortly afterwards,
and her work was not seen in Dublin again until 1968 when a retrospective
of her work was held at the Municipal Gallery of Modern Art. Her
work is included in the collections of the National Gallery of Ireland
and the Hugh Lane Gallery of Modern art, among many others.
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Paul Tallon (b.1947)
Paul Tallon exhibited widely in Ireland during the 1970s, mainly
through the RHA, the Oireachtas, the Davis Gallery and the Caldwell
Gallery. In 1980 he moved to Leeds, where he continued to paint
and sculpt. A number of his works, including another edition of
"The Farmer" are to be found in the collection of Charles
Haughey HRHA.
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Ann Taylor (1907-1976)
Ann Taylor was the daughter of Samuel C. Taylor (1878-1944).
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Norman B. Teeling (b.1944)
Norman Teeling is a Dublin born artist who graduated from the College
of Art and Design in Kildare Street in the early 1960s. He is best
known for his commissioned series of paintings depicting the 1916
Easter Rising which now hang in the General Post Office on O'Connell
Street, Dublin. In addition to painting, Teeling also works as a
film animator and illustrator.
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Hugh Thomson RI (1860-1920)
"The Charles Lamb of illustration", and a "luminary
of the Belfast Ramblers Club", Hugh Thomson was a highly successful
illustrator from Coleraine, Co. Derry. He built a reputation on
his depictions of eighteenth and nineteenth century scenes, replete
with "peppery squires and rubicund coachmen", and was
particularly famed for his illustrations for Pride and Prejudice
and Cranford, the latter being exhibited at the V&A in 1901.
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Walter Till (fl.1920s)
Walter Till exhibited a total of 20 works with the Dublin Sketching
Club and once at the RHA from an address in Dame Street. He is known
to have submitted designs to a competition for the first issue of
Irish Free State postage stamps in 1922.
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Astrid Tomrop-Hofmann
Originally from Hamburg, Germany, where she worked as a theatrical
make-up artist, Astrid Tomrop-Hofmann has been living and painting
in Ireland for close to thirty years. She has a studio (Bombyx Mori)
in Galway and recently exhibited at the Wexford Opera Festival 2000.
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Liam Treacy (b.1934)
Liam Treacy is a Wicklow artist who has been painting in an impressionist
style since the 1950s. He exhibits regularly with the James Gallery,
Dalkey, and has participated in a wide range of group shows including
the annual RHA exhibitions and the Wexford Opera Festival.
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Desmond Turner RUA (b.1923)
Born in Newtownards in 1923, Turner began his career in the arts
as an art/music specialist in the Boy's Model School, Belfast (1947-1950).
He later designed sets in the art department of Stranmillis College
(1950-1982) and for the Grand Opera House, the Group Theatre and
the Patricia Mulholland Irish Ballet Company. In 1966 he founded
a school of arts in Achill, such was his enthusiasm for the integration
of arts and general education. He exhibited at the RUA from 1944-1980,
with many of his works depicting scenes in the West of Ireland.
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Charles Tyrell (b.1950)
Long regarded as one of the most innovative abstract artists practicing
in Ireland today, Tyrell's minimalist yet painterly style emerged
early in his career with a strong dependency on abstract geometric
and mathematical elements. The RHA staged a survey exhibition of
his work in 2000. His recent series of acrylic on aluminum demonstrates
his desire to create a sense of space for the viewer with the reflective
quality of the medium. Tyrell's continuing success has led to shows
throughout Europe, Canada and America.
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Arland A. Ussher (fl.1881-1898)
A friend of George Campbell's (q.v.), Ussher exhibited at the RHA
each year from 1881 to 1898 (excepting 1894 & 1897). With addresses
at Dromore, Co. Down and Kingstown, Co. Dublin.
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Hilda van Stockum HRHA (b.1908)
Born in Rotterdam, of Dutch-Irish parentage, Hilda van Stockum was
one of the leading pupils of Patrick Tuohy and Seán Keating
at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art. She later emigrated to
north America where she has since earned a reputation as a leading
author and illustrator of children's books, whilst also maintaining
a career as a painter. Her works can be found in many major collections
including the NGI.
