Me and John Mulvany

John Mulvany is my great grand uncle and I grew up hearing stories of how he was a famous painter and looking at his portrait of “Sitting Bull” which hung in shadow at the top of our stairway.

I was 45 when my mother showed me a box of John Mulvany’s papers she, her aunt, her mother and grandmother preserved for over 80 years. There were fragile newspaper clippings, a few letters, pamphlets, and his death certificate among a jumble of yellowing papers. There was also a photograph showing my uncle, handsome in his stetson hat, sometime between 1900 and his death in 1906.

I was hooked and have spent the last 34 years researching his life. I began doing family genealogy and locating art books hoping John Mulvany’s name would appear. I found him listed as an American western artist. I traced down every reference I came across, confirming some information, discarding others. The story that was emerging was fascinating. Mulvany was a well-regarded painter, heavily involved in the Irish cause for freedom, was involved with a woman twenty-two years younger than himself, and had made some powerful enemies. In 1993 I wrote an unpublished monograph called “The Life and Art of John Mulvany, Irish American Artist, 1839-1906”. I submitted it to the Smithsonian, the Frick and the Getty Reference Libraries for inclusion in their collections and it was accepted. I thought I was done and hoped an Irish Art Historian would one day come across my material and take up the cause.

In 2000 just such a historian appeared. Niamh O’Sullivan taught design and art history at Trinity College in Dublin and she was thrilled at discovering my research.

Niamh was so interested in the primary source material I had, she made a trip to Maine to meet me and see the box of papers, which had now been copied with the originals preserved in archival material. She was enthusiastic about finding Mulvany’s paintings and was positive with the right exposure, they would pop out of the attics and storerooms across America where they were hiding. I helped in this process; correcting errors in my monograph as new information surfaced, (the portrait of Sitting Bull may actually be that of Red Cloud), searching newspaper databases, writing museums, historical societies, developing an inventory of his known works, and managing a catalogue complete with newspaper references. However, few of Mulvany’s major works were located.

Then in 2010, while looking for something else, Niamh came across the sale of one of Mulvany’s paintings on ebay. His major Irish painting, ‘The Battle of Aughrim’, was being auctioned off for $40,000 as an American Revolutionary piece. We both knew this painting was last seen in 1920 and Niamh jumped on finding a buyer while I flew out to California to see the painting and authenticate the signature. A gallery in Dublin purchased the painting and held a well-publicized opening on Dec, 10, 2010. I was thrilled to be there. The painting sold for over 240,000 pounds to a private collector and once again disappeared from public view. With all the publicity around this story, we were positive other paintings would surface. They did not.

As discouraging as this was, it was time to write an academic book on Mulvany’s life and contribution to art and culture. This was Niamh’s area of expertise. I decided to write about Mulvany’s early life in the form of historical fiction as few confirmed details are available, i.e., his date of birth is still in question.

I envision three books covering 1839 to 1872. These formative years give insight into the man and his decisions.