Michael Waldron and Shane Lordan pay tribute to Cork’s prodigy, Samuel Forde, whose precocious talent earned him a comparison with Raphael
Fair island—translucent amid thy deep gloom,
What spirits were thine, earth’s broad space to illumef…
Thy Barry—thy Grogan—thy Forde, glorious youth!
Thy Maclise—every line breathing Nature and Truth—
Thy Hogan—returned to his own sea-girt home,
Bearing back fadeless laurels, from seven-hill’d Rome!¹
Penned in the mid-19th century, this anonymous verse extols two generations of noted Cork artists, products of the 18th- and 19th-century city’s impressive culture of civic patronage and prominent art scene. The lasting reputation many of these artists earned mean they need little introduction even today. One whose name has slid from the canon, however, is the verse’s ‘glorious youth’, Samuel Forde (1805-28).
Eleanor Flegg visits ceramicist Mark Campden’s Kilkenny studio to witness the process behind his gleaming table-ware
Paula Murphy examines the background to Oisín Kelly’s immortalization of Big Jim Larkin commissioned by the workers of Ireland
Technical developments enable artistic development’: John Behan reflects on the circumstances which spurred his move to sculpture, in conversation here with Brian McAvera