Illuminating ireland: illuminated addresses and the material culture of irish civic and national identity in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries

This thesis explores the material culture of illuminated addresses in nineteenth and early twentieth-century Ireland as commemorative objects which concurrently exhibited Irish and British identity. It presents a history of the modern revival of illumination using the theoretical frameworks of material culture, art history, cultural history, anthropology and archaeology in order to determine the cultural, historical and socio-political value of illuminated addresses within the contexts of Romantic Nationalism, the Celtic Revival and modernity. The thesis reinvestigates the history of the revival of illumination in modern Ireland as it relates to the formation and expression of civic and national identity in the form of the illuminated address, and interrogates, as a case study, the art and printing firm of Marcus Ward & Co. and its chief artist and designer John Vinycomb within the larger civic development of Victorian Belfast, detailing their contributions to art, commerce and industry. As physical manifestations of Victorian and immediate post-Victorian and early modern identity, illuminated addresses were decorative, commemorative objects presented to people for significant achievements through public ceremony. The research questions associated with this thesis explore the material culture of illuminated addresses and conclude that illuminated addresses embodied, and were a key material part of expressing, Irish civic and national identity from the 1860s to the period immediately following Irish independence and partition, forming a major contribution to the study of material culture and art history in Ireland. It serves further as a recovery project in its construction of a history of forgotten objects.