Champion of the arts, especially for disabled

Everybody says the same thing. Jean Kennedy Smith had a genuine interest in the arts and her passion for Irish literature, theatre, film, music, art and dance was insatiable during her term as ambassador. The director of the Gate Theatre, Michael Colgan, sums it up best when he says that she "paid attention to the arts and not lip service to them".

But it was not just theatre first nights and film premieres that received ambassadorial attention. She was known to travel around the State to community arts theatres and projects and other less prestigious events. Her particular interest was, and continues to be, in the area of arts and disability. She founded Very Special Arts, a programme for young disabled people, in 1974. VSA is now represented in every state in the US and in more than 90 countries around the world.

Even before she came to Ireland as ambassador, Kennedy Smith attended VSA functions at the Dublin base in the City Arts Centre. According to Sandy Fitzgerald, director of the centre, she held regular fund-raisers in the US for the Young Playwrights Programme here and attended all awards ceremonies.

VSA Ireland is now an independent organisation and newlyappointed Arts Council member, Seamus eide, O Cinneide, is chairman. He says said that for a long time arts and disability had been neglected here.

"Jean Kennedy Smith helped to change that," he says. "The whole area has benefited from her energy and the effort she put into highlighting the issues. Her role was very much a pioneering one." A spokesman for the Minister for Arts, Heritage, Gaeltacht and the Islands, ile De Ms de Valera, said her advice was sought when the Government was setting up various programmes concerning the disabled. Riverdance composer Bill Whelan recalls how he became patron to the Drake Project - a cross-Border initiative for disabled composers - after being introduced to it by the ambassador. "She also held wonderful storytelling events where writers and musicians from all over the island would be invited to her home," he said.

And that, it appears, is where the ambassador really excelled in terms of the arts. Her home became the meeting place for the great and good in the arts worlds of America and Ireland.

Arthur Miller would rub shoulders with Sebastian Barry, Bill Whelan with Stephen Sondheim. She was a kind of philanthropic arts broker, introducing people who in the ordinary course would never have encountered each other. "The interest was a reciprocal one. Your presence at her house was never just as the token person representing the arts. There was always a huge proportion of artists there and she was great friends with many of them," says Mr Colgan. Michael D. Higgins has said that she instigated his meeting with a number of contacts on the west coast of America which were positive for the Irish film industry. "But it worked the other way around, too," he says. "She was hustling, in her non-bureaucratic, enthusiastic way, for the American industry also".

For aspiring thespians, writers or painters, she was a source of great encouragement.

"She was that rare breed in politics, ambitious for others, constantly looking to realise their potential and being utterly generous with her time, energy and contacts," says one admirer. During her time here she amassed an impressive collection of Irish art including several pieces by one of her favourite artists, John Behan.