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| Southern Ireland's flag |
INTRODUCTION
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| Southern Ireland in green |
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| Newgrange |
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| Book of Horus. Iluminated manuscript |
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| High Cross Sculpture |
In Southern Ireland, the first art work known are the Neolithic stone carvings discovered at Newgrange megalithic in County Meath, built between 3300 to 2900 BC, five centuries before the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt and the Stonehenge in England. During the Bronze and Iron Age, Ireland was characterized by the production of iron tools and weapons that were heavily influenced in its final centuries by the Celts. In this era, the Irish craftsmen developed a metal industry, with gold, bronze and copper objects. The country became an uninterrupted development of Celtic art and crafts, mainly because its geography prevented the colonization by Rome. But after the fall of Rome and the start of the Dark Ages, the Catholic Church selected Ireland as a base for the spread of Christianity and sent St Patrick in the role of missionary. This led to the establishment of monasteries, which acted as centres of learning in religious and profane subjects. Later, the productions of a series of illuminated manuscripts were elaborated, with illustrated biblical texts, decorated with Celtic-style and precious metals like gold and silver. This led to a gradual renaissance in Irish art, also called Hiberno-Saxon style. The monasteries continued to invest in religious icons and also for biblical sculpture. This religious stonework were a series of Celtic High Cross sculptures, divided into two groups, the 1st one decorated exclusively with abstract interlace ornament; the 2nd, decorated with narrative scenes from the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. Those sculptures represent Ireland's major sculptural contribution to the history of art. From 12th to middle 17th centuries, Ireland had an art recession in terms of arts. The recovery started in the 18th century, when many cultural institutions were formed, like the Royal Dublin Society and the Royal Irish Academy. The main area of activity was painting, with portraiture and landscapes. The recovery continued in the 19th century with the establishment of the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA), and the expansion of the Royal Dublin Society and the Crawford College of Art, all of these helped to stimulate the fine art infrastructure in Ireland, especially for visual arts like painting. This period was marked by continual emigration to London or France, due to the lack of patronage, mainly because of the Great Famine, political disputes between the arts establishments in London and Dublin, lack of commissions, and weather as well. But this also led to the formation of an indigenous school of Irish painting. Between 1900 and 1940, thanks to an increase in Dublin patronage, efforts of Hugh Lane Gallery and the impact of the Celtic Arts Revival movement, a new generation of indigenous Irish artists appeared, like George 'AE' Russell, Margaret Clarke and Sean Keating. In the two decades following Independence (1922), power within the Irish arts establishment was applied by conservative traditionalists, mainly indigenous group of Irish artists, who resisted the attempts by more broad-minded individuals to align Irish art with 20th century European styles of painting and sculpture. This period saw decline in visual arts, the patronage was still scarce, and the conservative Irish artistic establishment, represented by the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA), was unable to approach to European developments in art, like Fauvism, Cubism, Dadaism, and Surrealism, this caused big opposition from the modernists. The battle exploded in 1942, when Dublin artists organized the Irish Exhibition of Living Art (IELA). Its mission was to reunite significant work, of no matter what School or manner, by living Irish artists. The 1970s trend towards Postmodernist art was reflected in Ireland by changes in the country's leading art college, the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art, then known as the National College of Art and Design (NCAD). A more modern teaching philosophy was introduced, and NCAD began to take a lead role in the promotion of contemporary visual arts, such as installation, video, performance and various forms of conceptual art. In the 1980s, Irish art had absorbed contemporary art theory. The traditional forms of painting and sculpture were becoming less "aesthetic", more didactic and more satirical. The 1990s were defined as the "Celtic Tiger", which led to a significant rise in the arts budget. The Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) was founded in 1990, as the successor to the Hugh Lane Gallery. Abstract Art gained respect after the formation of the IELA, well exemplified in the works of Sean Scully, and the geometric abstraction of Francis Tansey. In Irish sculpture, abstraction is exemplified by Alexandra Wejchert and Conor Fallon. Romanticism inspired painting artists as Paul Henry, Brian Bourke, and John Doherty. Colourism has been represented by Brian Ballard and Marja Van Kampen; Impressionism by Arthur Maderson; Surrealism by Colin Middleton, and Pop-Art by Robert Ballagh. In the 21st century, the Irish art market rose to new heights. Although the commercial value of top Irish artists had ascended significantly during the 1990s, Francis Bacon smash the world record for the most expensive work of contemporary art, his Triptych '76 was sold for $86.3 million in 2008. Others also passed the million euro barrier: William Orpen, Jack Butler Yeats, John Lavery, Louis le Brocquy, William Scott and James Barry. Unfortunately, in 2008, the bubble burst, leaving Ireland's cultural revival under severe financial pressure in the recent worldwide recession. At present, an estimated 83% of Irish creative artists remain dependent upon the income of their partners. The long-term future of Irish art could hardly be brighter, at least when compared to previous eras of emigration and financial struggle.
