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178 MARTIN CREGAN RHA (1788-1870)
A Portrait of Arthur Guinness II, half length, seated wearing a black coat and white stock, his hand resting on a book and papers,
with a letter addressed ‘A. Guinness Beaumont’.
Oil on canvas, 91 x 70cm
Signed ‘Creyan’ on the papers.
Provenance: St. Anne’s, Clontarf, and by descent in the family.
Exhibited: RHA 1827, see Strickland, Vol I, p.227
Martin Cregan was amongst the most highly regarded, prolific and successful portrait painters of his day. Glin and Crookshank
(1978) describe his start in life as ‘romantic’, but being brought up as a foster child in Summerhill in Co. Meath, and then into the
service of the Stewarts of Killymoon, in Co. Tyrone may not have been so idyllic as he never, even to his own family, referred to his
parentage or upbringing.
His talent for drawing was, however, recognized by the Stewarts and he was sent to the Dublin Society Schools where he was a
double prize-winner in 1806 and 1807. He was then generously sponsored by the Stewarts to go to London where he became Sir
Martin Archer Shee’s one and only pupil. Cregan returned to Dublin in 1822 and quickly developed a reputation as a fine portrait
painter and over a period of thirty-three years exhibited 334 pictures at the Royal Hibernian Academy, of which institution he was
a founding member and later President. He fathered sixteen children, the support of whom necessitated his continuing to paint
commissions up until his death at the age of 82.
The present work, a portrait of the second Arthur Guinness (1768-1855), was exhibited at the RHA in 1827 and is also listed in
Strickland. Arthur was the second son of Guinness founder, Arthur Guinness (1725-1803) and is credited with greatly developing
the business at a time of great change economically and politically. He also extended the operations of the family into such areas
as flour milling and banking. Arthur’s interest in banking led him to being appointed to the ‘Court of Directors’ of the Bank of Ire-
land and later becoming it’s Govenor. He was also chairman of Dublin Chamber of Commerce and was elected a member of Dub-
lin Corporation. He married Ann Lee in 1793 and had nine children, including Benjamin Lee Guinness who was born in 1798. The
letter held by the sitter identifies him and is addressed at Beaumont House, his childhood home, which is now part of Beaumont
Hospital on the north side of Dublin. Views of Beaumont House were drawn by his daughter, Mary Jane after some remodeling in
the 1850s (see Painting Ireland, Topographical Views from Glin Castle, ref. nos.143 & 144).
€ 10,000 - 15,000