Pat O' Conner (fl.1679)
possibly Thomas ffrancis (fl.Montgomery 1635-1679-98)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1679 - 1700
Materials
Oil on paper and card varnished and pinned to a wooden panel.
Measurements
1518 x 632 x 60 mm
Order this imageCollection
Chirk Castle, Wrexham
NT 1171170
Summary
Oil painting on paper and card varnished and pinned to a wooden panel, Pat O'Conner (fl.1679), possibly by Thomas ffrancis (fl. 1635 - 1679), 1679, inscribed bottom right: Pat O’Conner. A full-length figure, turned slightly to the right, smiling/laughing and gazing at spectator, wearing a crumpled hat, coat, breeches, the buttons of which are undone at the knee, stockings and short boots, holding bagpipes in his hand an under his right arm, his fingers on the pipe ready to play. Pat O’Conner, itinerant Irish musicians, perhaps identifiable with the Bagpipe man and fidler ‘ who came to the castle in 1679 in the entourage of Mrs Katherine Mainwaring, aunt of Sir Thomas Myddelton, 2nd Bt (1651-1684).
Provenance
Entry in Acc. 2 Aug 1679: 'Bagpipe and fidler' and thence by descent; with some of the contents, in 1978, that were acquired along with Chirk Castle from Lt-Col Ririd Myddelton (1902–1988) by the National Land Fund and handed, on loan for 99 years, to the Secretary of State for Wales (In 1981 Chirk was transferred into the ownership of the National Trust); accepted by the Inland Revenue in lieu of Inheritance Tax from the estate of Lt-Col Ririd Myddelton (1902–1988) and transferred to the National Trust for display to the public at Chirk Castle in 1999.
Credit line
Chirk Castle, The Myddelton Collection (National Trust)
Marks and inscriptions
Pat O Conner
Makers and roles
possibly Thomas ffrancis (fl.Montgomery 1635-1679-98), artist British (English) School, artist
References
Hussey 1951: Christopher Hussey, ‘Chirk Castle, Denbighshire – III', Country Life, 5 October, 1951, p.1064-1067, fig.13