Death of well known Sligo artist
THE death has taken place of well known Sligo artist, Bernard McDonagh ( 92). HE was known both nationally and internationally as a landscape painter working predominantly in watercolour and oils.
He was the founder and director of the Sligo School of Landscape Painting in 1968 and taught at the National College of Art and Design, The Sligo Institute of Technology, St. Angela’s College and Summerhill College.
A regular exhibitor with the Watercolour Society of Ireland and the RHA, he has received several public commissions for murals and portraits.
Indeed, some of his most known murals were seen in Sligo at City Hall, Sligo Library, Summerhill College and MacSharry Park.
Bernard was hugely influenced by the great portraitists - Rembrandt, Velasquez, Van Dyck, and Sir William Orpen. A graduate and multiple- scholarship winner from Dublin’s National College of Art, Bernard went on to study throughout Europe including an extensive period in Rome in the 1940s.
He exhibited extensively throughout mainland Europe, USA, Canada, Australia and at home in Ireland. Often these exhibitions carry an inevitably Yeatsian or Sligo theme.
In 2005, Sligo Art Gallery marked forty years of portraits by Mr McDonagh in his first major portrait exhibition in over thirty years. The exhibition was a collection of over fifty portraits giving a slice of Irish and international political and cultural life of the twentieth century. A traditional academic painter, McDonagh’s portraits featured the work of a keen observer and technically accomplished painter.
He once remarked that the first step for any artist is to observe, then to compose and then to paint. He had strong views on contemporary art.
“There is no craftsmanship anymore. People don’t learn the basic skills before they start”, he said.
Bernard was also a member of National Portrait Collection of Limerick University. and founded the first school of landscape painting in Oregon in the 1970’ s.
Exhibitions included the Camerino University in Italy, Yeats Societies in Melbourne and Sydney and the CUA University in Washington. McDonagh’s portraits include many prominent Irish, American and Canadian politicians. His frescoes can be seen in the Irish College in Rome, in Monterey in California and in churches all over Ireland.
He passed away last Friday and was beloved husband of Grace and dear father of Ian, David, Bernice and Conor.
Sadly missed also by his grandchildren Èadaoin, Eimear and Aisling, daughtersin- law Damhnait and Anne- Maria and Bernice` s partner Kenny, sister Christina, sisters- in- law, nephews, nieces, relatives and friends.
He reposed at his Strandhill home on Saturday with removal on Sunday to Sligo Cathedral with Mass of the Resurrection on Monday followed by funeral to St. Patrick` s Cemetery, Scarden, Strandhill Rd, afterwards.