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Dermod O'Brien (1865-1945)
The Liffey at Ballymore Eustace
Currently not on view
- Year
- Unknown
- Size
- Unframed 38 x 46cm; Framed 51.3 x 59.2cm
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Provenance
- Donated by Alderman, R. Crotty, Mayor of Kilkenny, circa 1940s.
In 1865, Irish portraitist, landscape and figure painter Dermod O’Brien was born in Limerick, a grandson of the Irish patriot William Smith O'Brien. He attended Harrow School and Cambridge University, before spending time in Europe, particularly at the Louvre to study the paintings of the Old Masters.
O’Brien enrolled at the Antwerp Academy in 1887 to study under Charles Verlat. Walter Osborne was a fellow student. In Antwerp, O'Brien won a silver medal for drawing. In 1891, Dermod O'Brien attended the Academie Julian in Paris where he befriended the artist William Rothenstein. By 1894, Dermod O'Brien was at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, sharing a studio in Chelsea with Henry Tonks for a time.
In 1901 O’Brien moved to Dublin, exhibiting at the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA) regularly for 35 years. He also showed at the Royal Academy (RA). He was elected a full member of the RHA in 1907. O’Brien went on to serve as president of the RHA from 1910-1945, he also taught at the RHA art school. His artworks were also shown at several other exhibitions, at Leinster Hall Dublin, the Royal Scottish Academy (RSA), the Royal Society of British Artists, and Mills Hall Dublin. O'Brien's paintings and portraits are represented in many important Irish public collections.
O’Brien had a significant role in the Irish art world during his life, taking the role of Governor of the National Gallery, supporting Hugh Lane’s project to secure a premises for a modern art gallery, and playing an active part in organising Oireachtas exhibitions, including the first which took place in 1906.