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| White Jug Reflected. Brian Ballars |
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| The knight who sings. Jack Butler Yeats. |
Irish traditional folk music is worldwide known. In the middle years of the 20th century, young people tended to look to Britain and, particularly, the United States as models of progress and jazz, and rock and roll became extremely popular. During the 1960s, and inspired by the American folk music movement, there was a revival of interest in the Irish tradition. The Irish music has a distinction between 'traditional' and 'folk' music, 'folk' music has a wider and sometimes pejorative interpretation; it can refer to 'contemporary' songs with guitar accompaniment. Traditional musicians call it traditional music. Traditional music has two categories; instrumental music, which is mostly dance music, and the song tradition, which is mostly unaccompanied solo singing. Irish traditional music has remained alive through the 20th and 21st centuries, despite the cultural globalization. Irish music has kept many of its traditional aspects and has influenced many forms of music, such as country and roots music in the USA, which in turn have had some influence on modern rock music. It has occasionally been fused with rock and roll, punk rock and other genres. Up to the 17th century, harp musicians were patronised by the aristocracy in Ireland. This tradition died out in the 18th century with the collapse of Gaelic Ireland. Turlough Carolan is the best known of those harpists, and over 200 of his compositions are known. Irish traditional music includes many kinds of songs, including drinking songs, ballads and laments, sung unaccompanied or with accompaniment by a variety of instruments. Handel arrived in Dublin in 1742 to superintend the first performance of his famous oratorio. The Passerini and Damici families were favourite performers in Dublin at the operas, concerts and oratorios which were then very popular. Among the next generation of musicians was John Stevenson, his works include religious music, odes, operas, songs and symphonies. In terms of popular music, with the rise in popularity of American country music, a new subgenre developed in Ireland known as 'Country and Irish'. It was formed by mixing American Country music with Irish influences, incorporating Irish folk music, Big Tom and The Mainliners as example. The fusion music played a part in Irish popular music later in the century, with Clannad, Van Morrison and Sinéad O'Connor using traditional elements in popular songs. Enya achieved international success with New Age/Celtic fusions. The most notable fusion band in Ireland was Horslips, who combined Irish themes and music with heavy rock. In 1990s, Ireland also contributed a subgenre of folk metal known as Celtic metal with exponents of the genre including Skyclad, Geasa and Waylander.
