Irish Arts Review

Irish Walled Towns by John GivensReview by: Michael PottertonIrish Arts Review (2002-), Vol. 25, No. 3 (Autumn, 2008), pp. 144-145Published by: Irish Arts ReviewStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20493379 .

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3 B O OKS

- i~~~

Contemporary Irish Architecture Gerry O'Leary, Dublin, 2007

pp 256 ills. 345 col. h/b

E75.00 ISBN 978-0-9557900-0-3

Anna Ryan

Contemporary Irish Architecture is a self

published book by photographer Gerry O'Leary with a foreword by Emma

Cullinan. At first glance, it appears a

straightforward photographic catalogue of various buildings constructed in our coun try over the past fifteen years. Upon clos

er study, however, different readings appear. For this reviewer, the title of the

book then becomes ambiguous, possibly even misleading, and in many ways con

ceals the positive contribution this book makes to a consideration of the cultures of

contemporary Ireland. The book gathers a selection of 124

projects that O'Leary has been commis

sioned to photograph. Each project is

given a two-page spread, comprising one

full-page photograph, along with two or

three smaller photographs and a short

description of the project by the architect.

As O'Leary writes, his selection process

for these photographs is "governed by

arresting imagery". Though, to this reader,

the projects presented are of varying

architectural merit, what the book in its

entirety communicates is O'Leary's care ful visual sensibilities and enjoyment of his passion. It is surely this aspect that

earned it the top book award at the 2008

Orvieto Fotografia Awards. The most successful and architectural

photographs of this book are, to my mind,

those that become almost separate from

the 'concrete-ness' of the subject (the building), dematerialising it into studies of colour, composition, abstraction and spa tial enclosure. To give one example, I am,

to use O'Leary's term, visually "arrested"

by the photographs of the OPW's State

Laboratories in Celbridge that seem to intentionally divest the built project of its three-dimensional presence, highlighting the building's relationship with the ground in order to transform the photographs into still dramas that echo elevational

drawings; similarly I enjoyed the many

striking stair-detail photographs that emphasise experiences of flow, materiality, and connectivity.

But to consider this book purely at its

face value, as a compilation of visually

appealing photography, is perhaps limiting its scope. It has more to offer. Given that

much of the work photographed here

falls into a commercial category of build

ing development, the book reveals much about contemporary life in Ireland.

Through the clarity of the visual image, it

presents the kinds of environs in which

we, the Irish people, enjoy passing our

leisure time today - from hairdressing

salons to hotels, shopping centres to sur

round-sound cinemas. The vulnerability of architecture is suggested: the manifold

spatial and material potentials of architec

ture somewhat controlled by motivations

of branding and marketing.

I thus believe that this book will inter

est more than the intended photographic

audience. It is a social document. By gath

ering and recognising what we have built

for ourselves (our monuments to our selves) during an intense period of favourable economics, O'Leary's book stands as a vividly-visual record of the

recent dramatic increase in Irish con sumer-culture, a record of the transforma tion of our Irish life and psyche. This,

perhaps, is an unintentional or alternative

reading of the book, yet, for me, it is what

marks O'Leary's publication as a useful

contribution towards deepening our under standing of the drivers of contemporary Irish society.

Anna Ryan is an architect teaching at the School of Architecture, University of Limerick, and has recent

ly completed a PhD at the Department of Geography, University College Cork.

Irish Walled Towns John Givens

The Liffey Press, Dublin, 2007

pp 280 ills. 245 col. & b/w h/b

E629.95 ISBN 978-1-905785-26-1

Michael Potterton

For hundreds of years, vast sums of money

were invested in the construction and maintenance of the walls that enclosed

many of Ireland's towns. As the apparent

need for these defences gradually disap peared, however, money was no longer

spent on them and they faded from public

consciousness. In some places they were

dismantled as a source of building stone,

but elsewhere time and the elements were

left to take their toll. Neglect and vandal

ism are two of the most formidable ene

mies of cultural, archaeological and

architectural heritage, but in recent times

they found an unwitting ally in the form

of the local developer. New buildings were

erected close to town walls without any

regard for their scale or context; below

ground remains were wiped away without any archaeological supervision; and in

some instances complete sections of walls

were entirely demolished. Much of this was due to a lack of awareness.

