Irish Arts Review

Making and Meaning in Insular Art by Rachel MossReview by: Conleth ManningIrish Arts Review (2002-), Vol. 24, No. 3 (Autumn, 2007), pp. 137-138Published by: Irish Arts ReviewStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20493248 .

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death by his daughter Louisa, the eminent

silhouettist. Out of the 175 Irish illustra

tions, Casement has selected twenty-nine, a

number of which have in fact been pub

lished before and used them to discuss a

dozen Ulster buildings. She covers a lot of

familiar ground, but the images of Mount

Stewart are important as they depict the

house prior to the 1840s remodelling.

Not many people appreciate that in

Ireland the window tax only lasted from

1800 to 1822. Rob Goodbody examines

the impact of this unpopular tax and sug

gests that it may have contributed to the

fashion for Wyatt windows. McCarthy and

Kevin Mulligan conclude their researches

into the 'hapless career' of the Galway

architect Dominick Madden (d.1837).

They offer a fascinating insight into the

endeavours of a provincial run-of-the-mill

architect in early 19th-century Ireland.

Conor Lucey, who is currently

researching neo-classical domestic Dublin

interiors, has written on Chinoiserie lat

ticework balustrades in Georgian Dublin.

Undoubtably, the rage for Chinoiserie

building and garden features, which swept

Europe in the last decades of t,he 18th

century, owed much to Sir William

Chambers, but in these islands the fashion

developed earlier and drew from a variety

of sources, notably the early 1750s publi

cations of William Halfpenny and his son

John. In examining latticework balustrades from six Dublin houses, all

dating from the 1765-85 period, Lucey

showed that the craftsmen derived their

designs, directly or indirectly, from

Halfpenny. Examples of such balustrades,

normally located in service areas, were

once much more widespread in Dublin,

and also occurred outside the capital.

Lucey's research is sadly confined to

Dublin, but we are tempted to know more

of the range of other contemporary Chinoiserie features in Ireland; for exam ple, the 'Chinese Bridges' at Carton, Belan, Castlemartyr, Rathkenny, Dundalk

and elsewhere, all of which no doubt also

employed latticework balustrading. Finally, Patrick Bowe has contributed a

highly readable piece on Dublin's subur

ban gardens. He assesses the influence of

John Julius Loudon, using illustrations

from Incumbered Estates sales of the

1850s and 1860s. Considering Loudon's

towering impact on so many aspects of

Victorian life and his extraordinarily large

literary output, he has been the subject of

very few studies. Bowe's paper bucks the

trend, and hopefully more will be encour

aged to follow in his wake.

Terence J Reeves-Smyth is a Senior Inspector with

Built Heritage, Environment and Heritage Service,

Belfast.

MAKING AND MEANING IN

INSULAR. ART

RACHFI MOSS editor

Making and Meaning in Insular Art Rachel Moss (ed)

Four Courts Press, Dublin, 2007

pp 365 ills 255 col 25 b/w 230 h/b

65.00 ISBN 978-1-85182-986-6

Conleth Manning

The study of Insular art, that is the art of

the early medieval period in Ireland and

Britain, has in recent years benefited from

a broader approach, which is both interdis

ciplinary and international. A significant

element in this development has been the

holding of international conferences on

the subject and the publication of their

proceedings. The first of these conferences

was held in Cork in 1985 and subsequent

conferences have been held successively in

Edinburgh, Belfast, Cardiff and Dublin.

The book under review is the proceedings

of the latest of these conferences and is also

the first volume in a new series, Research

Studies in Irish Art, produced under the

auspices of the Irish Art Research Centre,

Trinity College Dublin (TRIARC). The volume contains twenty-three

papers: six concentrating on metalwork,

nine on architecture/sculpture and eight

on manuscripts. The material being stud

ied often requires a wide knowledge of dif

ferent art media from many countries and

sometimes too a knowledge of religious lit

erature and the Bible. There are many new

interpretations and approaches and some

surprising conclusions. The first article by

Lawrence Nees is on two ornamented belt

mounts from the Sutton Hoo ship burial.

Whereas it is normally argued that much

manuscript illumination in this period is

derived from ornamental metalwork, he

draws the conclusion that features of the

ornamentation of these mounts are

derived from manuscript painting. Niamh

Whitfield's paper deals with gold filigree

work and, through her detailed study of

the techniques, she is able to document

where the influences came from. Other

aspects of metalwork studied include the

figural iconography of two book shrines by

Paul Mullarkey of the National Museum

and croziers by Griffin Murray.

