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82

WHYTES

SINCE 1783

,

131

Richard Staunton Cahill (1826-1904)

READING THE NEWS, 1871

oil on canvas

signed and dated lower left; inscribed with marking and

numbered [50] upper left

24 by 36in. (60.96 by 91.44cm)

Provenance:

Tennants, North Yorkshire, 15 May 1992, lot 407;

Where purchased by the previous owner;

From whom acquired by the present owner

An accomplished figure painter in oil and watercolour, Richard

Staunton Cahill was born in County Clare. Having trained at the Royal

Hibernian Academy School in 1850, he exhibited there from 1851 until

1900. Research shows he painted in Clare and Galway, concentrating on

genre subjects such as The Irish Peasant Boy (1853),The Spinning

Wheel (1879) and An Impending Eviction (1888). He exhibited from the

early 1850s at London’s Royal Academy, and when living in London, at

The Royal Society of British Artists and the NewWatercolour Society

and elsewhere in English galleries. His detailed, sympathetic paintings

form useful historical sources for authentic furnishings and clothing.

Cahill’s group is gathered in an Irish cabin to listen to news read from

the newspaper.The post famine years saw a huge increase in

publication of provincial newspapers, from 68 in 1850, to 127 by 1880.

This growth went hand in hand with the establishment of National

schools, improved rates of literacy in English, and the expansion of the

railways, facilitating inexpensive distribution. Newspaper editors were

often highly politicised, encouraging the rise and spread of nationalism

through the printed word. People often shared newspapers and the

resulting debates had previously been depicted by other artists. Initially

John Boyne’s The County Chronicle shows a paper being read aloud in

a pub (1806).Then famous Scots artist David Wilkie produced The

Village Politicians (1913), popularised through engravings (and

stylistically influential here). Another lively Irish portrayal of the subject

was by Henry MacManus (c.1810-78) whose oil Reading the Nation

features the weekly paper ‘The Nation’, which was overtly political. By

the late 19th century, artists were addressing political issues more

frequently through their paintings. Subsequent to Cahill’s version of

this subject, other artists included similar imagery to draw attention to

Ireland’s evolving Nationalist movement. Most notable is Howard

Helmick’s Reading the News: Proclamation of the Land League (1881,

National Gallery of Ireland).

This setting suggests a small farmhouse, with its flagged floor and

comparatively well-dressed, well fed, comfortable inhabitants.The men

on the left are close to the open half door, which allowed light yet

restricted the movement of animals and children.The neatly made

form that they sit on, bears Cahill’s distinctive signature and date.The

young mother on the right sits on a stake-legged stool beside her

treadle spinning wheel, an improved type introduced for flax

production, used predominantly in northern counties. Her head is

covered, indicating her married status, and the boy listening attentively

in the centre wears green, a colour symbolic of Fenianism, as wearing

green had been outlawed by the ruling British in the late 17th century.

Young boys were traditionally dressed as girls, in skirts.There were

various reasons, including a superstition that if dressed as girls they

were less likely to be taken by the fairies, but also following similar

European aristocratic fashions, as well as for reasons of practical

hygiene. In the right corner is a red painted chest, upon which rests a

rush light holder, and a plate propped up, as was customary, for display.

The significance of the prominently placed initials and the drawing on

the wall to the left is uncertain. However, 1850 was the year of The

Reform Act, which increased the electorate, and helped build a newly

political nation.The juxtaposing of the male figures, with the older men

sitting passively, the young man standing (with his green hat band),

and the child centrally placed representing the future, suggests an

active stance towards a nationalist future, which by the time this was

painted in 1871, had started to become a reality.

The size and quality of the present work would suggest it may have

been painted for exhibition.While no record has yet been found in

exhibitors’ indexes for the present title, Reading the News, an example

by the artist shown at the ‘Irish Exhibition in London’ in 1888 entitled

Thoughts of the Future [catalogue no.99, £10] would be an equally

fitting name for the present work.Thoughts of the Future was lent by

the artist to the London exhibition.

Claudia Kinmonth MA(RCA) PhD

Moore Institute Visiting Research Fellow NUIG

January, 2015

References:

C. Kinmonth Irish Rural Interiors in Art (Yale University Press, 2006), figs.

85 & 130, pp.89-90.

B. Rooney ed., A time and a Place,Two centuries of Irish Social Life

(catalogue for Exhibition at the National Gallery of Ireland, Oct 2006-

Jan 2007), pp.128-131, figs 67-8.

Kevin O’Neill, ‘Reading Pictures: Reading Aloud in Rural Irish Society’ &

Andrew Kuhn ‘Painting Print: Reading in the Irish Cabin’ in V. Krielkamp

ed., Rural Ireland,The Inside Story (catalogue for exhibition at McMullen

Museum of Art, Boston College), pp.67-80.

8,000-

10,000 (£5,930-£7,410 approx.)