Aloysius O'Kelly — A Life of Art and Sedition
Irish Artist · 1853–1936
Aloysius O'Kelly
Painter of Connemara, Brittany and North Africa — a nationalist and traveller who lived a life of art and sedition.
Interior of a Church in Brittany — the hushed, light-filled naturalism that made his name.
The Story
Aloysius O'Kelly painted a Connemara Mass, a Breton church and a Cairo street with the same searching eye — one of the most travelled, cosmopolitan and politically committed Irish artists of the nineteenth century. The Dictionary of Irish Biography sums him up perfectly: a life of art and sedition.
He was born on 3 July 1853 in Dublin, into a remarkable family of artists and nationalists — his brother James J. O'Kelly was a Fenian and later an MP. In 1874 Aloysius became one of the very first Irish artists to study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, under the Orientalist master Jean-Léon Gérôme and the great portraitist Léon Bonnat — the finest training available anywhere.
He painted mainly in Brittany, at Concarneau, with a naturalist's precision and deep human sympathy. But his reach was extraordinary. His masterpiece, Mass in a Connemara Cabin (now in the National Gallery of Ireland), is one of the great images of Irish rural faith; and as an illustrator he travelled to Egypt and the Sudan during the conflicts of the 1880s, producing vivid North African scenes for the Illustrated London News.
Politics ran through everything he did — he sketched Land League figures and the cause of his imprisoned brother — and in 1895, in an unusual move, he emigrated to New York, where he sometimes worked under the name Arthur Oakley. He died on 12 January 1936. Long overlooked, he is now recognised as one of the most important and genuinely international Irish painters of his age.
Timeline
- 1853 — Born 3 July in Dublin, into a family of artists and nationalists.
- 1874 — Among the first Irish artists at the École des Beaux-Arts, Paris, under Gérôme and Bonnat.
- 1880s — Paints in Brittany and Connemara; travels to Egypt and Sudan as an illustrator.
- 1883 — Paints Mass in a Connemara Cabin, now in the National Gallery of Ireland.
- 1895 — Emigrates to New York, later working as "Arthur Oakley."
- 1936 — Dies 12 January.
Where He Painted
From a Connemara cabin to a Moroccan street — few Irish painters ranged so far. Click a pin to explore.
Connemara · Brittany · North Africa — the reach of a restless life.
Featured Works
Collector's Guide
His atmospheric Interior of a Church in Brittany is the essential O'Kelly — quiet, luminous and deeply felt. For the traveller, the sunlit Breton Girls on a Beach and the Orientalist A Barber, Morocco show his extraordinary range. His tender genre scenes, like A Young Girl Reading, complete the picture. Part of our full Irish Art Prints collection.
The O'Kelly Lover's Gift Guide
Three ways into his world, at three price points.
- Preparing for Winter — art print · from €55
- In the Conservatory — art print · from €60
- A Barber, Morocco — art print · from €75
Discover Similar Artists
Roderic O'Conor — his Irish contemporary in Brittany and beyond. · Walter Osborne — fellow plein-air naturalist. · John Lavery — the great Irish painter abroad.