| Paintings and Prints of Ireland by Barrie Maguire |
Kilmainham Gaol
30" x 22" - Oil on canvas - $2500
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We finally went to Kilmainham Gaol the last time we were in Dublin and found it a tremendously moving experience. The huge common room with its three teirs of cells is familiar from movies like Michael Collins, and the jail yard where four leaders of the Easter Rebellion where executed by firing squad are both powerful symbols of the trauma Ireland endured in the first quarter of the 20th century. But, for me, the brutal underground cells tell the true story, as chilling today as they must have been to Eamon De Valera and the other Republican ringleaders who were imprisoned there. The crumbling walls of the dimly lit corridors are in fact a dank yellowish green but I've chosen to turn them red, a reflection of the intense passions of the men locked away behind those doors so long ago.
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