The Younger: Irish painter Nathaniel Hone, living in legacy

Editor's Note: The following piece has been shared with IrishCentral from the American Irish Historical Society's (AIHS) Treasures of Time, stories from the collections and archives of the American Irish Historical Society in New York City.

Perhaps one of the most striking pieces on permanent exhibition in the American Irish Historical Society is at the same time one of the least familiar to Irish historians. Hanging at the center of our grand dining hall is a stunning, yet unintimidating, seascape encased in a gilded frame.

The simple backdrop and central location are likely what draws our viewer’s eye first. Still, it has to be said that the image itself lures the viewer with its familiar scene of a stormy Irish coast. It makes nothing more of itself than this natural Irish scenery, which was precisely the mode in which its maker functioned as an artist.

(AIHS)

Nathaniel Hone the Younger (1831-1917) authored this work around the late 19th century. It was donated to the American Irish Historical Society by philanthropist, Irish historian, and AIHS council member James Augustine Healy (1890-1975) in the 1940s. At the same time, Healy donated a number of books to our library collection, sharing his immense knowledge on the best-known Irish figures of history. Hone the Younger was mentioned sparingly, and never with his life as the focus.

Self-Portrait as an Old Man, Nathaniel Hone the Younger. (AIHS)

While his legacy is limited for a number of reasons, the most obvious comes from his name. Hone was named the Younger, as his namesake was considerably more famous during and after his time. Nathaniel Hone the Elder (1718-1784) was the most notable of many artists in their family line, though his subjects differed from those of his great-grand-nephew.

An Irish-born portrait and miniature painter, Hone the Elder was commissioned primarily to capture faces rather than landscapes. He was a popular artist, with connections to powerful upper-class clients who continued to support his work even as he mocked other popular artists in satirical work. He was a skilled and educated painter whose art allowed him to connect with those in power throughout Europe.

Self-Portrait, Nathaniel Hone the Elder, ca. 1760. (AIHS)

Hone the Younger, on the other hand, had little interest in portraiture. Though portraits have at times been notable works of art, their function is less to do with the artistic value as we would see it in a modern context and more to do with the skill of the artist to capture their subject.

The Hone family, emigrating to Ireland originally from Holland, rose as portrait artists as a way to rise in social class and connections. While some landscapes could be sold at high value to an interested client, portrait commissions had different intentions behind them.

“N.H.” signature. (AIHS)

Nathaniel the Younger, though, had no interest in painting in any form when he first started his studies. Attending Trinity College Dublin, Hone studied engineering with the intention of becoming a railway engineer. For a time, he succeeded in this field, being part of the construction of the Midland Great Western Railway.

(AIHS)

He had opportunities to continue on as an engineer, but instead made a sudden movement to Paris to study painting. Though it’s unclear why he made this change, his life was forever redefined by it.

In Paris as an Irish artist before this study became common, Hone encountered urban scenery at every turn and found himself uninspired. After a few years, he moved to the small French village of Barbizon in 1857 and began developing his skill in landscapes. The Barbizon School of art pushed a continued practice of realism, landscapes, and simple pastoral scenes. Hone found his artistic home in this tradition. He continued this work, largely private without many exhibited pieces, and his style developed through the lens of his French teachers and rural surroundings.

He lived in continental Europe for a number of years, exhibiting rarely and painting pieces that differed little from one to the next. Tension rose both at home in Ireland and across the continent, yet peace remained in his depictions of the world around him. When coming back to France after a visit to Italy in 1871, Hone found his home ransacked and shortly after returned to Ireland. The peace of the world was rocky, but so he continued.

Once back in Ireland, little development in his art is noted. Though he traded the French scenery for the Irish, the tone and technique were much the same, and he seemed largely comfortable in his style.

Again in opposition to his ancestor, Hone steered clear of portrait work and instead settled into the coasts, hills, and fields he adored.

(AIHS)

By no means were portraits disregarded as the art world developed. Indeed, Hone’s colleague John Butler Yeats (famed Irish painter and father to William Butler Yeats) still understood the value of portraits as the two painters entered the 20th century. By capturing the figures of Irish history, their lives have been held for our remembrances in vivid oil.

Yet, Hone’s paintings would only feature the occasional minimal human figure, more likely to center a bird or a cow than a politician. This is not to say, of course, that his work has any less value. Often, the pastoral landscape is overlooked for the revolutionary figure. Ireland’s paintings have often been political, pointed, and clearly stating the importance of her most noted revolutionaries. But Hone’s landscapes of Ireland, simple and tender, showed the country in all his favorite places.

(AIHS)

The locations featured in Hone’s paintings are no coincidence. Naturally, he returned to the places closest to him by foot and by heart, and it is an easy task to find the same settings appearing again in later works.

Hone’s fondness and affection for Ireland is apparent in each careful brush stroke, and every inch of the country that holds importance for him is represented in his art.

Nathaniel Hone the Younger’s “The Derelict” in Edinburgh’s City Art Centre shows the same coastal scene as our painting. (AIHS)

Though there are many Irish landscape paintings, they should not be too hastily overlooked as unimportant. For diasporic organizations such as our own, these landscapes hold a greater purpose. While this coastal view (likely of Portmarnock in Dublin) may have been commonplace for Hone, its realistic pull gives the Irish American viewer the chance to see the Irish sea from a new and distant home.

As this painting hangs on our wall, stop and consider what it meant to Hone to blend the colours of Ireland into canvas and capture it for our eyes.

This column is adapted from the blog of the American Irish Historical Society (AIHS). Read the full stories at AIHSNY.org/blog.

Founded in 1897 and located on Museum Mile in New York City, the American Irish Historical Society (AIHS) preserves and promotes the history and cultural legacy of the Irish in America through its archives, art collections, and public programs. Learn more at AIHSNY.org.