“Mass in a Conemara Cabin”, Aloyius O’Kelly, 1883, National Gallery of Ireland
A young priest gives the final blessing at Mass. He wears white vestments, and an image of the Sacred Heart in the background suggests that the Mass may be for the Feast. In the foreground, a farm labourer kneels with the rest of the congregation for the blessing and dismissal. Unlike the others, however, he appears to be dressed for work. O’Kelly’s painting is strikingly realistic. Details such as the young curate’s top hat and coat, or the texture of the kneeling woman’s shawl, feel entirely authentic. When Aloysius O’Kelly painted this picture, he was already an established artist. In fact this work was exhibited at the Paris Salon of 1884, making it the first painting by an Irish artist to receive that distinction. At the time, religious and political tensions were running high in the West of Ireland. The apparitions at Knock had taken place in August 1879. Near-famine conditions persisted across the country and in the west especially, landlords continued to demand excessive rents from their tenants. Against this background, the Land League was founded in Castlebar in October 1879 and would, in time, bring about a radical transformation in the system of land ownership. One of its key strategies was to hold mass meetings of tenant farmers on Sundays, when people were not working and had already gathered for Mass, thereby forging links between religious practice and the land war. The light falling from the left suggests an open door through which the congregation will soon depart, evoking both what has taken place inside the cabin and what awaits outside. Both an artist and a Fenian, O’Kelly presents the harsh realities of tenant farmers’ lives in the west of Ireland alongside the strength of their faith, a connection captured powerfully in the figure of the man kneeling at the front in his working clothes. This painting also has a special significance for Edinburgh, as it was discovered in St Patrick’s on the Cowgate, where coincidentally many poor Irish migrants lived. Thought to have been lost, it was identified there in 2002 by the parish priest. The painting is now on permanent loan to the National Gallery of Ireland.
The Catholic Chaplaincy serves the students and staff of the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Napier University and Queen Margaret University.
The Catholic Chaplaincy is also a parish of the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh (the Parish of St Albert the Great) and all Catholic students and staff are automatically members of this parish.
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