Irish Historical Studies: The Dublin civic portrait collection: patronage, politics and patriotism, 1603–2013

The Protestant and loyal city assembly governed until 1840 when municipal reform ushered in a new and more representative city council; its Catholic majority growing ever more nationalist. [...]the election of Sir Abraham Bradley King, deputy grand master of the Orange Order, as lord mayor in 1812–13 and 1820–21, and commissioning of his portrait (pp 114–15), would have been impossible after 1841. Clark's introduction and individual descriptions are full of interesting facts, such as the city's choice of a Huguenot artist, Peter Surville, to paint the portrait of the Catholic James II, or the departure to France in 1690 of the last Catholic lord mayor for over a century, who fled with the mayoral gold collar of SS (p. 23). Instead of producing a purely functional art catalogue, Dublin City Council deserve credit for publishing this handsome and informative analysis of the municipal collection.