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Patrick Viale (b.1952)
Born in Ireland, of Italian parents, Viale is predominantly a self-taught
artist. He has exhibited since 1991 at the Dublin United Artists
Club and at the Waldock Gallery in Blackrock. In 1994 he received
the Award for Emerging Talent at Eigse, Carlow. He exhibited at
the RHA 1996 and 1997, and is represented in numerous public and
private collections in Ireland, England, Italy, Belgium, and Switzerland.
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Thomas Bond Walker (1861-1933)
Born in London, Tom Bond Walker moved to Belfast in the 1880s and
soon began exhibiting with the Belfast Art Society. He took private
pupils by way of additional income, thus becoming inadvertantly
famous when he took on pupil Paul Henry (q.v.). In Henry's Further
Reminiscences, he recalled Walker as "a shy, retiring, ineffectual
little man with a genuine enthusiasm for teaching: a product of
the South Kensington Schools".
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John Crampton Walker ARHA (1890-1942)
Born in Dublin, John Crampton Walker exhibited at the RHA from 1914.
He was author of Irish Life and Landscape, (Talbot Press, Dublin,
1926). His work is in most of the major public collections in Ireland
including the NGI and the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery of Modern
Art.
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William Guy Wall (1792-1864)
Born in Dublin, Wall trained as an artist but moved to America early
on in his career, in 1818. There he achieved recognition for his
series of watercolour landscapes which were published in aquatint
form as the Hudson River Portfolio (c.1820), and which were later
used as transfer printed designs for Stevenson's Cobridge pottery
works in Staffordshire, England. In 1826 Wall helped found the hugely
influential National Academy of Design in New York, from where he
exhibited, whilst also showing at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine
Arts in Philadelphia. He returned to Ireland around 1832 and began
exhibiting at the RHA in 1840. In 1843 Wall was one of the nine
founding members of the Society of Irish Artists (along with Edward
Hayes, Michael Angelo Hayes, and the entire Brocas family). However,
a perceived neglect of his work led Wall to return to America in
1856 for a period of four years. He finally returned to Dublin in
1860 where he died in relative obscurity. His work hangs in the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the Brooklyn Museum of Art,
and in the collection of the New York Historical Society.
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Thomas Walmsley (1763-1806)
The son of a Lancashire military officer, Thomas Walmsley was born
in Ireland while his family were stationed there. He painted scenery
for Richard Daly's theatre in Dublin in the late 1780s. Throughout
the 1790s he painted mostly in Wales, although with occasional visits
to Ireland where he painted landscapes which were later engraved
and sold as sets of prints. His works, which were chiefly painted
in bodycolour, are recognisable for the "great luminousness
of his skies" (Strickland, op. cit., p.501).
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Manus Walsh (b.1940)
Having trained as a stained glass artist in Dublin, Manus Walsh
turned to painting and particularly collage in the 1960s and 1970s
as a way of interpreting the strange forms of the Burren, where
he still lives. He has exhibited at the Oireachtas, the RHA, and
the Cork Arts Society. More recently, he had a solo show at the
Origin Gallery, Dublin, in May 2000.
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Marian A. Walsh (fl. circa 1940s-1950s)
Originally from Castlebellingham, Co. Louth, little is known about
this artist other than some surviving student pieces executed as
part of a correspondence course in commercial art at the Bennett
College in Sheffield, England, which were auctioned at Whyte's in
December 2000 (Lots 386, 387 and 438).
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Owen Walsh (b.1933)
Born in Westport, Co. Mayo, Owen Walsh studied at the NCA, Dublin,
where he received major awards for painting and composition amongst
others. In 1954 he won the first Irish Travelling Scholarship in
Art - the MacAuley Fellowship - and went to Spain in 1955, working
and studying in Madrid, Toledo and Barcelona. In 1959 he founded
with others The Independent Artists' Exhibition (IAE) in opposition
to the Living Art Group and the RHA. He refused the offer of associate
academician at the RHA in 1960 and resigned as chairman of the IAE
in the same year. After a sojourn in France in 1967-1970 he has
lived and worked in Ireland since.
