While Irish art from the last years of the 19th century onwards has been the subject of a great deal of both popular and scholarly attention, earlier work produced in this country has not benefited from similar attention. Anyone interested in the development of the modern Irish school from its late 17th century origins will, therefore, wish to acquire a copy of the National Gallery of Ireland's newly published catalogue which examines the institution's collection of paintings from that period up to the early 19th century. Written by Dr Nicola Figgis and Dr Brendan Rooney, this is the first of three volumes covering the gallery's entire body of Irish painting.
The catalogue sets a very high standard for its successors and also whets the appetite for the publication next year of a new and completely revised edition of Professor Anne Crookshank and the Knight of Glin's book on Irish painting. In their introduction, the authors note that the emergence of Irish painting in the closing years of the 17th century was the result of two different and foreign styles coalescing here, the first being based on the formality of the Dutch school, the second altogether softer approach being inspired by English pastel artists. They suggest that the combination "produced a distinctively Irish manner, typified by the work of James Maubert". Although he was born in France and died in England, Maubert trained in Dublin before moving to London; he is represented in the NGI's collection by a portrait of Henrietta, Duchess of Bolton whose husband was Lord Lieutenant of Ireland for two years from 1717.
It is important to note that much early Irish art took the form of portraiture and it was only with the arrival in this country around 1722 of a Dutchman, William van der Hagen, that landscape painting began to find favour. Initially this genre took the form of "prospects" of gentlemen's country estates but landscape developed quickly in Ireland and has remained intensely popular ever since; certainly, a thesis or two could be written on its abiding favour among collectors here. Among the artists whose work is examined by Figgis and Rooney are Barret, Roberts and Ashford.
Like all the painters featured in the book, their entries open with a thorough biographical essay drawing on all available sources, certainly more than were available to Walter Strickland when he compiled his dictionary of Irish artists some 90 years ago. Each painting then receives attention, sometimes with interesting results. Among the Charles Jervas portraits, for example, one previously believed to represent Lady Mary Wortley Montagu is now considered to depict Elizabeth, Countess of Bridgewater.
Extremely handsomely produced and replete with colour illustrations throughout, the catalogue is now available from the National Gallery of Ireland, price £55 (€70).
