History of Art and Architecture

Department of

History of Art and Architecture Newsletter 2016-2017

Lawrence Gowing, portrait of Anne Crookshank (from the college collection). Š The estate of Lawrence Gowing

Department of History of Art and Architecture School of Histories and Humanities

Newsletter 2016 – 2017

Welcome Welcome to this year’s alumni newsletter.

The academic year 2016-17 marked the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the Department of History of Art and Architecture at Trinity. It was a year of celebration, but also of sadness with the death of the Department’s founding staff member, Professor Anne Crookshank in October 2016.

The tremendous fondness and respect for Anne was reflected at the service held in her memory in the College Chapel in March, attended by over 250 of Anne’s former friends, colleagues and students. The reception held in the Senior Common Room after the event provided an opportunity for everyone to share their memories of Anne, and for her family to announce their gift of a generous benefaction towards a travel fund for history of art and architecture students. This will ensure that her memory lives on with our students of the future.

Aside from our departmental ‘Golden Get-Together’ – of which more below – it was another busy year in the Department.

In November, as part of the annual Shadows and Lights series, we hosted a conversation between Catherine Marshall and contemporary artist Janet Mullarney attended by many of our students and alumni. The Department also welcomed two visiting academics as part the Long Room Hub fellowship scheme. Dr Carol Farr visited from London in October, using her fellowship to study some of the insular gospel books in the Library collections.

Dr Heather Pulliam, a Senior Lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, visited in February and May, using the Library resources to further her work on Irish high crosses. Both scholars gave presentations of their work during their visits.

It was also a busy year in terms of research and publication; details of some of the books published by departmental staff and their research projects are outlined in the following pages. We also include some updates on what our alumni have been up to. If you have news to share with us for next year’s newsletter please get in touch.

Rachel Moss, Head of Department

Finally, if you are missing the hum of the projector in the Emmet lecture theatre we have a listing of some of the events planned for next year, which friends and alumni of the Department are welcome to attend.

We hope to see you there!

Rachel Moss Head of Department of History of Art

Professor Anne Crookshank of her childhood were peripatetic, with Anne, her mother and sisters moving from London, to Carlyle and subsequently to Fethard in Co. Tipperary where the family stayed for a time with Anne’s aunt, Olivia Hughes. Although awarded a scholarship to Oxford, Anne ultimately studied History at Trinity, before progressing to the Courtauld Institute in London, where her formal study of art history began.

Anne Crookshank

For the first thirty years of its existence, the Department of History of Art (as it was then) grew and prospered under the ‘reign’ of Professor Anne Crookshank. She played a pivotal role not only as a teacher, researcher and writer within the University, but in her much wider contribution to the discipline nationally, through her publications and advocacy of Irish art.

Anne was born in Belfast in 1927, but spent the first five years of her life in India, where her father, Henry Crookshank, worked for the Geological Survey. The later years

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Following a brief period of employment at the Tate and three years as Librarian in the Witt Library, Anne was appointed keeper of painting in the Ulster Museum (then the Belfast Museum and Art Gallery) in 1957 where her progressive policy of collecting international and contemporary art proved controversial, but has more than weathered the test of time. It was during this period too that Anne was to consolidate a number of lifelong friendships; with the sculptor Deborah Browne, with whom she remained close throughout her life, and with Desmond Fitzgerald, who she met through her involvement with the Georgian Society.

In 1966 she moved to Dublin as the first Director of Studies in Visual Arts at Trinity.

Those who studied with her will each have

their own memories of her during this time; her depth of knowledge, generosity of spirit, and of course frequent reference to her cats. It was during her time in running the department that Anne, in collaboration with Desmond Fitzgerald embarked on what was to be her greatest legacy; a series of meticulously researched and beautifully produced books. With the publication of Irish Portraits 1660-1860 (1969 ), The Painters of Ireland c.16201920 (1978), The Watercolours of Ireland (1994) and Ireland’s Painters 1600-1940 (2002) Irish art history was transformed.

Following her retirement in 1987 Anne moved to Ramelton in Co. Donegal, while continuing to make frequent trips to Dublin and maintaining close links with the department. The research materials that she and Desmond Fitzgerald had assembled over several decades were generously gifted to the Trinity Irish Art Research Centre in 2004, where they remain available for current students and researchers to peruse, and her name also lives on in the Anne Crookshank prize, awarded to the JF student with the highest grade in art history, and the Anne Crookshank student travel bursary.