The Irish people have a proud and well-earned reputation as lovers of the word, spoken and written. This characteristic has resulted in a small nation making an out of proportion contribution to the culture of the world in the field of literature. With a manuscript tradition dating to the 6th century, the Irish literature, the oldest vernacular literature in Western Europe is important for its range: law texts, genealogies, scholar, devotional, and especially imaginative literature, including legends which are plenty in Irish literature. Before the Irish became literate after Christianity in the 5th century, they used a simple writing system called “ogham” that was used to make inscriptions. With the introduction of Latin and the adaption of the Latin alphabet into the Irish language, the result was a small literate class, clerical and lay. The earliest Irish literature consisted in lyric poetry and ancient prose tales. In the 6th century, the poetry illustrated the religious faith or described the world of nature. These works were linguistically archaic. Many of the poems found in the margin of manuscripts were written by monks who talked about their surroundings. The importance of landscape, embracing at once nature, place and mythology, comes from the old hermit poets to the medieval ones, and later to modern and contemporary Irish poetry. The main expression was the verse. Women were excluded from the official literature. In the 15th century, a certain number of women were literate; some of them were contributors to an unofficial corpus of courtly love poetry known as dánta grádha. The Norman invasion in the 12th century introduced new influences. In this period, the translations from English started. In the 17th century the English control over Ireland was higher suppressing the Irish traditional aristocracy. In consequence, the literary class lost its patrons because the new English nobility did not have sympathy for the Irish culture. Poetry was still the dominant, it was done by poor scholars educated in hidden schools. A certain number of patrons could still be found, even in the early 19th century, especially among the surviving families of the Gaelic aristocracy. Women were of great importance in the oral tradition in this period. They were the composers of traditional laments that contained the most intense poetry. These compositions were not in writing until collected in the 19th century. The printing was introduced in 1500, but the first Irish version of the Bible was published in the 17th century. Many popular works were printed in the 19th century, but the manuscript was still the most affordable means of transmission until the end of the century. Although English was becoming dominant in the 19th century, Irish was still used in large areas of the south-west, west and north-west. The great famine of the 1840s fastened the retreat of the Irish language. Many of its speakers died. The schools that helped maintain the native culture were supplanted by National Schools where only English was allowed. Now, the dominant cultural force was an English-speaking middle class, but some took an interest in the literature of the Irish language. Like the young protestant scholar Samuel Ferguson, who studied secretly and discovered the Irish poetry, and began to translate it. James Hardiman collected popular Irish poetry in 1831. These attempts tried to bridge the gap between the two languages. One of the first earliest writers in English was Jonathan Swift, a powerful satirist born in Ireland but that spend much of his life in England. Other Irish novelists to emerge during the 19th century were John Banim, Gerald Griffin, and Charles Kickham. Their works tended to reflect the views of the middle class or aristocracy and they wrote "novels of the big house". This growth of Irish cultural nationalism towards the end of the 19th century, culminating in the Gaelic Revival, had a big influence on Irish writing in English. This can be seen in the plays of J.M. Synge, who spent some time in the Irish-speaking Aran Islands, and in the early poetry of William Butler Yeats, where Irish mythology is used in a personal and idiosyncratic way. In 1899 it was founded the Gaelic League, who led the publication of thousands of books and pamphlets in Irish, starting a foundation of new literature in the coming decades. This period saw remarkable autobiographies from Tomás Ó Criomhthain, Peig Sayers and Muiris Ó Súilleabháin. In the beginning of the 20th century, Yeats was a prominent writer who changed his style due to the influence of modernism. James Joyce and Samuel Beckett, both wrote poetry, fiction and drama. Joyce is known as the father of literary genre “stream of consciousness”, exemplified in Ulysses, considered one of the 20th century's greatest literary achievements. With the rise of the Irish Free State and the Republic of Ireland, more novelists from the lower social classes began to emerge. Frequently, these authors wrote of the narrow, restricted lives of the lower-middle classes and small farmers, like Brinsley McNamara and John McGahern.
