Nick Maxwell By Anna Rose Garvey In this issue we explore three films on the IFI Archive Player that celebrate Irish artists. The Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, previously the Department of External Affairs, was one of the many state bodies to commission films to be produced on its behalf. The National Film Institute, now … Read more
By Damian Murphy Church architecture in Ireland might be described as in stasis for the first half of the twentieth century, tied to the traditions of an earlier age, occasionally with a contemporary twist, the substitution of concrete block, fibre-cement and steel for costly masonry, slate and timber forming the only obvious connection with the … Read more
By Fiona Fitzsimons In the seventeenth century Ireland, not America, was the land of opportunity. There were more English settlers in Ireland, and more money to be made here, than in the American colonies, which were too distant, with little economic development. The other side of this particular coin was that those dispossessed by conquest … Read more
By Lar Joye By the 1830s over 30% of those serving in the British Army were Irish Catholics. Most joined for the regular pay and meals, but for most of the nineteenth century they were subject to an extreme disciplinary regime that was not seen in other armies. Unlike in the military, for civilians the … Read more
By Jonathan Stearn Try to walk along the coast in Devlin near Louisburgh, Co. Mayo, and you’ll be confronted by barbed wire and signs warning you to keep out. Try the Cliffs of Moher in County Clare and you’ll find parts of the way barred, despite the public purse funding a coastal trail. Back in … Read more