Department of History of Art and Architecture School of Histories and Humanities

Staff Publications Art and Education in Medieval Europe On the facade of Chartres cathedral serene personifications of the arts of grammar, rhetoric, dialectic, music, arithmetic, geometry and astronomy present passers-by with a vision of education as an improving process leading to greater knowledge of God. Education in Twelfth-Century Art and Architecture Images of Learning in Europe, c.11001220 (Boydell and Brewer, 2016) by Laura Cleaver explores medieval imagery of the arts in manuscripts, stained-glass and luxury metalwork objects as well as on the facades of churches. These idealized figures contrast with many textual accounts of education, in which authors recorded the hardships of student poverty and the

temptations of drink and women to be found in the cities where teachers were increasingly establishing themselves. This book considers how and why education was explored in the art and architecture of the twelfth century. Through analysis of imagery in a wide range of media, it examines how teachers and students sought to use images to enhance their reputations and the status of their studies.

It also investigates how the ideal models often set out in imagery compared with contemporary practice in an era that saw significant changes, beginning with a shift away from monastic education and culminating in the appearance of the first universities.

50 Years of the Department of History of Art

Bernini’s Daphne recalling her Trinity years Best in show for this rendition of Magritte’s The Son of Man Angela Griffith (winner of the Wolfgang Beltracci prize for ‘most like the original’) donning Louise Bourgeois’ spider, with Van Gogh’s sunflowers as Peter Cherry

Eddie McParland and Melanie Hayes striking a classical, columnar pose

On 24th May the Department held a ‘Golden Get-Together’ to celebrate 50 years since the foundation of the department in the Douglas Hyde Gallery. Alumni were invited to attend dressed as their favourite art work, with various prizes (art socks) awarded. As you can see, competition was stiff!

Frida Kahlo helping out with the canapes

Christine Casey as the Empress Theodora, winner of the Raphael prize for ‘most aesthetically pleasing’ costume

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Newsletter 2016 – 2017

Staff Publications Revealing the World of European Stuccadores in the 18th century Christine Casey’s new book Making Magnificence, Architects, Stuccatori and the 18th Century Interior (Yale University Press, 2017) was launched on June 1st

by Her Excellency Marie-Claude Meylan, Ambassador for Switzerland in Ireland.

The book combines a narrative study of migrant European craftsmen with a thematic exploration of the interface between architecture and craftsmanship.

It examines the role of decoration in early modern European architecture and demonstrates the role of Italian speaking craftsmen in the design and making of sumptuous interiors in Europe, Britain and Ireland.

The illustrations for the book were funded by a range of institutions including the Heritage Department of Dublin City Council, the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, the Trinity Association and Trust and TRIARC. Publication awards were received from the Annie Burr Lewis fund at Harvard University and Fondazione Ticino Nostro.

Research News Trinity-Bank of America Merrill Lynch Early Irish Manuscripts Project

Rachel making a video about the Garland of Howth manuscript

This year saw the completion of the Bank of America Merrill Lynch Early Irish Manuscripts project, a joint initiative between the Department of History of Art and Architecture (led by Rachel Moss) and the Library (led by Susie Bioletti). Four of the Library’s most precious manuscripts – Codex Usserianus Primus, the Book of Dimma, the Book of Mulling and the Garland of Howth – have now been conserved, analysed and digitised, so making them available for view to the wider public for 4

the first time. The project was formally launched on June 1st by Mary Robinson, Chancellor of the University and received excellent coverage in the Irish Times, on the 6.01 news and on RTE’s Nationwide.

Videos about each of the manuscripts are now also on show in the Book of Kells exhibition and online. These, and further information about the project, can be accessed through an online exhibition at www.tcd.ie/library/exhibitions/early-irish-mss

A booklet about the project manuscripts, Early Irish Gospel Books in the Library of Trinity College, is available to purchase from the Library shop, with all proceeds going to further conservation and research of the college collections.

Department of History of Art and Architecture School of Histories and Humanities

Research News IRC - Making Victorian Dublin: Materials, Craftsmanship and Agency in Built Heritage

Members of the project team, Dr Patrick WyseJackson, Andrew Tierney and Louise Caulfield on a visit to Ballyknockan quarry, Co. Wicklow

Congratulations to Christine Casey and Patrick Wyse Jackson (Department of Geology) who were awarded an Irish Research Council grant under the New Horizons interdisciplinary research scheme.

The project focuses on the Museum Building at Trinity as an exemplar for the use of Irish building stone and for standards of excellence in carving. Almost half of the entire range of building stones used in Victorian Dublin was employed

in this sumptuously carved structure but much research is required to map the process of quarrying, cutting and carving which produced this seminal building. A survey of the source quarries and of carvings in different rock types will be conducted together with research on the building techniques employed here and throughout the city. Recent conservation of the Museum Building’s exterior has opened new avenues for research into contemporary carving and has raised complex and widely relevant questions regarding future conservation of the interior with rich potential for interactive interpretative techniques.

