History of Irish Art

Irish Art has a long history that starts around 3300 BC. History of Irish Art has been begun with Neolithic stone carvings at the Newgrange megalithic tomb, part of the Bru na Boinne complex in County Meath. This tomb was built before the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt and Stonehenge stone circle in England. Newgrange petroglyphs are among the finest known examples of Neolithic art in Europe.

There are also artifacts from Bronze and Iron Ages. Evidence of Bronze Age is considered artifacts from the Beaker culture and wedge tombs. The Beaker culture is a term that describes the culture of prehistoric western Europe starting in the late Neolithic and running into the early Bronze Age. This culture can be described as a culture of bell-shape cups.

Iron Age is characterized by the production iron tools and weapons. In the end of this period, the Celts influenced the development of Irish culture. Development of Celtic Art was in 400 BC – 800 AD. Due to geographic remoteness of Ireland, development of this art wasn’t interrupted by Rome colonization. This fact permitted Celtic Art to develop in its own way.

Celtic Art includes a lot of different beautiful pieces of art that you can find around Ireland. This art is based on its tradition of metallurgical craftsmanship and carving skills. The most famous example of Celtic Art is The Celtic Cross. It’s a form of Christian cross featuring a nimbus or ring.

Illuminated Manuscripts were next achievement of Irish Art (c.650 – 1000). This art represents Biblical art with lavishly illustrated panels. These panels were decorated with Celtic-style animals, spirals, knotwork, human faces and ribbon interlacements. The most known piece of this art is the Book of Kells (c.800). This book was produced by Irish monks and includes the four Gospels of the New Testament written in Latin.

Development of Celtic Art and Illuminated Manuscript and also influence of religion lead to the new great achievement of Irish Art – religious stonework (c.750 – 1150).  During this period Irish sculptors created a series of Celtic High Cross Sculptures. Celtic High Crosses were constructed on religious sites, often as part of a monastery complex. They constitute the most significant body of free-standing sculpture produced between the collapse of the Roman Empire (c.450) and the beginning of Renaissance art in Italy (c.1400).

Approximately a half of a century since 1200 is characterized as a stagnant period of Irish Art. In this period, Ireland didn’t produce any major contribution in the world visual art. Rebirth of Irish Art began in 1650. Many talented artists appeared from the late of 17^th century. The main modern art activity was fine art painting, mostly portraiture and landscapes. During early 18^th century, there was the appearance of new culture institutions, such as Royal Dublin Society, Royal Irish Academy, Crawford College of Art.

The 19^th century of Irish Art is a century of the Irish artist emigration. London was more attractive for Irish artists. There were a bigger art-market and more art studios and career potential. So Irish artists emigrated to London to have opportunities for their development and realization. Among such emigrant artists, were the sculptors Patrick MacDowell (1799-1870), John Foley (1818-74), John Lawlor (1820-1901) and John Hughes (1865-1941), and portraitists like the County Down-born John Butler Yeats (1839-1922), the academic style Gerald Festus Kelly (1879-1972) and William Orpen (1878-1931). Instead of all these Irish artists, Irish landscape painters emigrated to France, where they absorbed the plein-air painting methods of the Impressionists.

While emigrated artists were in London, France or somewhere else, there were Irish artists who stayed in Ireland and wanted to develop art in their own country. So in the early 20^th century, a new generation of Irish artists appeared thru the beneficial effects of education, along with an increase in Dublin patronage, and the impact of the Celtic Arts Revival movement. The new generation was more internationally minded. They introduced Cubism and other abstract art forms to Ireland during 1900 – 1940, forming the avant-garde Society of Dublin Painters in the process. But this period was taken the end by the World War II.

There was a decline of Irish Art in the 1940s. It happened because the Irish artistic establishment (Royal Hibernian Academy) was too conservative and didn’t want to follow new artistic movements – such as Fauvism, Cubism, Dadaism, and Surrealism. The conservatives thought these new movements would go away and that art would revert to the representationalist traditions of the Renaissance.

The battle between the traditionalists and modernists erupted in 1942 because Royal Hibernian Academy refused many modern works. As a result, modern Dublin artists organized the Irish Exhibition of Living Art, a new annual forum for painters and sculptors who did not agree with the "blinkered" vision of the Royal Hibernian Academy. So while Royal Hibernian Academy followed tradition development, the Irish Exhibition of Living Art was open to every new development. Now, for instance, artists could explore abstract art without being accused of blasphemy! In this sense, the Irish Exhibition of Living Art was a defining step in the development of the Irish school.

Despite the broadening of its outlook, Irish art during the four post-war decades was as much influenced by economic and political events at home, than by anything in the international art world. The drab 1950s led to further emigration by artists, while the excitement of the mid-1960s rapidly cooled with the onset of the 'Troubles' in the North, during the 1970s and 1980s, when politics dominated the headlines.

The 1990s were defined by the economic boom of the "Celtic Tiger", which led to a significant rise in the arts budget. The Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) was founded in 1990, as the successor to the Hugh Lane Gallery (more correctly known as the Dublin Metropolitan Gallery of Modern Art), and in 1997 the Department of Arts instituted the Per Cent for Art Scheme, in order to raise funds for visual arts in Ireland. Plans were also drawn up for two more brand new galleries - the Naughton Gallery at Queens University Belfast (completed in 2001), and the Lewis Glucksman Gallery at University College Cork (completed 2004). Culture Ireland (Cultúr Na hÉireann) - the body which promotes Irish art and culture abroad - was established in 2005.