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Mainie Jellett[edit]

Mary Harriet "Mainie" Jellett (29 April 1897, Dublin – 16 February 1944, Dublin) was an Irish painter whose Decoration (1923) was among the first abstract paintings shown in Ireland when it was exhibited at the Society of Dublin Painters Group Show in 1923. Jellett was born and raised in Dublin at Fitzwilliam Square West. Later she moved to 24 Upper Pembroke Street, Dublin 2 where she is now honoured with a plaque.

Life[edit]

Jellett was born on 29 April 1897 at 36 Fitzwilliam Square, Dublin, the daughter of William Morgan Jellett, a barrister and later MP, and Janet McKenzie Stokes.

Jellett studied at the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin. At the age of 18 Jellett left her Dublin home and travelled to London to study under Walter Sickert at the Westminster Technical Institute. Jellett once said it was in London that "drawing and composition came alive"[1] to her. She showed precocious talent as an artist in the impressionist style. Later, she moved to Paris with her companion Evie Hone, where, working under André Lhote and Albert Gleizes she encountered cubism and began an exploration of non-representational art laying down the foundation of the style in which Jellett is renown for. After 1921 she and Evie Hone returned to Dublin where she would teach art to private students but for the next decade she continued to spend part of each year in Paris maintaining close contact with Albert Gleizes and his artistic ideas.[2] It was in 1923 where Jellett's work would first be put onto display to the Irish public. Jellett's modern art style was met with positive criticism though was branded "controversial" and "freakish" by a majority Catholic audience. In 1935 Jellett returned to London for a full year in an attempt to gain insight into oriental art. During this time the "Winter Exhibition of Chinese Art at Burlington House" was on display which Jellett stated was the reason behind her London return. The art at the exhibition formed a lasting impression on Jellett who ever since began practising landscape art in various forms. On her return to Ireland Jellett began to focus on Irish art and became some what of a critic on the strengths and weaknesses of Irish art.[3] Jellett had now adapted her style following the hostility which was shown towards her previous works in Ireland attempting to appeal more to the Catholic Irish audiences. It was these political and religious views which Jellett states influenced her work in later life often painting abstract Catholic and Celtic symbols.[4]

Jellett was an important figure in Irish art history, both as an early proponent of abstract art and as a champion of the modern movement. Her painting was often attacked critically but she proved eloquent in defence of her ideas. Along with Evie Hone, Louis le Brocquy, Jack Hanlon and Norah McGuinness, Jellett co-founded the Irish Exhibition of Living Art in 1943.

Religion and Art[edit]

A deeply committed Christian (Anglo-Irish Protestant) her paintings, though strictly non-representational, often have religious titles and often resemble icons in tone and palate. Her religious beliefs often caused conflict and provoked hostility amongst the predominate Catholic beliefs of the Irish population. In Irish Art, a Concise History Bruce Arnold writes that

"Many of her abstracts are built up from a central 'eye' or 'heart' in arcs of colour, help up and together by the rhythm of line and shape, and given depth and intensity - a sense of abstract perspective - by the basic understanding of light and colour".

Death[edit]

Jellett died Febuary 16th 1944 aged 46 of pancreatic cancer. She never married nor had she had children. Her possessions were left to her younger sister, but the second eldest in the Jellett family, Dorothea Jellett. 

Work in Collections[edit]

References[edit]

External Links[edit]

https://elearning.ucd.ie/webapps/Bb-wiki-bb_bb60/wikiView?course_id=_9632_1&wiki_id=_34955_1&page_guid=bc63f2e1a0454b48860c6e22dc0d3ca8

(bibliographic portrait in BB)

  1. ^ Cullen, F (1943). Mainie Jellett, My Voyage of Discovery. pp. 86–91.
  2. ^ F, Cullen (1943). Mainie Jellet: My Voyage of Discovery. Ireland: Sources in Irish Art. pp. 86–91.
  3. ^ Cullen, F (1943). Mainie Jellett: My Voyage of Discovery. Ireland: Sources in Irish Art. pp. 86–91.
  4. ^ Barrett, C. Mainie Jellett and Irish Modernism. Ireland: Irish Arts Review Yearbook, 9. pp. 167–173.
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