92
74. *May Guinness (1863-1955)
La Parisienne
Oil on board, 38 x 32cm
Exhibited:
The French Connection
,The Ava Gallery, The Hunt Museum 2010
___________________________________
Dublin born artist May Guinness began a long association with theWatercolour Society of Ireland
in 1892. Just two years after she began exhibiting there she moved to Newlyn, Cornwall, for a
period with Mildred Anne Butler where she studied under Norman Garstin. Guinness broadened
her horizons further in 1902 when she visited Florence to make sketches, and later made trips to
Brittany where she painted en plein air during the summer, spending winters studying under André
Lhote in Paris, where she had a solo show at Galerie Visconti in 1925. DuringWorldWar II Guin-
ness worked as a nurse for the French Army, and for which she was awarded the Croix de Guerre.
When the war ended she was again in a position to focus her attention on painting, and had a solo
show at Victor Waddington Galleries in Dublin in 1946. It is claimed that although Guinness began
exhibiting with the RHA in 1897 and continued to do so until 1911, an unspecified dispute meant
that she refused to exhibit there in subsequent years.
