James Fitzgerald: The Aran Drawings

Regional Cultural Centre, Port Road, Letterkenny, Co Donegal Tues-Fri 11am-5pm, Sat 1-5pm Until Jun 20 074-9129186

In the first of three exhibitions exploring significant Irish-American cultural links as manifest in the lives of three individuals – the other two being the artist Rockwell Kent and the trail-blazing museum director James Johnson Sweeney – Letterkenny’s Regional Cultural Centre presents never-before-seen work by Irish-American artist James Fitzgerald. Born in Milton, Massachusetts, Fitzgerald spent several of his adult years at sea before settling down to work as an artist in Monterey, California, where he was associated with a circle that included John Steinbeck, John Cage and others.

Drawn to the west coast of Ireland, he visited the islands along the coast and was much struck by the harshness of the conditions in which the islanders lived. The show features work from his Irish sketchbooks, made between 1965 and 1971 (such as Study for Aran RowersVI, above).

On April 9th that year he died suddenly while working on Arranmore. He is buried in Dublin.

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