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28. *Mainie Jellett (1897-1944)
Four Elements
Gouache, 19 x 23cm
Exhibited:“The Abstract Eye”The Glebe Gallery, Donegal, June-August 2009
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Mainie Jellett (born Mary Harriet Jellett) began painting in watercolours at the young age
of eleven, studying under Sarah Cecilia Harrison and May Manning, before taking classes in
Wimereux and Brittany, France, from the age of fourteen. In 1914 she entered the Dublin
Metropolitan School of Art where she studied for three years after which she moved to the
Westminster Art School in London and studied under Walter Sickert. She was awarded the
Taylor Scholarship.
In 1921 Jellett travelled to Paris with Evie Hone, whom she had met while at Westminster
Art School, where they studied cubism under André Lhote. Jellett later remarked ‘with Lhote
I learnt how to use natural forms as a starting point towards the creation of form for its own
sake; to use colour with the knowledge of its great potential force, and to produce work based
on a knowledge of rhythmical form and organic colour.’Yet it was to Albert Gleizes Jellett and
Hone turned to further their studies with cubism. Becoming his companion workers, the two
flourished under Gleizes’ guidance, and it was his influence that lead Jellett to develop her own
distinctive cubist style.
Jellett returned to Dublin at various intervals, during which she taught both adults and children
privately at Fitzwilliam Square. In 1923 she exhibited two cubist canvases at a Dublin Painters’
exhibition but was met with hostile criticism. However she persisted, exhibiting in Paris and at
the Dublin Radical Club where a number of her exhibitions were opened byW.B.Yeats. In 1928
Jellett’s work was represented in the Irish section of the exhibition of art at the Amsterdam
Olympic Games.
Having established her work at home, Jellett won the silver gilt medal for Decorative Painting
at the 1932 Aontach Tailteann, and lectured at the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art in the
same year. Jellett is best known for her cubist works, yet throughout her career she painted both
abstractly and figuratively, and was accomplished in both set design and industrial design. Máirín
Allen wrote in 1942 ‘Miss Jellett has some of the qualities of an ascetic and an idealist. She has
followed her own path despite opposition and misunderstanding… her influence may be one
of the most important in bringing our painters back into contact with European thought and
European painting.’