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| Ogham alphabet |
In terms of demographics, genetic research suggests that the first settlers of Ireland migrated from Iberia following the most recent Ice Age. After the Mesolithic, the Neolithic and Bronze Age, migrants introduced Celtic language and culture. Migrants from the Neolithic to Bronze Age still represent the genetic heritage of most Irish people. Gaelic tradition expanded throughout the island and became the dominant form. Irish people are mainly of Gaelic ancestry, and some of Norse, Anglo-Norman, English, Scottish, French, and Welsh ancestry. Irish Travellers are classified as a "social group" in Ireland, but are an "ethnic minority group" in the United Kingdom, politically linked with Rome and Gypsy groups. Ireland had one of the fastest growing populations in Europe from 2004–2006, with annual growth rates exceeding 2%. This can be attributed to low death rates, high birth rates and immigration. The birth rate is currently over double the death rate, which is highly unusual among western European countries. In April 2011, the population of Ireland was 4,581,269.In terms of education, Ireland has three levels: primary, secondary and higher education. Education is obligatory between the ages of 6 and 15 years, and all children up to the age of 18 must complete the first 3 years of secondary. The Leaving Certificate, which is taken after 2 years of study, is the final examination in the secondary school system. Those who want higher education take it, with access to third-level courses generally depending on results obtained from the best six subjects taken. Third-level education is conferred by more than 38 Higher Education Institutions approved by the Government and can grant award at all academic levels. The Programme for International Student Assessment, coordinated by the OECD, currently ranks Ireland's education as the 20th best among participating countries in science, being statistically significantly higher than the OECD average. In 2006, Irish students aged 15 years had the second highest levels of reading literacy in the EU. Ireland also has 0.747 of the World's top 500 Universities per capita, which ranks the country in 8th place in the world. Primary, secondary and higher (University/College) level of education are all free in Ireland for all EU citizens. There are charges to cover student services and examinations.
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| Ireland system education |
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| Irish wedding |
Traditions are usually passed from family’s generation to another in an oral way. The majority of them will dissolve with time, mainly because new ways of life. But the most important are kept as almost a rule in our modern days. Irish customs and traditions are full of variety. They have a lot of feasts and historical legends that come from probably hundreds of years old and that they still maintain and celebrate to our days. An old tradition that is getting lost in Ireland is the “Irish Blessings”. It is not as popular as it used to be, although some people all over the world are still trying to keep it alive. Some may have hundreds of years old, some, created last week in another country. A Blessing is always about welcoming, warmth and turning negative situations in positive, as an answer to the history of misery of Ireland: May the friendships you make be those which endure and all of your Grey clouds be small ones for sure. And trusting in Him to Whom we all pray, may a song fill your heart every step of the way. Another tradition is the “Irish Wedding”, the bride uses the typical white dress known worldwide that symbolizes purity. The groom would wear the kilt made from tartan, a woollen cloth with patterns and intersected lines, same as the Scottish, representing the Celtic identity. The wedding ceremony is full of superstitions. Before Christianity, they celebrated a Celtic ceremony of unity where the couple decided if they wanted to be together “till death do us apart” or renew their union each year. With Christianity, it is celebrated in a Church with a Priest. Another tradition is St Patrick's, celebrated in March 17th in many countries. St Patrick is considered the Patron Saint of Ireland. A known tradition of this day is wearing something green, which is done in the U.S. This, to show their Irish heritage and culture, but this is not used in Ireland. Irish do wear shamrocks as a pin in their clothes. Irish go to Church, have a feast and see parades. The also celebrate Easter Sunday, All Saints Day and All Souls Day. Before Christianity, this celebration was called Samhain, in Celtic means the Darkhalf of the year. The Ancient Celtic New Year starts in the nightfall on October 31st, this is when the barriers with the other world are no more, and dead can walk the Earth. The custom of wearing costumes started from an old Celtic tradition, people used to dress as evil spirits so they could calm them so the real spirits wouldn’t be tempted to take them with them. Christmas is celebrated as many other countries, they do light in every front window a candle to symbolize Virgin Mary and Joseph. The Big Christmas Dinner has a turkey slow-cooked, vegetables, ham, chicken, potatoes and stuffing.
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| Leprechaum |
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| Irish breakfast |
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| Gaelic footall |
CONCLUSION
As a conclusion, we can see that art in Ireland has passed throughout several changes and periods, from Stone Age with the Neolithic stone carvings discovered at the Newgrange megalithic tomb in County Meath; the Bronze and Iron Age where tools and artefacts were made of iron and in the end of this period influenced by the Celtic-style. Later was the creation of illuminated manuscripts with Celtic-style and biblical features. The fourth achievement of Irish art was religious stonework. After that painting had its rebirth, especially portraits and landscapes. After this, many artists immigrated mainly to London because of scarce patronage. Later, all the artists who stayed in Ireland became a major group, mainly traditionalists who resisted all attempts of modernization. Later this “modernization” finally entered the Irish art, slowly how it should be.
