Robert Ballagh, Irish, b.1943
Title: James Connolly (1868-1916)
Medium: Acrylic on canvas
Dimensions:
152 x 102 cm
Credit Line: Presented in memory of John and Martina Friel, 2004
Object Number: NGI.4737
DescriptionSocialist, theorist and revolutionary, James Connolly is chiefly remembered as one of the leaders of the Easter Rising in Dublin, 1916 (shot by a firing squad on 12 May). In 1896 he founded the Irish Socialist Republican Party. He began to write articles and pamphlets arguing that the national question was also a social question. In 1910 Connolly became acting general secretary of the Irish Transport and General Workers Union and Commandant of the Irish Citizen Army from 1914. This portrait originates from Robert Ballagh's well known commitment to socialist ideas and his personal admiration for Connolly's writings. The four roundels, one containing a silhouette of the sitter, symbolize the workers riot in Dublin in 1913, Connolly's violent death and the Plough from the Plough and the Stars flag.
ProvenanceDavid Hendriks Gallery, Dublin, whence purcahsed January 1972; James Adam Salerooms, 12 December 1985, lot 103; private collection, Dublin; presented, 2004
Exhibition HistoryOireachtas Art Exhibition, 1971, no.3
Exhibition of Irish Paintings: From Yeats till Ballagh, Lunds Konsthall, Lund, Sweden, April - May 1972
A Terrible Beauty: Robert Ballagh, A Centennial Reflection, The Hunt Museum, Limerick, 23 May - 31 August 2016
Exhibition of Irish Paintings: From Yeats till Ballagh, Lunds Konsthall, Lund, Sweden, April - May 1972
A Terrible Beauty: Robert Ballagh, A Centennial Reflection, The Hunt Museum, Limerick, 23 May - 31 August 2016