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IFI Irish Film Archive

Hallowed Fire: The Art of Evie Hone

Year1950 Duration12m 18s ProducerDepartment of Foreign Affairs
This short documentary about renowned Irish cubist painter and stained glass artist Evie Hone was one of a series of artist profiles commissioned by the Cultural Relations Committee of the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs. Filmed at her Dublin studio in Marley Park in Rathfarnham in 1950, it explores the artist’s life, creative process and influences. Hone discusses her education and upbringing, and demonstrates the process of creating stained glass. The film is shot mainly in black and white (due probably to budgetary restrictions) with colour stock reserved to show some of her finest stained glass work at the end of the film. Hone was born in 1894 in Co Dublin. Shortly before her twelfth birthday, she suffered from infant paralysis which impacted on her health throughout her life. This did not however deter her creative abilities and after years of studying art in London and Paris, she returned to Dublin to set up her own studio in Rathfarnham. Her initial love of abstract art and cubist painting was later replaced by a career working in stained glass. One of her greatest masterpieces is the Stations of the Cross window made for Kiltullagh Church in Galway, which was sold by Whyte’s Auctioneers for €42,000 in 2005. She was a friend and contemporary of Mainie Jellett and together they were instrumental in introducing modern art to Ireland.

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Kay

Kay is a short documentary that explores the artistic approach and paintings of Kay Lavelle, a sixth-year pupil at Sion Hill, one of Ireland's oldest all girls’ secondary schools in County Dublin. The film follows the student as she paints on Killiney strand with beachgoers and fishermen and at the school's art studio. Sister Maureen MacMahon, the filmmaker and Kay's teacher, created the work after her student returned from Germany dramatically affected by the adverse effects of the industrial revolution on the human psyche. Kay won the National Film Institute's Amateur Cine Competition in 1968. Sister Maureen MacMahon OP (b.1918) is an artist, writer, educator, filmmaker and Dominican nun. She entered the Dominican Order at Cabra, County Dublin, in 1936. MacMahon attended the National College of Art, Dublin, and received an ATC Certificate and Diploma in Art Education in 1970. She taught art in various local primary schools from 1947 to 1971. In the early 1970s, she worked as the Head of the Audio-Visual Department at Radharc, and later part-time lecturer at Trinity College, Dublin and St. Patrick’s Training College. MacMahon was part of the Black Raven Film Group, along with Owen Carton and Sean Brophy, which produced documentaries and educational films even winning the National Film Institute’s ‘Gevaert Perpetual Challenge’1st Place Trophy in 1967. In 2022, the Irish Film Institute held a public screening of MacMahon’s work, which she attended at the age of 104 years old.

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Come Back to Erin - Trish McAdam Filmmaker Playlist

Our second IFI Filmmaker Playlist is curated by filmmaker and visual artist Trish McAdam. Since the production of her early shorts in the 1980s, Trish has created a vibrant and varied body of work, embracing a range of forms and subjects and retaining a singular, independent voice. We're delighted to welcome Trish to the Irish Film Institute to select her top picks from films preserved in the IFI Irish Film Archive and presented on the IFI Archive Player. Only one reel of this three-reel film has survived the ravages of time and so the tale is incomplete – but worth watching nonetheless. In this transatlantic tale, feisty young Peggy O’Malley (Gene Gauntier) refuses her father's orders to marry Jerry, the village blacksmith and runs away to New York City via steam-liner. Upon landing in New York she gets a job working as a parlour maid in the home of wealthy Mrs Mortimer. The film includes striking documentary-like elements in scenes set in Ireland – at the cattle market in Killarney and scenes of the emigrant ship leaving Queenstown (now Cobh) for America. This is all that survives of the film. Contemporaneous reviews fill in the remaining story : It’s not long before Peggy falls into a bad crowd and soon finds herself arrested for a crime she didn’t commit. With the news of Peggy’s arrest having made its way back home, will her blacksmith in shining armour come to save her from her wrongful imprisonment and take her back to Ireland? A single reel of this 3 reel film was discovered in the Museum of Modern Art following research by IFI in preparation for a major retrospective of Irish cinema in MOMA in 2011.

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