Curator and historian Michael Waldron celebrates the work of stained glass artist Harry Clarke, the subject of a new exhibition at the National Museum of Ireland.
One hundred years ago, Harry Clarke received an auspicious visit to his North Frederick Street studio in Dublin.
Fellow artist and educator George Atkinson was there to view and secure 'specimens' of the stained-glass artist and illustrator’s work for the collection of what is now Crawford Art Gallery.
Clarke had first exhibited there in December 1921 but, ‘owing to pressure on his time,’ later declined an invitation to give a lecture at the Cork institution.
By April 1924, however, the gallery’s Gibson Bequest Committee agreed to acquire 26 works from the artist at a cost of £133 17s (nearly €9,000 in today’s money).
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Watch: Harry Clarke stained glass exhibition opens in Dublin
Perhaps echoing the later fate of his work The Geneva Window, purchase of Clarke’s illustration for one of Edgar Allan Poe’s tales, A Man of the Crowd, was deemed unsuitable due ‘to the nature of the subject and the Hogarthian treatment.’ The ‘offending’ watercolour is a slum-like street scene with brothels, bare breasts, and a seemingly decapitated body.
Three of those artworks acquired by Crawford Art Gallery a century ago now form part of a new exhibition. Curated by Siobhán Doyle, Harry Clarke’s Stained Glass is a collaboration at Collins Barracks between the National Museum of Ireland and Crawford Art Gallery.
In this miniature panel, Clarke used technical solutions, aciding and plating together of two double pieces of glass of different colours to achieve his desired combination of hues. This piece was inspired by the ballad 'A Meeting' by Heinrich Heine (1839-42), which was written around 1839. It depicts a mermaid wearing a brilliant red dress, dissolving at the knee and her mane of flowing golden hair is unfurling behind her. The pale, balletic figure of the androgynous merman is clothed in exquisitely figured doublet, breeches and hose. It features a thick, deep blue colour that Clarke loved and used with great effect.
The Consecration of St. Mel, Bishop of Longford, by St. Patrick (1910), The Godhead Enthroned (1911) and The Meeting of St. Brendan with the Unhappy Judas (1911) represent Clarke’s earliest surviving stained-glass panels.
He made them at the end of his students days at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art. In 1911, the 22-year-old Dubliner submitted the panels to the Board of Education National Competition held in South Kensington, seemingly becoming the first Irishman to win a coveted gold medal.
Noted at the time for their ‘vigour and character, earnest feeling, richness of conception and great resource in design and detail,’ these early panels set Clarke’s career on a remarkable trajectory of success and industry.
Given that he was born on St Patrick’s Day in 1889 – and his middle name was Patrick – it’s quite a pleasing thought that Clarke’s earliest known work in a medium he was to master should be The Consecration of St. Mel, Bishop of Longford, by St. Patrick. Such an ecclesiastical subject was, of course, to be expected from an Irish stained-glass artist whose father owned a church decorating business.
This long, thin, single-light leaded stained-glass panel indicates Clarke's individualistic style. This artwork has a harrowing subject matter as it depicts Judas with the Angel of Death holding a rope over his neck. On the original drawing for this piece, there are 30 pieces of silver depicted on Judas’ yellow robe, but this panel has only 14. The top of the panel shows Judas being received into heaven through the prayer of angels. This work won Clarke his third consecutive gold medal at the Board of Education National Competition in London. The National Museum of Ireland purchased this artwork in 2008.
The Godhead Enthroned and The Meeting of St. Brendan with the Unhappy Judas offer further evidence of his rapid development, incorporating innovations in his treatment of form, colour, and storytelling. The latter is inspired by an episode in the fabled Voyage of Saint Brendan.
Now brought into close proximity with later works The Unhappy Judas (1913), A Meeting (1918), and Richard Mulcahy (c.1925), these stained-glass treasures tell a compelling story of the artist on his own journey of discovery.
Five of these were last displayed together some 45 years ago, so it is a rare and enviable opportunity for visitors to Collins Barracks to encounter Clarke’s work up close and personal, to revel in the magical details, extraordinary colours and textures, and gain a true sense of the artist’s genius.
