Irish Arts Review

The Seven Sacraments: Abigail O'BrienReview by: Brian McAveraIrish Arts Review (2002-), Vol. 22, No. 1 (Spring, 2005), p. 144Published by: Irish Arts ReviewStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25503189 .

Accessed: 12/06/2014 14:36

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

Irish Arts Review is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Irish Arts Review(2002-).

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.78 on Thu, 12 Jun 2014 14:36:13 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Cie)

LAU

LUJ

;^??

*&&^^^^^^TWi>?t

CATALOGUES

A Distinctive Palette: the Art of Georgina Moutray Kyle Naughton Gallery, Queens University, Belfast 2004

pp 68 tall wide octavo format, decorative card

covers, ills 34 col / ills 4 b/w

?8.00 ISBN: 0853898642

Readability: * *

Reference Use: ****-&

Design & Durability: *****

Quality of Plates: &_

Georgina Mountray Kyle was a minor

Belfast painter, described here as being in

the manner of French Post Impressionism,

whose last?and second?exhibition was

held over sixty years ago. The catalogue is

well-printed and well-researched (by the

Ulster Museum's Eileen Black), with

colour repros of thirty-four works plus

brief notes on each, a bibliography and

exhibition listing, and an essay by Black

that is informative, but doesn't really

make a case for the work to be taken overly

seriously. No list of illustrations.

Modern American Painting from the NYU Art Collection_ Lewis Glucksman Gallery,

University College Cork 2004

pp 104, h/b octavo, ills 22 col/ills 33 b/w

15.00 ISBN-.0-9502440-1-5

Readability: *****

Reference: ****&

Design & Durability: ****#

Quality of plates: &_

By comparison with Queen's University's

G M Kyle catalogue, this is a much more

ambitious undertaking, being an inaugural

exhibition of Modern Painting, specifically New York School, from the NYU art col

lection. There are three essays (apart from

a brief introduction) which are serious,

witty, academically solid, and entertaining,

and especially the one by the marvellous

James Elkins. The reproduction of the

works, while elegant, sacrifices much to

designer style, as much space is wasted and

many of the images are far too small to be

legible in any real sense. There is a complete

catalogue of the works in the exhibition at

the rear with three tiny black and white

images to the page, reproducing again the

information on the colour illustrations,

though not cross-referencing with them.

Still, this book is a treat More please.

The Seven Sacraments:

Abigail O'Brien Husderkunst Steidl, Munich 2004

pp 128 folio h/b ills 88 col 25.00

ISBN: 3-86521-004-X

Readability: +*+ti?

Reference: ****#

Design & Durability: *****

Quality of plates: _

This catalogue, in German and English, is

a record of the exhibition which went to

Munich and comes to the RHA. O'Brien's

The Seven Sacraments, a photographic

installation, according to the catalogue is

a commentary on the meaning of ritual

religion, and the female figure in contem

porary art. There are three essays, one of

which solemnly and, to my mind ludi

crously, compares her work to Dutch 17th

century genre painting. In addition there

is a CV, a list of works (though not cross

referenced to the colour images) and a list

of selected reviews. The works are superbly

reproduced?the Germans are specialists

in this kind of thing?and it's not surpris

ing that the work is known abroad more

than at home, as the fey Catholicism, and

overtly stiff, posed nature of the works can

be easily misinterpreted.

Luis Melendez: Still Ufes National Gallery of Ireland 2004

pp 174, wide quarto format, decorative card

covers, ills 99 col 35.00 ISBN: 1904288073

Readability: *****

Reference Use: ****-&

Design & Durability: ****-&

Quality of plates: &_

A superb catalogue from the National

Gallery of Ireland which showcases forty

paintings of the Spanish 18th-century

still-life painter, twenty of them coming

from the Prado. In addition to the repro

ductions, each with facing page of infor

mation there are two scholarly and very

readable essays by Peter Cherry and Juan

J Luna, along with a detailed bibliography

and list of exhibitions. A checklist of the

paintings would have helped as would a

time-line, but this is to quibble. Superb.

A German Dream:

Masterpieces of Romanticism from the Nationalgalerie Berlin_ National Gallery of Ireland 2004

pp 168 quarto format, decorative card covers,

ills 103 col 30.00 ISBN: 1-90428809-X

Readability: *****

Reference Use: *****

Design & Durability: *****

Quality of plates: *&-&-&&_

The basics of this catalogue are excellent.

There's a timeline, artists' biographies

doubling as an index, five solid essays

(especially those by Berhard Maaz and

Brendan Rooney, the latter one being on

German influences on 19th-century Irish

art), along with full-page colour illustra

tions of all of the loans, each with a mini

essay on the opposite page. The major

drawback? is that the reproductions are,

for the most part, poor.

Catherine McWilliams: a retrospective 1961-2004_ Self-published, Belfast ND

2004_

pp 72 oblong format, decorative card covers,

fully illustrated ?5.00 No ISBN

Readability: ****#

Reference use: **-&-&-&

Design & Durability: ***#-&

Quality of plates: ****&_

Catherine McWilliams and her painter

husband run the Cavehill Gallery in

Belfast. This catalogue, which has a brief

introduction by the painter, and a short

essay by the Ulster Museum's S B

Kennedy, has as its rationale almost one

hundred colour images, but unfortunately

they are not numbered, nor is there a list

of illustrations. There is a CV, but the bib

liography is rudimentary, and there is an

exhibition review listed from a newspa

per, but without the page reference.

BRIAN MCAVERA is a playwright and art critic.

144 I

IRISH ARTS REVIEW SPRING 2005

This content downloaded from 62.122.79.78 on Thu, 12 Jun 2014 14:36:13 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions