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Ronald Ossory Dunlop was born in Dublin in 1894. His mother, Eleanor
Dunlop (née Fitzpatrick) was a watercolour artist and his
father, Daniel Nicol Dunlop (1868-1935), was a great friend of W.
B. Yeats, James Stephens and George Russell, or 'Æ'. Together
Yeats, 'Æ' and Daniel Nicol Dunlop published The Irish Theosophist
from the home of Eleanor's father, the Shakespearean scholar R.H.
Fitzpatrick. Thus the young Ronald Ossory grew up surrounded by
the seminal figures of the Irish Literary Renaissance, in an atmosphere
that smacked peculiarly of mysticism and spiritualism. The Dunlop
family moved to New York in 1899, then London three years later.
From here, they made the annual pilgrimage back to Dublin during
Horse Show week, with Dunlop's father returning to London clutching
two or three more 'Æ' canvasses each time. Dunlop trained
in art in London, associating with a group of young artists who
all exhibited at the Hurricane Lamp Gallery in Chelsea. In 1928
the group published a journal called Emotionism, with Dunlop supplying
a rather vague manifesto ("Art is the expression of the essence
of life"), a poem, and an illustration of one of his paintings,
'The Fish Market'. Dunlop soon expanded his exhibiting circle, showing
with the NEAC and later with the RA and the RBA. He also maintained
his Irish connections, returning periodically to paint in Dublin
and submitting a number of works to the RHA in the 1940s and 1950s.
In addition to painting, he was a prolific author; his books include
Modern Still Life Painting in Oil (London 1938), Understanding Pictures
(London 1948), Painting for Pleasure (London 1951), Sketching for
Pleasure (London 1952), How to Paint for Pleasure (New York 1953),
Ancient Arundel (London 1953), Landscape Painting: Ma Yuan to Picasso
(London 1954), and finally, an autobiography: Struggling with Paint:
Some Reminiscences (London, 1956). Examples of his paintings can
be seen in the Crawford Gallery, Cork, and the Tate Gallery and
National Portrait Gallery, London. |