Webinar: The Crown & The Harp: Fractured Identities by CICERONI Travel

CICERONI Travel

Synoposis

The ‘Act of Union’ of 1800 marked the beginning of the end for the link between the British Crown and the Irish Harp. With power now effectively concentrated at Westminster, the stage was set for the slow unravelling of those links which had, for better or worse, bound the two island neighbours to each other since 1169. Whilst it would be too easy to rehearse the usual litany of social and political disasters and misunderstandings of the last 200 years, Tom Duncan will use the visual and literary arts to look afresh at this extraordinary story, warts and all, the consequences of which still affect our daily lives.

Meet The Lecturer

Tom Duncan

Tom Duncan was educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he studied, successively, Music and then History of Art with Ancient History and Archaeology. He moved to the United States in 1980 to research Late Antiquity and the Early Church. This formative experience brought him to Cambridge, England in 1984 to complete a Ph D on the influence of Early Christian Art on Baroque Painting in Rome. A period as a university lecturer followed, together with many invitations to lecture to organisations such as The Art Fund and The Arts Society (formerly NADFAS). Consequently, he began to lead tours over twenty years ago and in 1999, together with Stephen Brook, founded CICERONI Travel, now one of the UK's most respected independent cultural travel companies. When not lecturing or travelling, he devotes most of his time to gardening, music and opera, the other great interests in his life.

Series of two lectures

On Demand

Lecture 1 - Quis Separabit: Who Will Separate Us?

Wednesday, March 10, 2021 · 11:00 AM GMT

For much of the early 19th century Irish life seemed to continue as before. Trade expanded, houses large and small continued to be built, and while Dublin began its slow decline, the visual arts flourished as never before. All was not well, however, as demands for the vote to be extended to non-Anglicans, the horrors of the Irish Famine and the consequent ‘Land Wars’ slowly unravelled the link between Crown and Harp. The story of a few select houses, and the content of some remarkable paintings will be the framework for this extraordinary and poignant story as Ireland seeks to be ‘ a nation once again’.

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On Demand

Lecture 2 - A Terrible Beauty: The Birth of Two Nations

Wednesday, March 17, 2021 · 11:00 AM GMT

As World War 1 began in 1914, Ireland put to one side its differences with Britain as it fought for ‘King and Empire’, hoping for the return of ‘Home Rule’ at war’s end. But this was to be a temporary state of affairs. Between 1916 and 1923 ‘a terrible beauty was born’, as Yeats so memorably put it. Rebellion, the partition of Ireland and the consequent Civil War saw two separate states emerge, north and south. Ruskin wrote it was the art of a country, not its deeds or words, that was a more trustworthy guide to its history. Was this a piece of Victorian romanticism? The final lecture of this series will test this theory in an attempt to make sense of the recent past.

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