Lot 131: Richard Staunton Cahill (1826-1904) READING THE NEWS, 1871

Richard Staunton Cahill (1826-1904)
READING THE NEWS, 1871
oil on canvas
signed and dated lower left; inscribed with marking and numbered [50] upper left
h:24  w:36 in.

Provenance:
Tennants, North Yorkshire, 15 May 1992, lot 407;
Where purchased by the previous owner;
From whom acquired by the present owner

An accomplished figure painter in oil and watercolour, Richard Staunton Cahill was born in County Clare. Having trained at the Royal Hibernian Academy School in 1850, he exhibited there from 1851 until 1900. Research shows he painted in Clare and Galway, concentrating on genre subjects such as The Irish Peasant Boy (1853), The Spinning Wheel (1879) and An Impending Eviction (1888). He exhibited from the early 1850s at London's The Royal Academy, and when living in London, at Royal Society of British Artists and the New Watercolour Society and elsewhere in English galleries. His detailed, sympathetic paintings form useful historical sources for authentic furnishings and clothing.
Cahill's group is gathered in an Irish cabin to listen to news read from the newspaper. The post famine years saw a huge increase in publication of provincial newspapers, from 68 in 1850, to 127 by 1880. This growth went hand in hand with the establishment of National schools, improved rates of literacy in English, and the expansion of the railways, facilitating inexpensive distribution. Newspaper editors were often highly politicised, encouraging the rise and spread of nationalism through the printed word. People often shared newspapers and the resulting debates had previously been depicted by other artists. Initially John Boyne's The County Chronicle shows a paper being read aloud in a pub (1806). Then famous Scots artist David Wilkie produced The Village Politicians (1913), popularised through engravings (and stylistically influential here). Another lively Irish portrayal of the subject was by Henry MacManus (c.1810-78) whose oil Reading the Nation features the weekly paper 'The Nation', which was overtly political. By the late 19th Century, artists were addressing political issues more frequently through their paintings. Subsequent to Cahill's version of this subject, other artists included similar imagery to draw attention to Ireland's evolving Nationalist movement. Most notable is Howard Helmick's Reading the News: Proclamation of the Land League (1881, National Gallery of Ireland).
This setting suggests a small farmhouse, with its flagged floor and comparatively well-dressed, well fed, comfortable inhabitants. The men on the left are close to the open half door, which allowed light yet restricted the movement of animals and children. The neatly made form that they sit on, bears Cahill's distinctive signature and date. The young mother on the right sits on a stake-legged stool beside her treadle spinning wheel, an improved type introduced for flax production, used predominantly in northern counties. Her head is covered, indicating her married status, and the boy listening attentively in the centre wears green, a colour symbolic of Fenianism, as wearing green had been outlawed by the ruling British in the late 17th Century. Young boys were traditionally dressed as girls, in skirts. There were various reasons, including a superstition that if dressed as girls they were less likely to be taken by the fairies, but also following similar European aristocratic fashions, as well as for reasons of practical hygiene. In the right corner is a red painted chest, upon which rests a rush light holder, and a plate propped up, as was customary, for display. The significance of the prominently placed initials and the drawing on the wall to the left is uncertain. However, 1850 was the year of The Reform Act, which increased the electorate, and helped build a newly political nation. The juxtaposing of the male figures, with the older men sitting passively, the young man standing (with his green hat band), and the child centrally placed representing the future, suggests an active stance towards a nationalist future, which by the time this was painted in 1871, had started to become a reality.

The size and quality of the present work would suggest it may have been painted for exhibition. While no record has yet been found in exhibitors' indexes for the present title, Reading the News, an example by the artist shown at the 'Irish Exhibition in London' in 1888 entitled Thoughts of the Future [catalogue no.99, £10] would be an equally fitting name for the present work. Thoughts of the Future was lent by the artist to the London exhibition.

Claudia Kinmonth MA(RCA) PhD
Moore Institute Visiting Research Fellow NUIG
January, 2015


References:
C. Kinmonth Irish Rural Interiors in Art (Yale University Press, 2006), figs. 85 & 130, pp.89-90.
B. Rooney ed., A time and a Place, Two centuries of Irish Social Life (catalogue for Exhibition at the National Gallery of Ireland, Oct 2006-Jan 2007), pp.128-131, figs 67-8.
Kevin O'Neill, 'Reading Pictures: Reading Aloud in Rural Irish Society' & Andrew Kuhn 'Painting Print: Reading in the Irish Cabin' in V. Krielkamp ed., Rural Ireland, The Inside Story (catalogue for exhibition at McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College), pp.67-80.