A life in relief
Michael Davitt is one of the forgotten heroes of Ireland’s struggle for independence. But all that could change thanks to Lancashire artist Brendon Deacy. Martin Doyle explains why.  In the pantheon of Irish heroes, Michael Davitt stands unfairly neglected.
There is no Hollywood film or instantly recognisable image of him. However, on the eve of the centenary of his death, a Lancashire-born Irish artist is hard at work on a project to celebrate the man who did more than anyone to give the Irish back their land.
Brendon Deacy is almost born for the job of bringing the memory of Michael Davitt to life.
He was born and bred in Bacup — six miles from Haslingden where Michael Davitt grew up.
But home for him was always his father’s native Co. Mayo and on holidays back in Bohola he remembers often making the pilgrimage to nearby Straide to visit Davitt’s grave.
If Davitt is his hero then his own father is his inspiration.
Deacy’s father worked as an open-cast miner then a tunneller before settling down to life in a Lancashire cotton mill.
Now his son is gouging his own furrow in linoleum — creating a 77-strong series of linocuts that will recreate the life and times of Michael Davitt.
“My father was always a fantastic storyteller,” says Deacy. “That informs my artwork. I want to tell stories visually with the passion of his storytelling.”
Though his mother is English and he moved to Ireland only in his 30s with his own family, Deacy has an uncomplicated Irish identity.
“I always felt all Irish,” he says. “We grew up very much in the Irish tradition — almost living in a state of denial.
“Our parents would listen only to Irish radio, read Irish papers, drink in Irish pubs, discuss Irish politics.
“From my early days I always felt my home was Mayo. I grew up as an Irish kid. Working in Leeds and in Birmingham, I was always recognised as Irish.
“It was only when I got a job at the National College of Art and Design in Dublin that people all of a sudden saw me as British because of my accent.
“I wouldn’t say I had an identity crisis but I had to think about who I was.”
Deacy’s previous work The State We’re Out was a superb exhibition and book of linocuts telling his family’s story of emigration from Mayo to Lancashire.
And while Deacy’s work is a rare example of artistic interpretation of the Irish immigrant tradition in British life its appeal is much broader.
An Indian child wrote in the comments book: “I never understood what my father went through in this country until now but it’s taken an Irishman to show me.”
Similarly, Davitt captured Deacy’s imagination not just as a neighbour but as a man who defied poverty and physical handicap and imprisonment to fight injustice and better the lives of his fellow men not just in Ireland and Britain but in South Africa and Australia.
“Davitt is high on my list of heroes,” says Deacy. “He was a great liberator of the working classes. He went from literally having nothing but the clothes he stood up in to be an international arbitrator yet the guy had so many handicaps.
“When he lost his arm in the cotton mill in a perverse way that was a blessing in disguise for instead of working in the cotton mills he got an education, developed an interest in Irish history and became a Fenian.
“He realised Ireland was not going to defeat the might of the British Empire by force and was one of the first to embrace the constitutional route.
“His passive resistance influenced Gandhi and his constitutional politics were 100 years ahead of his time.
“He was also an outsider because of his handicap which gave him an empathy for the downtrodden.”
But despite the hard work of the Michael Davitt Centenary Committee in Rossendale the Irish hero’s profile in Britain is not high — but nor is it in Ireland.
Deacy says: “He should be one of the most celebrated figures in Irish history. There is very little visual art to celebrate his life but that’s where I come in.”
But above all Deacy is concerned with communication — telling a story through images just like two of his other heroes the film-makers John Ford and Sergei Eisenstein.
“The first time I saw Ford’s The Grapes of Wrath it left an indelible impression on me,” he says.
There is indeed a cinematic quality to Deacy’s work with panoramas being followed by intricately detailed close-ups.
There is also a sense of things being boiled down to their essence — the result of the artist’s profound concentration.
“For me drawing is a way of slowing time down,” he says. “It gives me the chance to immerse myself in a subject and the opportunity for reflection on the man’s deeds.”
In our modern, over-exposed world stuffed with vacuous celebrities and venal politicians, heroes can seem hard to come by.
Deacy believes he has found one.
“For me, Davitt represents truths and ideals: integrity, honesty, humility and a Christian sense of grace.”
n The Michael Davitt exhibition will be shown next March in Rossendale Museum and will then tour to Dublin, the Linenhall Arts Centre in Castlebar and the Dunamaise Centre in Portlaoise.
Where to see the exhibition next year
January and February:
The Dean Clough Galleries, Halifax (West Yorkshire).
March 4–April 2:
The Rossendale Museum, (Lancashire).
April 4–May 5:
Hammersmith Irish Centre.
Then onto Ireland
May:
Kilmainham Gaol, Dublin
September:
The Linenhall, Castlebar, Mayo
October:
The Dunamaise Arts Centre, Portlaoise, Laois |
