Patrick Hennessy (painter)

Patrick Anthony Hennessy RHA (28 August 1915 – 30 December 1980) was an Irish realist painter.

He was known for his highly finished still lifes, landscapes and trompe l'oeil paintings.

The hallmark of his style was his carefully observed realism and his highly finished surfaces, the result of a virtuoso painting technique.

He was brought up in Arbroath by his mother and step-father, his father having been killed during World War One.

He attended Dundee School of Art where he met his lifelong companion, the painter Henry (Harry) Robertson Craig.

Patrick Hennessy was born in Cork, Ireland, in 1915.

The son of John Hennessy an army sergeant major (Leinster Regiment) from County Kerry and Bridget Hennessy from Cork.

John Hennessy was killed at the battle of Passchendaele in 1917.

In 1921 when Patrick was five years old his mother Bridget remarried in Cork.

Her second husband was a Scot named John Duncan and shortly afterwards the whole family moved to Arbroath, Scotland where Duncan had relatives.

Patrick Hennessy was educated in Arbroath at St Thomas RC Primary School followed by secondary education at Arbroath High School (1927–1933), where he began to show an aptitude for art leaving in 1933 with the Dux for Art and an accompanying medal.

In the autumn of that year he enrolled at the Dundee School of Art, for a four-year Diploma course in Drawing and Painting under James McIntosh Patrick RSA and Edward Baird.

The family's decision to support the young Hennessy in his artistic ambition was not taken lightly.

They were not well off.

Here he met Harry Robertson Craig who would become his lifelong companion.

He gained a First Class Pass in each year of the course along with winning first prize in 1934 and 1936 for work done during the summer vacation.

Hennessy played a full part in the social activities of the college, winning a fancy dress award at the Christmas revels in 1935 and producing a ballet "Paradise Lost" the following year.

He graduated with a First Class Distinction in 1937.

Having gained a scholarship he continued his studies there for a further year by doing a Post-Graduate Diploma course in Drawing and Painting.

He also helped out his old high school by painting the background scenery at their concert.

Within a month of gaining his Post-Graduate Diploma he held his first joint exhibition at the Art Galleries in Arbroath.

In June 1938 he was awarded the Annual Travelling Scholarship for further studies in Paris and Italy.

In Paris he met up with the artists Robert Colquhoun and Robert MacBryde whom he had met the previous year, the three travelling south together to Marseilles towards the end of that year.

On his return to Scotland he was selected for the residential summer school course at Hospitalfield House near Arbroath under James Cowie.

Hennessy voiced some criticism of the Principal of Dundee College of Art for not recruiting locally.

Two of his paintings, a still life and a self-portrait, were accepted that year by the Royal Scottish Academy for their Annual Exhibition.

Two of his paintings were accepted in 1939 at the Royal Scottish Academy for their Annual Exhibition.

For the next 29 years he lived in Ireland with extended trips abroad.

However, by the autumn of 1939 with war looming and feeling somewhat disenchanted on his return to Scotland after his travels abroad as well as an unhappy experience at Hospitalfield House he decided to leave Scotland and return to Ireland.

James Mackintosh Patrick when asked fifty years later if he remembered his pupil Hennessy, replied, I can recall him only because he was outstanding.

On arrival in Dublin Hennessy was offered an exhibition in December 1939 at the Country Shop on St Stephens Green which was opened by Mainie Jellett.

This attracted favourable attention.

During the early forties he lived at various addresses in and around Dublin city with frequent trips to Cork.

In 1940 he was invited to join the Society of Dublin Painters and held regular annual exhibitions of his work there during the forties and early fifties.

These exhibitions were supplemented by an eclectic mix of commissions, mostly portraits which he undertook during this period.

In 1941 Hennessy had three of his paintings accepted by the Royal Hibernian Academy, RHA, for their annual exhibition.

He was elected a member of the Royal Hibernian Academy in 1949.

The Hendriks Gallery in Dublin and the Guildhall Galleries in Chicago were the main outlets for his work.

In the late 1960s he moved permanently to Tangier and then, after suffering ill health, to the Algarve.

He died in London.