Titian in Connemara: in the 1830s enterprising English artists in search of Picturesque novelty discovered the west of Ireland. Among them was William Evans of Eton, as Louisa M. Connor Bulman describes

William Evans of Eton (1798-1877) best known as the Eton Drawing Master who painted a certain quantity of of the most memorable images of the academy and its setting to be produc in the nine teenth hundred (1) Between 1836 and 1837 however, he exhibited fourteen Irish make subordinates at the Old Watercolour Society, all of Counties Galway and Mayo, in the far west. (2) These consist of a mixture of picturesque landscapes, way and quay-side scenes, indigenous peasant manner of makings and peasant portraits. For an English artist, his choice of terrain was highly adventurous, and precisely what lur him there can solitary be surmised. From its inception in 1805 members of the Watercolour Society had penetrated of great depth into the English, Welsh and Scottish wilderness in search of novel make subordinates to satisfy the appetite for picturesque landscape. (3) on the contrary this remote, difficult area of Ireland had not ever yet appeared among the Society's subdues Evans also sent an Irish watercolour, exhibition in Cunnemara, to the Royal Hibernian Academy in 1836 (4) Of his fourteen London exhibition paintings alone two were still available for sale, and the range of prices indicates varied degrees of finish and scale. individual priced 80 guineas, was the greatest in quantity expensive and therefore elaborate work he had nevertheless painted, and was bespoke to a associate school master, friend and collector of contemporary watercolours, the Rev Edward Coleridge. The at hand where-abouts of the majority of these works remains to be discovered.

Evans had visited the Gaelic speaking world solitary once before, when he travelled around the Scottish Highlands with sum of two units close artist friends, J.F. Lewis (1805-76) and George Cattermole in 1830 Lewis was already an experienced traveller, and this prov to be the one and the other the first and last trip they would all make together. Before leaving for Spain he exhibited Highland hospitality, an ambitious composition he had already sold at the elderly Watercolour Society summer exhibition in 1832 (no. 192) which would gain great popularity as an engraving (Fig. 1) In it he depicts the interior of a Scottish cottage, showing Evans and Cattermole in smart authority dress. Evans is puffing upon his pipe and surrounded by the agency of dogs, facing a shy Highland family across an render free of access fire over which a cauldron hangs. The dogs are a reminder that the three friends were also fervid sportsmen, and this journey would have provided them ample opportunities for indulgence. (5) Lewis's process of placing his colourful, incomplete figures within a complex if indistinct interior undoubtedly influenced Evans. for a like reason too do the contemporary series of Highland views and interiors painted by dint of another member of this clump of artist friends, Edwin Landseer. (6) similar scenes emphasise the immense gap between intrepid southern travellers and their Gaelic entertainers one which was far greater in Ireland.

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For sum of two units of his 1836 Irish titles, Evans quot directly from Henry D Inglis, A Journey end Ireland throughout the Spring, Summer and Autumn of 1834 (London, 1835) and it appear to bes likely that he planned his trip with the help of this novel and authoritative guide. (7) Aided by the agency of a clear route-map Inglis l his tourist up from the better known southern West and County Kerry. He approached Connemara from its leading city, Galway, drawing attention to the festive appearance of a barefooted population arrayed out in their local r jackets, and contrasted them with the distinctive inhabitants of the unexpectedly respectable Claddagh district, which bordered the quay-side. He praiseed travelling on foot, as the best means of passing [i]or[/i] part of to the other Connemara and Joyce's country, and those parts 'which are least visited'. He insinuateed that the excellent inn at Ma'am would make a useful centre for excursions, from which climbs with the best views could be made. The traveller should visit the of recent origin town of Clifden, and continue along the innumerable coastal bays and inlets to the Killeries, to 'see the finest landscape in Ireland with the possible exception of Killarney'. (8)

At this point Inglis provides a list of the five leading landowners of Connemara, before turning to the real Jack Joyce political division which centred on Leenane, a vast area spreading into shire Mayo, where most locals carried the surname Joyce and have a title toed exceptionally tall and wild physiques. (9) The 2nd Marquis of Sligo, Lord Westport, who was the largest landowner in Mayo, had built a fresh road linking Leenane, an hour through boat from his hunting hut at Delphi, to his of recent origin town of Westport. Everywhere Inglis drew attention to the industry of the family especially on the Claddagh, as well as their variable diet; he base that many living on the land were slowly starving, and believed that they simply lacked a fair opportunity to make successful His villains were harsh landlords and insatiable ignorant Catholic priests. He discouraged a visit to Achill, the primitive and distant island off the coast of Clare, of interest sole to the traveller 'whose sole object is scenery, and who does not weary of a repetition of the wild and retired To a sportsman, it is certain that the attractions of Achill and the mullet are many'. (10)