Until recently little attention was paid to the role of art in constructing the “story” of theIrish nation. This wide-ranging study of Irish pictures and sculpture opens up the subject byproviding a fresh interdisciplinary approach. Each work is analyzed beyond its strictly arthistorical relevance. A deeper investigation into the context in which a work was producedreveals much about the aspirations and ideological ambitions of artists, those commissioningworks, and the viewing public. The study of such diverse topics as the representation of theIrish peasant, the behind-the-scenes tensions in setting up a national gallery for Ireland, theerecting of political monuments, Church art, West of Ireland landscape painting, and the differencein nationalistic fervor among artists as diverse as Albert G. Power and Jack B. Yeats unveilfascinating testimony about Ireland’s collective national “needs” and its constructs of identity.