Research assistants, Dr Andrew Tierney (History of Art) and Dr Louise Caulfield (Geology) have begun the task of gathering all available documentation on the building, its materials, history and conservation and are exploring avenues for a dynamic, interdisciplinary analysis of Dublin’s Victorian architecture.

Polychrome stone in the Museum building, TCD

Cooke’s Discovery of New Zealand:

Barrie Cooke’s New Zealand Landscape Paintings The celebrated Irish landscape painter, Barrie Cooke, regularly visited New Zealand’s south island for extended stays over a period of almost twenty years from the late 1980s, to pursue his twin passions of fishing and painting. He travelled extensively exploring the remote wilderness landscapes represented in his work. Despite Cooke’s profile as a major artist in Ireland of the last few decades, and the recognition of New Zealand’s importance to him, prior to this project,

little was known of the nature and extent of his travels there, who he encountered, the places he witnessed, or how his experiences there influenced his artwork.

The research, initiated by Yvonne Scott in 2015 following an AHSSF award, has involved identifying the range of relevant artwork, field trips to investigate the locations Cooke explored, discovering his colleagues there – artists, writers, critics and gallerists, several of whom provided studio space and exhibition opportunities

– and the particular conceptualisation of the landscapes he depicted. The research has uncovered a travel diary, photographs, maps, books, painting and fishing equipment, and previously unseen footage of the artist at work. Most significant for the research, which takes an ecocritical perspective, are the findings about the nature and extent of the artist’s concerns for the environment. A final field trip to New Zealand to complete the investigative element is planned for 2018.

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Newsletter 2016 – 2017

Research News TRIARC Summer School in the History of Art and Design

Una Sealy RHA at work during the TRIARC summer school

In the last week of June, 2017, the department hosted its second annual TRIARC Summer School in the History of Art and Design. Each morning participants attended lectures on a range of themes including Romanesque art and architecture, eighteenth-century Palladianism, Baroque painting, the history of women in art and the art of the print. The afternoon sessions included site visits to the newly re-furbished National Gallery of Ireland, the National Museum and walking tours of Medieval and Georgian Dublin.

A highlight of the week was a painting demonstration by the renowned Irish artist and Royal Hibernian Academician Una Sealy. Working from a live model, Una described and illustrated her approach to depicting the human figure. Her energy, passion and skill was greatly appreciated by all those in attendance. Participants with practical art experience availed of the opportunity to work in tandem with Una, drawing from the model.

Presenting a new programme each year, the summer school is designed to introduce (or re-introduce) audiences to the history of art and design. Past participants have come from a variety of backgrounds, including those that have studied art history before and those that are coming to the subject for the first time. A parallel module in the afternoon is designed to support art educators and those working in the cultural heritage sectors.

The course may be attended on a parttime basis (morning lectures only) or on a full-time basis where participants also attend seminars in the afternoon.

The Summer School for 2018 will run from Monday 25th to Friday 29th June. There are limited spaces for the full-time courses.

Those interested should look at the Summer School webpage at www.tcd.ie/History_of_Art/summer-school or email Angela Griffith at griffiam@tcd.ie

Alumni News: Congratulations to Aoife Brady, Jennifer Gleeson, John McCrossan and Caroline McGee who were conferred with their doctorates in the History of Art and Architecture this year.

Dr Georgina Jackson took up her new role as Director of the Douglas Hyde Gallery at the end of May 2017. Dr Xavier Bray was appointed Director of the Wallace Collection,

London. Dr Caroline McGee was appointed project creative lead in the Digital Repository of Ireland, at the Royal Irish Academy. Dr Brendan Rooney curated the successful ‘Creating Histories’ show at the National Gallery of Ireland and was editor of the accompanying book, Creating Histories: Stories of Ireland in Art (Irish Academic Press, 2016). Dr Ellen Rowley was awarded honorary fellowship the Royal Institute of

Architects of Ireland in recognition of her contribution to the architectural profession.

Katherine Sedovic and Dr Aoife Brady have both been awarded curatorial internships at the Getty Museum, commencing Autumn, 2017. Dylan Haskins has recently become editorial producer in the BBC’s Radio and Education division working on the development of a new ‘BBC Ideas’ digital service.

Funding for Recent Graduates in History of Art – The Naylor Downes Bursary This bursary is awarded annually to a graduate of Trinity in the History of Art or Fine Arts born in Ireland for further education or training in the discipline.

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One award having an approximate value of €600 may be made each academic year. Applications should be submitted to hoahead@tcd.ie no later than 31st

January in the year following graduation. The winner of the award will be announced in early March.

Department of History of Art and Architecture School of Histories and Humanities

Events for 2017-18 Public Events: Lucian Freud in Ireland To coincide with the loan of works

by Lucian Freud to the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) for a five year period, IMMA Collection: Freud Project and the Department of the History of Art and Architecture and TRIARC are undertaking a joint research programme

to encourage critical investigations into the work of this important twentieth century artist. The project will be accompanied by a full programme of public lectures, learning programmes, artists’ commissions and related exhibitions.

The lecture series will be hosted by both institutions and is open to all.

For further information and to reserve a place please contact Angela Griffith griffiam@tcd.ie

Date

Event

Venue

18 Oct, 2017, 7pm

Series launch and keynote lecture,

Trinity, Robert Emmet Theatre

Martin Gayford, art critic, Sitting for a Portrait by Lucian Freud

1 Nov, 2017, 7pm

Lecture

IMMA

Yvonne Scott, Associate Professor, Department of the History of Art and Architecture, TCD, What is a Portrait? Freud and Art History

6 Dec, 2017, 7pm

Lecture Christina Kennedy, Senior Curator and Head of Collections at IMMA,

Trinity, Robert Emmet Theatre

Freud and the Contemporary 24 Jan, 2018, 7pm

Lecture

IMMA

Noreen Giffney, Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist and Lecturer, Ulster University, The Body & Affect / Freud & the Psychological

7 Feb, 2017

Lecture Nathan O’Donnell, Research Fellow TCD,

Trinity, Robert Emmet Theatre

The Historiography of Freud. Critical Reception from past to present 10 Mar, 2018, 2-4pm

Shadows and Light Annual Seminar on Gender and Art to mark International Women’s Day

Trinity, Robert Emmet Theatre

Daphne Wright, artist, Ethics of Scrutiny in conversation with Angela Griffith, Department of the History of Art and Architecture, TCD and chaired by Christine Kennedy, IMMA

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Other Events: October 2017-May 2018: Beyond the Book of Kells.

April 2018: Freud Conference Trinity in Association with IMMA

A series of lectures on manuscripts in the TCD Library collections. More information: www.tcd.ie/trinitylongroomhub/whatson/details/beyond-kells.php

Convened as part of the IMMA Collection: Freud Project and the Department of the History of Art and Architecture and TRIARC are undertaking a joint research programme further information contact Angela Griffith griffiam@tcd.ie

November 23, 2017: Michael Craig-Martin In the centenary year of Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain, Michael CraigMartin will discuss the influence of Duchamp, and the emergence of his own work. For more information contact Yvonne Scott, scotty@tcd.ie

June 25-29, 2018: TRIARC Summer School in the History of Art and Design For further information contact Angela Griffith griffiam@tcd.ie

February 9-10, 2018: Making Victorian Dublin International Symposium This symposium will include sessions on the Irish marble industry in the 19th century, architectural carving and conservation. For further information contact Christine Casey at caseyc@tcd.ie

Summer 2018. National Gallery of Ireland Exhibition: Etching Revival in Ireland c.1880-1930 In summer 2018, the National Gallery of Ireland will exhibit the work of Irish artists who created original prints including Walter Osborne, Roderic O’Conor and Estelle Solomons. The exhibition, the first of its kind, will introduce audiences to a number of Irish etchers who were celebrated in their day, but who have since been forgotten. The exhibition will be curated by Angela Griffith in collaboration with Anne Hodge of the Prints and Drawings department, NGI. For further information contact Angela Griffith, griffiam@tcd.ie September 2018: Conference: Art, Ecology and Anthropocene For further information contact Yvonne Scott, scotty@tcd.ie

The chucker out’ by William Orpen

Upcoming Alumni Events

Get Involved

Class Notes

Christmas Commons 6th and 13th December 2017

Trinity has a long tradition of outreach and community engagement. To find out about the numerous ways you can get involved with Trinity both at home and abroad, please visit www.tcd.ie/alumni/volunteer

Do you have any news or updates that you’d like to share with your fellow alumni? Submit your news with an image, subject of study and year of graduation to alumni@tcd.ie For more information please visit www.tcd.ie/alumni

Christmas Homecoming 21 December 2017 Other Upcoming Events www.tcd.ie/alumni/news-events/events

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