EMBASSY OF IRELAND LECTURE 2018

Date:  20 November, 12h00-14h00

Venue: School of Arts and Humanities, University of Lisbon | Library, room 2

Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa | Biblioteca, Sala 2

Organisation: ULICES – University of Lisbon Centre for English Studies

Sponsor: Embassy of Ireland in Portugal

Admission free.

Guest speakers: Thaddeus O’Sullivan (director); R. F. Foster (historian).

Title: A Great Pictured Song: Hugh Lane and the Ireland of his Time

At the opening of the twentieth century, the city of Dublin became the epicentre of cultural energy – notably in terms of drama and poetry, with the foundation of the Abbey Theatre, the plays of J. M. Synge and Augusta Gregory, and the poetry of W. B. Yeats. This cultural ‘Revival’ was accompanied by shifts of political allegiance which would eventually, after the outbreak of World War I, see the rise of separatist nationalism, the decline of the more moderate ‘Home Rule’ movement, and finally an armed revolution against British rule. In the early 1900s, however, there was a general expectation that self-government would come by constitutional means, and Dublin would be the capital of an autonomous Ireland. For Lady Gregory, Yeats and other cultural ‘power-brokers’, this required the acquisition of cultural capital; and Gregory’s nephew, an art dealer and philanthropist called Hugh Lane, became the driving force in the effort to create a gallery of modern art in the city. This opened in temporary accommodation in 1908, and contained the nucleus of an astonishing collection of modern French paintings by Manet, Renoir, Monet, Daumier, Vuillard, Degas and others. But the campaign to build a permanent gallery to house the collection became intensely controversial, and was still uncertain when Lane was drowned on the Lusitania in 1915. While his intention to leave his modern art collection to Dublin was clear, due to a legal quirk the paintings were claimed by the National Gallery in London – inaugurating a contentious situation which is still only partly resolved today. The story of Lane and his paintings intersects with fascinating issues in the history of Irish nationalism, cultural politics and Anglo-Irish relations: all of these themes feature in Professor Foster’s lecture, and in Thaddeus O’Sullivan’s film which will follow later in Cinemateca.

Transatlantic Perspectives: Ireland and Beyond

20 Nov., 18:30-20:30 – Cinemateca Portuguesa

Screening of Citizen Lane and conversation with director T. O’Sullivan and historian R.F. Foster. | Cinemateca admission fees here.

20 Nov., 20:30-21:30 – Linha de Sombra Cinemateca Portuguesa bookshop

Presentation by Professor Mário Avelar (Universidade Aberta) of Cinematic Narratives: Transatlantic Perspectives, eds. Morris Beja et al. (2017), featuring an essay on and an extensive interview with O’Sullivan. | Admission free.

15 Nov., 12:00-14:00 – School of Arts and Humanities, University of Lisbon|Library, room 2 / Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa | Biblioteca Sala 2

Screening of Stella Days (2011) | Admission free.

22 Nov., 12:00-14:00 – School of Arts and Humanities, University of Lisbon|Library, room 2 / Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Lisboa | Biblioteca Sala 2

Screening of Nothing Personal (1995) | Admission free.

Bionotes

Thaddeus O’Sullivan Irish born cinematographer and award-winning film director has worked in cinema and TV on both sides of the Atlantic. He made his directorial debut in 1985 with the critically acclaimed short fiction film, The Woman who Married Clark Gable, for which he received a BAFTA nomination. His first full-length feature, December Bride, was awarded the Special Jury Prize at the European Film Awards and was followed by a variety of feature films, television films, and mini-series. Nothing Personal and Stella Days (nominated for the IFTA Best Director Award: Film) will be shown at the School of Arts and Humanities on 15^th & 22^nd November respectively, as part of the cinema cycle dedicated to his work. His most recent documentary-drama Citizen Lane (2018) will be shown at Cinemateca Portuguesa on 20^th November 2018.

R. F. Foster obtained his M.A. and PhD from Trinity College, Dublin. He was the Carroll Professor of Irish History at Hertford College, Oxford, from 1991 until 2016. Before taking up this position he was Professor of Modern British History at Birbeck, University of London, and held visiting fellowships at St Anthony’s College, Oxford, and at Princeton University. The author of Modern Ireland: 1600–1972 (1988) and editor of The Oxford History of Ireland (1989), he also wrote the early biographies of Charles Stewart Parnell and Lord Randolph Churchill, as well as a two-volume biography of William Butler Yeats (1998; 2003), which was distinguished with the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. His 2014 publication, Vivid Faces: The Revolutionary Generation in Ireland 1890–1923, was awarded the British Academy Medal in 2015. He collaborated with Thaddeus O’Sullivan in Citizen Lane.