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Wendy F. Walsh (b.1915)
A noted botanical artist, Wendy Walsh has designed stamps for Ireland
and has illustrated both An Irish Florilegium Volumes I (1983) and
II (1987).
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Pearse Ward
Examples of this artist's work are in the collections of both the
current President of Ireland, Mary McAleese, and her predecessor,
Mary Robinson.
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Louisa Ann, Marchioness of Waterford (1818-1891)
Born and reared in Paris, Louisa Ann Stuart studied art under the
great John Ruskin and was a friend of Watts and Burne-Jones. She
moved to Ireland in 1842 upon her marriage to the third Marquess
of Waterford. She mainly depicted religious and genre scenes, the
latter often featuring children and with titles such as "The
Little Bridesmaids" or "A Birthday Queen". She exhibited
her watercolours at both the Grosvenor and Dudley Galleries in London
and some can now be seen in the collections of the British Museum,
the V&A and the National Gallery of Scotland. However, the majority
of her work remains within the Waterford family.
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Kenneth Webb RWA FRSA RUA (b.1927)
Born in London, Kenneth Webb came to the Ulster College of Art in
1953 as head of the Painting School, where his part-time assistants
included Tom Carr, John Luke and Colin Middleton. In 1957 he founded
the Irish School of Landscape Painting and for the last thirty years
has had numerous one-man shows in Europe and North America. He has
exhibited at the RA, the RI and the RUA.
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Robert Lucius West RHA (1774-1850)
West was the youngest of a dynasty of artists. He obtained medals
in the RDS School in 1795 and 1796. He painted portraits and subject
pieces both in oil and crayons and in 1807 was given a sum of money
to further his training in London. He followed his grandfather and
father in becoming Master of the RDS School and was one of the original
members of the RHA in 1823.
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Margaret J. White
Born in Co. Westmeath, Margaret White studied art at the Slade School,
London, and has earned an international reputation for her Irish
landscape paintings.
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Maurice Canning Wilks RUA ARHA (1910-1984)
A well-known name in Irish art circles, Wilks exhibited at the Victor
Waddington galleries in 1946, showing twenty four of his works,
predominately Antrim and Donegal landscapes. The Irish Times critic
of the time discerned "a fine romantic spirit and considerable
feeling" in his work. An academician of the Ulster Academy
of Arts, he had solo shows in Montreal and Boston. He also exhibited
at the Magee Gallery, Belfast.
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Alexander Williams RHA (1846-1930)
Landscape and marine painter Alexander Williams studied at the RDS
Drawing Schools. In 1870 he first exhibited at the RHA and from
then until 1930 he showed no fewer than 450 works and never missed
a single exhibition in sixty years. He was also a member of the
Belfast Art Society. His first London show was at the Modern Gallery,
Bond Street in 1901. In the NGI he is represented by his oil 'Rocky
Cliffs By The Sea' and by a watercolour 'A House By A River'. His
work can also be seen at the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery of Modern
Art.
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Padraic Woods RUA (1893-1991)
Born in Newry, Co. Down, Woods studied art part-time over the course
of ten years at the Belfast School of Art whilst earning his living
as a teacher. In 1931 he was elected an Associate of the RUA and
he spent the next two years painting on Achill Island. Five of these
Achill works were exhibited at the RHA between 1932 and 1933. In
1948 he became President of the Ulster Arts Club, where he was a
regular exhibitor, and in 1964 he was appointed a governor of the
Belfast College of Art. He was a friend and great admirer of James
Humbert Craig and co-exhibited with William Conor (q.q.v.). Woods'
work attracted favourable reviews in his own life-time, and he was
given the honour of a retrospective exhibition at the Linen Hall
Library in Belfast in 1987. He is represented in the collections
of the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery, the National Museum of Ireland,
and the RUA.
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