In terms of music, the Irish traditional music maintained its protagonism in the 20th and 21st century, despite the globalization of cultural forces. Instead of that, it has influenced country and roots music in the USA. In the 17th century, music was patronised by the aristocracy. It has been many revivals of Irish music to maintain it alive and prosper. Today, it can be heard with different fusions but it has never disappeared. Until our days is present even in modern pop and rock music.
The Irish literature is one of the oldest in Western Europe. The Irish literature started in manuscripts, mainly talking about landscapes or mythology. All of these as reflection of what it was going on in those times. The literature was first Pagan, then Christian. They mainly expressed themselves through verses, poetry. As always, literacy was allowed only for some. Women were mainly excluded until the 15th century. In the 17th century, the English had control, leaving no patrons for Irish literacy. In the end of the 18th century women are protagonist in the oral tradition, composed by intensive poetry. All these were collected in writing in the 19th century. The main reason of the retreat of the Irish language in literature was the great famine and emigration. Leaving English as the dominant force. The Gaelic revival started in 1899, where thousands of books and pamphlets were published in Irish, starting a new literature for the next decades. With Independence, writers from lower social classes appeared.
The Irish economy has had a transformation from agricultural to high technology industries and services. Although is highly dependent of foreign investment it has attracted many multinational corporations. Ireland is ranked as the 7th most free economy of the world. Today is trying to recover from an ongoing Irish banking crisis with loans from the United Kingdom, Sweden and Denmark. Today Ireland has annual growth rates higher than 2%, thanks to low death rates, high birth and immigration. Every kind of discrimination is illegal, which says a lot about human quality and also very responsible with the environment. The education in Ireland has 3 levels, they also have an examination if they want to access to third-level courses, just like Chile. The difference between the two, all three levels are of the highest quality and absolutely free in Ireland.
Irish customs and traditions are highly based in its Christian influences and also from more ancient traditions, like Celtic or pagans. Most of their traditions have become worldwide famous. People around the world imitate these celebrations maybe without knowing its origins. Today, these celebrations are confused with being from somewhere else. But now we know where they came from and how they started and were transformed with time and influences from other cultures.
There are plenty of myths and legends born in Ireland as we can see. With only the few that were named here, we can say Ireland is full of these tales and beliefs that come from ancient times and that has been documented and also transmitted orally throughout the centuries. Some stay the same as before, others, have change with time and influences from other cultures and of course, time. But most of them stay as Irish culture tales. Even though, many of them are known all over the world, with other names but with the same story. That is how we know many stories are connected worldwide and how much our folklore has practically the same roots as other cultures.
Irish cuisine is a style of cooking originating from Ireland or developed by Irish people. It evolved from centuries of social and political change. The cuisine takes its influence from the crops grown and animals farmed in its temperate climate. The introduction of the potato in the second half of the 16th century heavily influenced Ireland's cuisine thereafter. It is mainly home-made and very healthy.
Southern Ireland has inspired the world, and the world has also influenced the cultural life of the Irish. The Celtic native spirit is well planted in the country, having multiple revivals in order to keep it alive. Music and arts has been influenced by other cultures, but music has fused with the Irish rhythms. Literature in its beginning has influenced many and has marked the path for future writers. The actual economy in the country is on recession but with good expectation on the future. Irish population is highly growing, due to high birth rates and low death ones. The Irish education is an example, as one of the best in the world, considering is free. Many old Irish traditions had become a worldwide celebration, like Halloween or Christmas, and even St Patrick's day, specially in USA, where many emigrants travelled. Some Irish myths and legends are known in the rest of the world with other names, others exists in Ireland only, like Changelings. Cuisine is very Irish and home made, done with ingredients of the country. However the modern cuisine is very influenced by other cultures. Irish sports player in Ireland, are mainly their own and with their own rules, like Gaelic football or handball. As we can see, Irish has for centuries influenced cultures, as they also been influenced but has never loose their Irish spirit. Being known as a country with a high care for their native customs.
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