National Museum acquires Harry Clarke stained glass

Today 8th May 2008, The National Museum of Ireland acquired a significant piece of stained glass, The Unhappy Judas, by Irish artist Harry Clarke.

The National Museum of Ireland today acquired a significant piece of stained glass by the renowned Irish artist Harry Clarke. The piece had been offered for sale at Christie’s ‘Irish Sale’ in London but the Museum managed to negotiate an agreement at the last minute to acquire it before it went to auction. The sale price was not released but it was confirmed by the Museum that it was acquired ‘very close to the lower end of the estimate’.

The piece, measuring 124 cm long and 40 cm wide, consists of the upper two thirds of a tall lancet window entitled The Unhappy Judas. It depicts the figure of Judas clad in a yellow robe on which are depicted the thirty pieces of silver for which he betrayed Jesus. Above him is the figure of an angel holding the noose with which Judas hanged himself. Above this is a scene depicting the burial of Judas.

The window was entered by Clarke in the Board of Education’s National Competition in 1913 where it was exhibited in the South Kensington Schools of Design. It won Clarke a gold medal – his third in the competition in as many years. It also won first prize in the Royal Dublin Society’s Art Industries Exhibition in the same year. It is a milestone in Clarke’s artistic career and one of the earliest pieces of stained glass attributed to him: the influence of medieval stained glass windows is manifest in its layout and decoration and it pre-dates Clarke’s masterpieces – the windows depicting Irish saints at the Honan Chapel, Cork begun the following year. It was described at the time as ‘a remarkably original design, both as to the subject and treatment, admirably drawn and well carried out in the glass’.

In announcing the acquisition, the Director of the National Museum of Ireland, Dr Pat Wallace said: ‘I am delighted to have acquired this magnificent piece of Irish craftsmanship of the early 20th century which shows Clarke’s genius and craft as an artist at his very best and the leading artist in the stained glass medium in his day. It is particularly fitting that the piece should be acquired by the National Museum which partly owes its origins in the movement to encourage the highest quality in Irish art and design, spearheaded by the South Kensington Schools of Design to which the National Museum of Ireland was affiliated’.

The museum intends to display the panel as part of its new extension at Collins Barracks for which work is expected to commence shortly.

Further Info
http://www.museum.ie