Mary McSweeney's Ireland: Putting a land and people in perspective
In 1995 a Killarney-born painter working outside Chicago turned from cliffs and mountains to the old Irish kitchen, and found a new audience for it.
As printed in the Celtic Mirror, July 1995
Landscape artist Mary McSweeney looked indoors for the subject of her latest work, the oldtime Irish kitchen.
Titled "The Hearth," the painting, in oil, preserves a vanishing way of life in her country.
"It was a lot of fun doing it. It surprised me. A lot of younger men are buying it. They say it reminds them of their grandmother," McSweeney says of sales of the limited edition prints.
Painting is McSweeney's way of providing a record of the culture and tradition from which she came.
Her paintings are detailed stories of Irish customs and scenes that are framed under titles such as "Donegal Coastline," "Croagh Patrick," "Irish Springtime," and "Cliffs of Moher."
"It was a different Ireland than it is now. It changed so fast in the last 20 years. Change is even getting into the Gaelic-speaking areas," she says.
Born in Killarney, McSweeney, 39, a wife and mother of two boys, maintains a studio in her home in Libertyville, Lake County, Ill. She has had commissions from numerous private and public individuals and groups, including Tralee Chamber of Commerce and the Bank of Ireland in her homeland and the Chicago Gaelic Park in America.
She paints simple everyday events that people tend to overlook. As such, her work has been likened to that of Norman Rockwell, who chronicled the simple things about life in America in the 1950s and 1960s.
Many of her oil paintings, "The Hearth" included, are reproduced as limited edition prints.
Oil is not the only medium in which she works.
McSweeney uses pencil, which can be seen by viewing her work titled "Blasket Island Men," and does pen and ink series of drawings as well.
She says her talent came naturally. Her earliest recollections are of her love of painting.
"I remember drawing on newspapers because paper wasn't too plentiful. The bigger the sheet of paper, the more I could get on it," she says. "In Killarney, we have the highest mountains in all of Ireland."
A graduate of the Cork School of Art in fine arts and graphics, McSweeney also studied in London. After schooling, she opened a studio in Tralee until she and her husband, Michael Browne, emigrated to Canada, and from there, to America.
"It's been 11 years. We were three years in Canada and then we came to America. The local people (in Ireland) thought I was crazy when I made the decision to emigrate," she recalls. "I had a good business. But, still, I was limited there. People there don't have that extra money to spend. It was mostly the business community commissioning me.
"My husband really wanted to leave Ireland. He was being taxed too much. Artists in Ireland are tax-free, so I didn't have that problem."
While commissions and her desire to record history keep her busy, so do sons, Daniel, 3, and Kerry, 5.
She does much of her painting during the three days of the week that the boys are in pre-school.
"I don't mind giving them the time. I think my work is better because of them," she says in reference to being a mother and a working woman.
McSweeney goes on location to sketch in pencil the scenes that she will later paint in her studio. She says that she must do this in order to capture the detail for which her work is known.
"And, even when I lived in Ireland, I only sketched on location. The weather is so inclement there. It doesn't accommodate sitting outside," she says.
"Also, I have a very detailed style. Sketching on location has a lot to do with that. I use photographs of each piece, too. But, I can't depend solely on them when I paint."
Having enjoyed widening her venue to include indoor scenes and enjoying the compliments it has brought from customers, McSweeney says she may do more paintings of Ireland on the inside.
And, when Daniel and Kerry are grown, she may expand her work to include the diaspora.
"In time, I would like to do American scenes. But, I can't see myself doing that for a long time yet. Sometimes, I think I'd like to do something on the emigration. I would have to gather the material. I would have to dedicate at least a year toward a lot of research. Right now, the only thing I have to draw on is being an immigrant myself. I can't imagine what it was like for them," she says.
Where she paints now
Mary McSweeney did not stay in Illinois. Her profile on The Wild Geese, an Irish heritage site she joined in February 2015, gives her base as Cape Cod, with a gallery and studio in Cummaquid, about a mile east of Barnstable Village on Route 6A. It is open all year, with set hours from May to October.
The method she described in 1995 has not changed much. She still works mainly in oils, still goes back to Ireland to sketch and paint on the spot, and sums up her work with the phrase "Welcome to my Ireland." The places in her later work overlap with this article's list: the Cliffs of Moher, the Donegal coastline and Croagh Patrick, now joined by Ross Castle, Achill Island, the Gap of Dunloe, Glendalough, Blarney Castle and a hillside farm in the McGillicuddy Reeks above her native Killarney. Her mother's house in the hills turns up as a subject too.
She told Christine Goldbeck she might one day paint the emigrant story, once the boys were grown. We have not found such a series in her published work, so we leave that thread where she left it.
One editorial change. The 1995 article ended with a Libertyville post office box and telephone number for ordering her catalogue. Both are three decades out of date, so we have removed them. Readers looking for her work today should start with the Cape Cod gallery.
Questions readers ask
Where is Mary McSweeney's gallery?
Mary McSweeney's gallery and studio is in Cummaquid, on Cape Cod in Massachusetts, about a mile east of Barnstable Village at the corner of Route 6A and Mary Dunn Road. According to her profile it is open year-round, with regular hours from May to October. In 1995 she was working from a home studio in Libertyville, Illinois.
Where is the painter Mary McSweeney from?
Mary McSweeney was born and raised in Killarney, County Kerry. She graduated from the Cork School of Art, opened a studio in Tralee and emigrated with her husband, spending three years in Canada before moving to the United States. She paints Irish landscapes and everyday scenes, mainly in oils, from sketches made on location.
What does Mary McSweeney paint?
She paints Ireland, mostly in oils and from sketches made on the spot: coastlines, mountains, castles and the rural life around them. Her titles over the years include Donegal Coastline, Croagh Patrick and Cliffs of Moher, as well as The Hearth, her 1995 painting of an old Irish kitchen, and later views of Ross Castle, Achill Island and the Gap of Dunloe.
