James Christen Steward

This text heavy volume looks at art in Ireland in the twentieth century especially in its political and social context. With essays from a number of contributors, the book opens with a chronology setting out the significant developments in Ireland's history since 1800. The book concludes with a brief biography for each artist and a bibliography.

Just over half the book is devoted to the Catalogue, with many of the artists represented by several paintings. Each work is reproduced in full colour to a size as large as the page will permit allowing for format, on the facing page is an illuminating discussion of each painting. Over seventy works are featured and in addition to the seventy plus colour plates there are several black and white illustrations the Catalogue. The preceding essays are also well illustrated with numerous, albeit often small, black and white reproductions or artists' work.

This is a fascinating and informative publication, and illustrates well the progress and diversity of painting during the twentieth century in Ireland.… (more)