An interesting and thought-provoking

paper by Tomas 6 Carragaiin attempts to

explain some puzzling aspects of early

Irish churches, such as why they are so

simple, plain and small. He suggests that

'they prioritised authenticity and the

emulation of buildings from an earlier age

over architectural innovation'. Jenifer Ni

Gradaigh discusses the saor or master

craftsman/mason and his workshop partly from manuscript sources, while Rachel

Moss, the editor, discusses aspects of Irish Romanesque sculpture. No book such as

AU Tr tIMN 2007 IRISH ARTS REVrIEW E 1 37

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B O OKS

this would be complete without some dis

cussion of the great Irish high crosses and

Roger Stalley, in taking a fresh look at

some of the scripture crosses from a stylis

tic point of view, names the gifted carver

of a number of them - the Muiredach

Master, after Muiredach's Cross at

Monasterboice. He describes him as 'one

of the most gifted stone sculptors of the

pre-Romanesque era'. Peter Harbison's

article is also concerned with the high

crosses and in particular with animals

carved mainly on cross bases, which he

argues are derived mainly from classical

sources. There are a number of other

important articles on sculpture such as

Conor Newman and Niamh Walsh's new

interpretation of the Marigold Stone at

Carndonagh, which benefits from won

derful new laser scans of the sculpture;

Nancy Edwards' study of early cross

inscribed slabs and pillars from SW

Wales; Isabel Henderson's discussion of

the recent discovery of further carved

portions of the wonderful Hilton of

Cadboll slab from the north of Scotland,

and Jane Hawkes' study of the great stu

dent of Anglo-Saxon sculpture, W G

Collingwood, which discusses the differ

ent approaches to the study of ancient

art: archaeological, art-historical or a

mixture of both.

Gifford Charles-Edwards analyses dis

play capitals in manuscripts and con

cludes that they resulted from the

difficulties of carving inscriptions in tim

ber and stone. Carol Neuman de Vegvar

sees meaning and in particular reference

to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in

the form of the arcades within which

canon tables are presented in manuscripts

such as the Book of Kells. Other articles

on manuscripts include one on the

iconography of the Devil in the Book of

Kells by Bernard Meehan; hand gestures

and the blessing hand in Insular art by

Tessa Morrison and the revival of the

early style of ornamentation in later

medieval Irish manuscripts by Colum Hourihane.

The book has been well edited and

beautifully produced with good quality illustrations including a separate section in colour and should be on the shelf of

anyone interested in early medieval Ireland or Britain.

Conleth Manning is a Senior Archaeologist with the

National Monuments Section of the Department of

the Environment, Heritage and Local Government.

Modern Ulster Architecture David Evans, Mark Hackett, Alastair Hall, Paul

Larmour, Charles Rattray

Ulster Architectural Heritage Society, Belfast,

2006 pp 208 ills 580 col 220 b/w 153

architectural sketches 207 p/b

E29.99/E20.00 ISBN 0-900457-67-8

James Howley

Modem Ulster Architecture, published by the Ulster Architectural Heritage Society

(UAHS), is a welcome addition to the

small number of books on the subject of

contemporary architecture in Ireland. It is

arranged in three distinct sections, the

first of which contains essays by Paul

Larmour, David Evans and Charles

Rattray. Larmour describes the arrival and

early development of the modern move

ment in Ulster during the first half of the

20th century, while Evans charts its devel

opment and relative decline during the

remainder of the century. The third essay

considers modern Ulster architecture in a

wider intemational context. Some inter esting early work is described in this sec

tion, mainly in the design of cinemas,

schools and social and private housings,

some of which sadly no longer exists.

Consistent with the geographical remit of

the UAHS, the book embraces all nine

counties of the province of Ulster, rather

than the six counties of Northern Ireland.

Not surprisingly the work of Liam McCormick features prominently and

rightly so, as one of Ireland's greatest

architects of the 20th century. While his

best work was built south (and west) of

the border and he also lived in the

Republic, his offices were situated in Northern Ireland.

Part Two contains forty-four building studies mainly selected from the second half of the 20th century and the early

years of th& 21st century. These are

described in substantial written accounts

and illustrated with colour and black and

white photographs and architectural drawings. The majority of these studies

are of accomplished buildings, of which a

small number could justifiably be described as exceptional, while others strike this writer as being much less inter

esting such as 'Antrim County Hall and

Castle Building at Stormont'. These

buildings represent the blandness that beset much of the architecture of these

islands during the 1960s and 1970s from

which the McCormick churches stand out

like beacons, particularly St Michael's

Creeslough and St Aengus's Burt. These

two churches remain fresh and original

today, some thirty-five and forty years

after they were built. Another memorable

work from this period is the bold exten

sion to the Ulster Museum by Francis

Pym, which is striking in its external

expression and spacious interiors. Of the

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