An File (the Poet): Mícheál Ó Gaoithín, the Blasket Painter

Collected here for the first time are 55 of the best of Ó Gaoithín's paintings and drawings, accompanied by written responses to the work by novelist Éilís Ní Dhuibhne and art historian Catherine Marshall.

Author: Maria Simonds-Gooding
Publisher: Lilliput Press
Published: 02/01/2023
Pages: 128
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 2.65lbs
Size: 10.90h x 11.30w x 1.30d
ISBN13: 9781843518556
ISBN10: 1843518554
BISAC Categories:
- Art | Individual Artists | Artists' Books
- Art | Techniques | Painting
- Art | European

About the Author
Ó Gaoithín, Micheál (1904-74), poet and writer in Irish, was born January 3, 1904 on the Great Blasket island, one of the six surviving children of renowned storyteller Peig Sayers and her husband, Pádraig 'Flint' Ó Guithín, a small farmer and fisherman. He became a fisherman after finishing primary school and worked on the family farm until around 1930 when he decided to follow his other siblings to Boston in search of work. Failing to find a job and being in poor health, he soon returned to Ireland. His interest in literature and folklore began at an early age and like his mother, Peig, he was a renowned storyteller.

Approximately six years before he died he took an interest in painting and drawing with the encouragement of the artist Maria Simonds-Gooding. A number of his paintings appeared in an exhibition entitled 'An ghaeltacht bheo, ' which opened on May 8, 1974.