Membership: Your support makes a difference

Stylised, semi-abstract painting of yellow crabs against a blue and grey background.

Anne Yeats (1919-2001), Crayfish, 20th century. © Estate of Anne Yeats, DACS London/IVARO Dublin, 2021. Photo © National Gallery of Ireland.Credit

By becoming a Friend or a Patron you are helping the Gallery to acquire works to enrich the national collection, to display world-class exhibitions, and to expand awareness and appreciation of the visual arts.

Read on discover the exhibitions and acquisitions that the Friends and Patrons have supported.

2021 support

Oil painting of Virgin and Child with Saint John the Baptist

A man in a dark overcoat with his hands in his pockets, wearing a cap. In the background, the sea.

Exhibition

This year, our Friends are supporting the upcoming exhibition Christ and His Cousin: Renaissance Rediscoveries which will introduce the public to sixteenth-century Italian paintings from the collection that have been carefully restored by the Gallery’s Head of Conservation, Simone Mancini, over the past decade.

Research

The Friends are also supporting research in the form of a book which will accompany the forthcoming exhibition Jack B. Yeats: Painting & Memory. Coinciding with the 150^th anniversary of the birth of one of Ireland’s most important artists, this exhibition will explore the role of memory in Jack B. Yeats’ life and work.

Portrait of a young girl wearing a white communion dress, headdress and veil.

John Lavery (1856-1941), Her First Communion (detail), 1901-1902. Photo © National Gallery of Ireland.Credit

Acquisitions

In 2018, the Friends and Patrons contributed towards the acquisition of a stunning portrait by John Lavery (1856-1941): Her First Communion, 1901-1902.

In 2017, Anne Yeats’s painting Crayfish (illustrated at the top of the page) was purchased for the national collection with support from the Friends and Patrons.

Both artworks will be displayed in the forthcoming exhibition New Perspectives: Acquisitions 2011 - 2020.