A Tribute To The Irish Community Butte Montana 1916-1919




This collection of work is both biographical and autobiographical which revolves around memory, narrative and family history told to Graham by her Grandmother and Mother of her Grandmother's childhood memories. Graham has utilised her memory of personal history and combined this with her sense of humour to create quirky and humorous characters and scenes. As a child she was intrigued by stories about her Grandmother's childhood in Butte Montana at the start of the twentieth century and how it was to be an Irish American whose family was very involved in the Fenian movement.


At the age of three her Grandmother unknowingly smuggled money into Ireland, it was hidden in her dolls pram to aid the 1916 rising in Dublin. The ever-growing curiosity and voracious appetite for narrative demanded the incessant retelling of these stories. Even with the passing of time these memories are embellished and gilded in Graham's mind and she is able to retrieve them with the most exquisite detail. 

Graham can visualize her Grandmother as a child enjoying cowboy shoot outs or enduring the over crowding in cars as the community traveled vast distances to listen to DeValera at the rallies.She can still sense the apprehension when she recalls the stories of the mine bell ringing as her Grandmother witnessed one of the worst mining disaster in American history.


This reminiscence has instilled in Graham's mind the importance of oral history and the tradition of storytelling from one generation to another. Without the continuation of this talent, much of  history be it regional, national or international is lost, just as the archaic traditions that have been lost to posterity. This has indeed set the seed in the artists mind for a world regarding both the importance of history and the passage of these stories to the generations to come.

 

RHA Ashford Gallery January 2017 installation images




 
 

De Valera's Rally Montana 1919        

Aquatint, Hard and Soft Ground Etchings and Drawing Collage, 240 x 70cm, 2009

 
 

Main Street Butte 1916 

Aquatint, Hard and Soft Ground Etchings, Drawing and Fabric Collage, 240 x 30 cm, 2009

 
 
 
 

Butte Mining Disaster 1917

Aquatint, Hard and Soft Ground Etchings and Drawing Collage, 210 x 90cm, 2009 



 


Installation Shot from Repetition Exhibition presented by Black Church Print Studios

Photograph courtesy of Black Church Print Studios




Installation Shot from Repetition Exhibition presented by Black Church Print Studios

Photograph courtesy of Black Church Print Studios



 


Installation Shot from Repetition Exhibition presented by Black Church Print Studios

Photograph courtesy of Black Church Print Studios 



 © Amanda Jane Graham