On Sunday, we trade the medieval town of Kilkenny (pop 27,184 in 2022), with Kilkenny Castle (13th century) and the River Nore, for the modern, big-city of Dublin (pop 592,713 in 2022), the tech and financial towers, and the River Liffey. We have finally planned a visit Kilmainham Gaol tomorrow.
We arrive by train to Connolly Station and cross the Liffey on the Sean O'Casey Bridge. By coincidence, the two figures, James Connolly and Seán O'Casey, are connected by the Socialist Party of Ireland and the Irish Citizen Army – Connolly was executed at Kilmainham Gaol after the Easter Rising in April of 1916, while O'Casey would move to London and continue writing about the Irish working class.
On the Bridge, we scan the city's landmarks. The Custom House dome and the Liberty Hall (Desmond Rea O'Kelly, 1961-65), the headquarters of the SIPTU with the banner "Cease Fire Now" (not the first time the building has been employed as a billboard), are to the west. The Samuel Beckett Bridge (Santiago Calatrava, 2007-09) and the Jeanie Johnston, a replica of the so-called 'Coffin Ship', are to the east.
Now Monday, we have time before our entry to Kilmainham to visit the National Gallery of Ireland, conveniently near our hotel. On the way, we pass a Dali-esque mural on the side of a public house and prepare to enjoy some art.
The current special exhibit is entitled, "Rembrandt to Matisse – A Celebration of European Works on Paper" and shows a wide variety of artists, techniques, and historical movements.
From the German Renaissance and the Dutch Golden Age, "Saint Catherine of Alexandria" (ink on paper, Albrecht Dürer or Hans von Kulmbach, c1513) and "Landscape with Cottages and a Hay Barn: Oblong" (etching with touches of drypoint on paper, Rembrandt van Rijn, 1641) display incredible line work.
From the time of Impressionism, "Bregenz, Lake Constance, Austria" (watercolour, graphite, gouache and charcoal on blue paper; Joseph Mallord William Turner; 1840), "Les Deux Arlequins" (pastel on paper, Edgar Degas, c1885), and "Deux Danseuses dans la Loge" (pastel on paper, Degas, c1880) exemplify the era's fascination with rich colors and light.
From Post-Impressionism, "Arbres au-dessus d'un Estuaire" (etching, aquatint and drypoint on paper; Armand Séguin; 1892), and "La Montagne Sainte-Victoire vue des Lauves" (graphite and watercolour on white paper, Paul Cézanne, 1901-06) represent a sense of graphic minimalism – one dark and one light.
And from the Realism Movement, "Brustbild einer Arbeiterfrau mit Blauem Tuch" (colour lithograph on paper, Käthe Kollwitz, 1903 – above) synthesizes many of these qualities: active line work, gold and blue tones, bright highlight, dark shadows, all with a spare, emotional impact.
In the last of the three rooms, there are contemporary pieces including an intriguing selection of landscapes on the back wall. Each works seems to call back an aspect of another work from the proceeding rooms.
"Glendalough" (aquatint and etching on paper, Elke Thönnes, 2019) echos the Turner both compositionally and with the bright sun at the foot of a mountain by a lake. However, there are no buildings in this one, and the lake edge beams with ice; the hues are dimmed and a stillness replaced Turner's dynamism.
"Hand Cut Bog" (gelatin silver print, Amelia Stein, 2011, printed 2019) repeats the pattern and the stance of Degas' 'Arlequins', but again, in muddy tones. Though the peat logs at stacked at the top for drying, the image primarily shows the surface of the bog that's been cut, and there is a casual 'slump' to it, as well as a sense of impending movement – again, like Degas catching his performers backstage.
"Aran" (digital c-print, Sean Scully, 2006) gives us a nearly abstract series of gradations. But when we study it closely, like studying a Renaissance etching, we see the intricate textures of the grass and the stacked rocks. Having just been to The Burren, we have some idea of the geological qualities of the Aran Islands, and that the natural landscape is as unexpected as images of the man-made.
"Kilcoe" (gouache and wash on acrylic primed paper, William Crozier, c1984) applies the same kind of distillation as the Post-Impressionists and the graphic synthesis of the Realists. This is a fascinating curatorial exercise in joining images across time and techniques – the only commonality being paper.
Walking through the galleries, we end up in the Millenium Wing (Benson & Forsyth, 2002), having a snack in the Gallery Café. Local planners preventing the demolition of a neighboring building, so we eat in its back garden.
Evidence the Irish relationship with its history is expressed in their art, their naming of train stations for martyrs and bridges for poets, and their conservation of old buildings. Thus, it's extra-appropriate that one of Dublin's most popular tourist attraction is a prison.
Three years ago, after a visit to the Kilmainham Hospital (Irish Museum of Modern Art), we try to get tickets to Kilmainham Gaol, but it's fully booked; it's the same day that we make our first visit to Kilkenny.
We've booked ahead, and show up right on time to the Visitors Centre in Kilmainham Courthouse. After a brief introduction, we follow the guide to the Catholic Chapel, well known as the wedding site of Joseph Plunkett and Grace Gifford. It's one of Ireland's most tragic love stories; they are married just hours before his execution on May 4, 1916.