144 41IRISH

ARTS REVIEW AUTUMN 2008

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Happily, the tide has begun to turn,

and this is in no small measure due to the

work of the Irish Walled Towns Network. The IWTN has formal links with the

International Walled Towns Friendship Circle, and seeks to unite and coordinate

the strategic efforts of all bodies involved

in the management, conservation and enhancement of historic walled towns

across the island of Ireland. Barely three

years since it was established by the

Heritage Council in 2005, the IWTN

already has twenty member towns and it

has coordinated dozens of awareness-rais ing events including conferences, open days and photographic competitions, as

well as facilitating the preparation of

conservation and management plans for

many towns. The publication of Irish Walled Towns

allows the IWTN to tick yet another box,

as this was one of the key actions of their

Three-Year Plan for 2005-2008. John

Givens' exquisitely-produced book covers all twenty members of the IWTN, from

cities including Cork, Derry and Dublin,

to the small towns of Carlingford, Fethard

and Kilmallock. A ten-to-fifteen page essay

describes the historical evolution of each town, with the aid of accompanying time

lines, maps and illustrations. Each time

line neatly charts the important dates in

the development of the town in question,

while each map indicates the circuit of the

walls (both the upstanding remains and the

known line of sections no longer extant),

mural towers, gates, and other buildings

within the town that are contemporary

with the defences. The maps are very clear

and attractively presented and will probably be reproduced for years. There are more than 200 other images, mostly in colour, comprising antiquarian sketches and paint ings, historical maps, reconstruction draw ings and photographs. Most of the photographs are the work of David O'Shea, but it is fitting that some are by winners - both adults and children - of the 2006

JOHN GIVENS

IRISH WALLED

TOWNS

Walled Towns Photographic Competition (another IWTN initiative). Some old pho

tographs show gates and towers that have

subsequently been demolished. Givens' text is carefully researched, con

cise and instructive. It is written in a simple

style that conveys a lot of information while

remaining easy to read (there is also a glos

sary to explain terms that might be

unclear). The essays are broken into sub

sections, with additional text boxes con

taining supplementary information on

related events (such as battles and sieges),

people (including Hugh de Lacy, Richard

Boyle and Oliver Cromwell), buildings (mostly castles and fortified houses) and

artefacts (like the remarkable wooden

sculptures from Fethard). The introductory

essay gives a good overview of urban devel

opment in Ireland, with a potted chronolo

gy and a map showing the distribution of all

known walled towns in the country. Here,

and especially throughout the volume, one

is struck by the importance of water -

almost every one of the towns discussed is

situated either on the coast or on a river or

lake. The density of urban settlement in the

south-east of the country compared to the

north-west is abundantly clear.

The Academic Advisor for Irish Walled

Towns was John Bradley of the Department

of History at the National University of

Ireland, Maynooth. Bradley is Ireland's

foremost expert on medieval towns and the author could not have hoped for a better guide. The volume, which is pub lished by The Liffey Press, is finished to a very high standard and Alicia McAuley, who was responsible for the editing, design and layout, must be congratulated on a splendid job. It is hard to find any fault

with this book, and the small handful of

typos and one or two inconsistencies are

but a minor grievance. Having whetted

the appetite, an appended short-list of fur ther reading for each town would add one

more dimension, but that might be gilding the lily. Those who read this book, or sim

ply dip into it, will learn much about the

origins and development of Ireland's walled towns. The key to the future of

these walls is awareness and public con

sciousness, and in this regard, as in many

others, this book will play a significant role.

MICHAEL POTTERTON is a Senior Research

Archaeologist with the Discovery Programme,

Ireland's archaeological research institute.

The Rembrandt House: a catalogue of Rembrandt etchings

Wanders Publishers, Zwolle, 2008

pp 172 fully illustrated in biw p/b

E15.00 ISBN: 978 90 400 85109

Brian McAvera

Rembrandt must be one of the most stud

ied artists ever. Just when one thinks that

there couldn't possibly be anything left to say about his life and work, a book like

Paul Crenshaw's Rembrandt's Bankruptcy (Cambridge: 2006) is published, which

was a root-and-branch re-exploration of

the artist, his patrons, and the art market

in Rembrandt's time. Back in 1851

Delacroix had suggested the unthinkable: that Rembrandt would one day be rated

higher than Renaissance artists such as

Raphael. He proved to be correct. Most people probably think of the

artist in terms of his paintings but

Rembrandt was a major printmaker, usu

ally regarded nowadays as the best etcher

ever. It is clear that he loved printmaking

for its creative possibilities as opposed to

its reproductive ones - though, like Durer, he was well aware of the advantages of

reproductive printmaking. There have been numerous catalogues

of the prints, starting with Gersaint in 1751,

though the most widely used classification

AUTUMN 2008 IRISH ARTS REVIEW I 145

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