Society’s values are more happily reflected in their monuments to writers than to statesmen, suggests Gerry Walker
In most instances – Henry Moore’s monument to W B Yeats being an exception – the Irish writer is both conservatively and sparingly represented in figurative public sculpture. The genre is, like that of its political-military manifestations essentially grounded in a 19th-century classical/ naturalistic mimetic tradition. Christopher Moore’s 1857 bronze monumental portrait of the renowned balladeer Thomas Moore was reviled in Dublin as ‘that horrible exportation from London.’ Selected by a committee it reflected a burgeoning French tendency to celebrate literary achievement. It aspired to the august but never attained more than the melodramatic. It also compounded the prejudice that the Irish did not have the acumen to do the job for themselves and needed the assistance of outside agencies to complete such tasks. That resentment was to last well into the next century. John Foley’s 1864 bronze of Oliver Goldsmith (1730-1774) situated outside Trinity College Dublin (Fig 2) seems to owe its existence to the fact that he once attended lectures there as an indifferent student. It was erected on a strip of land owned by the college. Strictly speaking it would have fallen into the category of private work but since as a subject it was deemed to be uncontentious, the land was leased by Dublin corporation and the costs were met by public subscription. Goldsmith became a minor poet with a sentimental caste of mind which Foley captured with some accuracy.
Northern Ireland: 30 Years of Photography at Belfast Exposed and the MAC this summer highlights the medium as a highly-charged, critical artform that constantly questions its own role in the construction of memories, writes Stephanie McBride
As a building commissioned by a State entity charged with the stewardship of a precarious energy resource, Bord Gáis Network Services Centre warrants some reflection on its relevance as a benchmark and path-finder, writes Seán O’Laoire