From the Chapel and through a red door, we enter the West Wing (late 18th century) cell block. The building is clean, but unrestored, as if plastering and painting the walls would exorcize the ghosts. Peering through the peepholes, we are sure they are still here.
We cross from the north hall to the south hall, known as the 'Informers' Corridor'. In this double-loaded passageway, the open floors, with iron grating, and small porthole skylights add some much need natural light.
The Main Hall of the East Wing (19th century) opens to the sky; it's bright, with fresh(er) paintwork, but it is still a prison. Sign with names hang over the doors of many of the cells, for example "Michael O'Hanrahan 1916" reminds us that other participants in the Easter Rising were held here – O'Hanrahan is executed on the same day as Plunkett.
Another door says, "Mrs. Joseph Plunkett 1923, nee Grace Gifford, 1923". During the Civil War, she is arrested and housed in Kilmainham for several months, and leaves some artwork in her cell, her so-called "Blessed Virgin".
The East Wing follows the general design principles of the 'panopticon', a principle of prison-reform from eighteenth-century philosopher Jeremy Bentham, which explains its airy and expansive character. But the cells are not so different from those in the West Wing, except for the condition of the wall finish; they are cramped, spare, and without any additional amenities.
Our guide ends the tour in the Stonebreaker's Yard; here is the description from the Visitors' Guide:
On Easter Monday 1916, groups of the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army seized the General Post Office and other strategic buildings in Dublin, and declared an Irish Republic. They held out for almost a week before surrendering. Kilmainham Gaol was reopened to house hundreds of men and women arrested for their part in the Rising. Between 3rd and 12th May 1916, fourteen men were executed by firing squad in what had been the stone-breakers' yard. The first executed was Patrick Pearse, Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteers. [ … ] The final execution was that of James Connolly.
Low crosses mark the locations at the west and east ends of the Yard where the executions were carried out. The Irish flag stands in the center of the Yard, in front of a bronze plaque listing the victims. To the east, we pass the main entrance with another flag; in the Gaol's early days, this is where public hangings occurred. The prison's 'hydra motif' is in the semi-circular pediment over the central doors.
The Kilmainham Gaol Museum is on the other side of the entrance yard. The old entrance doors are inside, along with images that more clearly show the 'chained hydra' – explained by the NBHS as:
A detail of the boldly rusticated and vermiculated doorcase that forms the centre of the entrance block and which features a chained serpent, the mythical hydra, in its overpanel. It is said that the many-headed serpent represented the five worst crimes: murder, piracy, rape, theft and treason. Just visible in the recess overhead are two granite inserts where the gallows used to be attached for public hangings. The last public execution took place in 1865 when Patrick Kilkenny was hanged for the murder of Margaret Waugh.
Windows in the Museum look out to the semi-circular east side of the East Wing, and we can see the small ventilation windows, thus looking less like a building meant for human habitation. Walking back to the Courthouse feels like returning from a different reality.
Having started the day in Kilkenny, we finish the with an after-dinner walk around Merrion Square, near our hotel. Leinster House, home of the Houses of the Oireachtas (parliament) and the Government Buildings (Aston Webb, 1904-22), home of the Department of the Taoiseach (prime minister), are at the west edge of the park mixed in with the museums.
Wonderfully lit at night, the statue in the pediment is a seated male figure resembling Auguste Rodin's "The Thinker". It is, in fact, an allegorical statue of "Science" (1911) by Albert Power, as the building's original program was for the Royal College of Science. That seems an excellent and unexpected reminder for the highest executive office of any nation.
On Tuesday morning, we return to Merrion Square for an after-breakfast stroll. We happen on the National Monument to the Member of the Defense Forces A tall pyramid voids cut through the centers of each side, and at the crossing is an eternal flame and the statues representing the Irish Defense Forces.
Then walking past the Government Buildings, we see four more allegorical statues atop the towers of the front screen, all also by Power. There is nothing online that identifies the seated female figures. We may speculate that they represent (left to right) 'Education' (child with a book), 'Industry' (rope catching a fish), 'Welfare' (breastfeeding baby and crib), 'Agriculture' (basket and cold child) or some other theme related to the study of science, but their true meanings are lost. Better now that they represent the duties the government owes its people, and that passers-by consider what those might be.
Our experience at Kilmainham Gaol sits on our shoulders, especially as we walk in front of the Irish seats of power. The cause and object of those who struggled and sacrificed at the Gaol is this government. That it's housed in a science college is simply an odd twist in the storyline. The architecture makes no sense until we lay history over it, and knowing what happened at the Gaol, that history has weight.
Most often our travels and arts training lead us to places where we can admire the beauty and creativity as well as the stories and ideas. Sometimes, the architecture takes a back seat to the stories, and in other museums like the Verzetsmuseum, or other political prisons like the Aljube, where these ideas live and these stories are retold, the architecture hardly matters at all.
In 1962, the BBC covered the restoration of Kilmainham and interviewed Seamus Brennan, who himself had been scheduled for execution on May 4, 1916, but survived and helped lead the restoration project.
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