Susan Butler (1905-1991)

Susan Butler co-founded Kilkenny Art Gallery Society in 1943 stewarding the society through many decades of economic hardship in Ireland with determined ambition, until it was later renamed Butler Gallery in her honour upon moving to Kilkenny Castle in 1976.

Susan (Peggy) Butler was largely a figurative painter using both watercolour and oil paint and highly active in the Arts in Kilkenny. She initiated the committee which lead to the foundation of the Kilkenny Civic Trust and was also one of the founding members of Kilkenny Arts Week, now Kilkenny Arts Festival. Her humorous drawings were published in two books, ‘They speak for themselves’ in 1981 and ‘Minds Eye’ in 1993. Butler Gallery held an exhibition of her work in 1997 entitled Susan Butler.

We are so grateful to Susan Butler for all that she did for Butler Gallery and the Arts in Kilkenny. Thank you to all the dedicated and passionate women who work so hard to keep the Arts thriving in Ireland.