Painting Sean O’Leary – Episode 5 – Sean on film, a shopkeeper, Caroline and Ella

Filed Under Painting Sean O'Leary - A Tribute to a Local Legend | 2 Comments

Before I continue, some recent news. Good news. In a comment on my last blog, by Don MacEachern, I learned that Sean must have visited Islay and stayed there in 1962 or 1963, earlier than I have mentioned before. Don had a Youtube movie to prove that and I love to share it with you. For me it was the first time I saw Sean moving. Goosebumps. Here it is: Sean at Bowmore on YouTube (Sean appears after 2’ 50”) For some it will be a dear memory (“Wellies and kilt were his standard outfit”).

The second good news is that the Islay Hotel is restored and reopened and two of Sean’s paintings are starring in it, one of them the Highland Wedding. As the story continues I shall tell you about the discovery of the second painting. The good news about the Islay Hotel came to me from Taff Jefferey, whom I shall introduce later on as well, an old friend of Sean and by now good friend of mine.

Back to where I was…

The next day I was on my way to the next person on my ‘George Rhind list’: Caroline Bell. I was passing through a hamlet (I forgot to make a note of the name) and stopped at a small shop to buy some sweets. They also had nice caps with ‘Isle of Islay’ embroidered on them. When I approached the counter to pay for my purchases, the lady gave me a big smile and said: “You must be Peter, the guy who’s going to write a book about Sean.” She had surprised me and I just could nod, grinning. That would have been the moment I committed myself to continue and finish what I had started, without a deadline, but whenever possible. And after almost ten years I still wear that cap.

Caroline Bell and her husband Angus were a very hospitable couple who lived in the heart of Islay. They kindly offered me tea and oatcakes and showed me a self-portrait of Sean, probably painted towards the end of his life and a water colour portrait of an unknown young girl. A Mr. Andrews who had died some time ago gave both paintings to them. “Sean was a rascal, but an educated man and he also was a celebrity in the pub”, Angus said and Caroline continued: “He was probably related to the Guinness family. There’s a young man at the pub of the Bowmore hotel who knows his real name.”

Ella Mc Calman was a former art teacher, an educated woman. Unfortunately she had bad eyes but did not want to complain. She had come to Islay in 1955 – and still feels a bit imported – and had married her Robert in 1963. And that was the year she saw Sean for the first time. “In 1963 we returned from Glasgow where we had been married. In the bar of the ferry there was this tall Irishman in a saffron coloured kilt. He was with the Mottrams, at that time hotel owners in Bowmore.”

I showed her the photograph I had taken from his self-portrait. She remarked that she didn’t think it flattered, that he had been a much more beautiful man. “He was a tall man, well built and he walked with confidence. His hair had the colour of dried ginger.” You could feel her disappointment that Sean had not made more of his talents and had become a ‘real’ painter, a real artist. And when she had said that, I saw her sitting on her bench between Compassion and Irritation.

“Sean was one of the people who wanted to charm women with friendly lies. Once we sat at the table and he took my hand, kissed it and said with a smile ‘Now I have done this before Robert (Ella’s husband)’. He was a tall man, well built and he walked with confidence. His hair had the colour of dried up ginger.
One time he arrived a bit drunk when I was with some lady friends. He had torn his kilt and the women were willing to mend it for him. First he did not want that because he didn’t want them to see him naked. In the end he put some cloth around himself and they mended the kilt. He has been engaged to mrs Grey’s sister. She gave him a new kilt and jacket. Shortly after that they split up.”

When I asked her about Sean’s relatives, Ella commented:
“His sister from London gave him an allowance. At his funeral there was also his nephew in a wheelchair. I haven’t been to the funeral, I am ashamed of that now. Colin had been there. You should see Colin, he and his wife had been close friends of Sean.”

Sean, the artist, then.
“He must have had an art school background. But then, there are people who are painters and people who have a trick. It may sound snobbish of me, but Sean was one with a trick. My friend Frances became cross about the enthusiasm of people calling Sean a great painter. She said that he was a liar ‘How do you know O’Leary is his real name? My son once saw a painting of tenements in a junk shop in Glasgow. It had Sean’s signature on it. His painting was more out of expressing and observing, not art stemming from a passion. (I wondered: isn’t observing and then expressing it in paintings an urge, a form of passion?)
Once Sean was asked to paint a portrait of the headmaster’s little daughter. He painted the child almost in a Velasquez way, you know, the way Velasquez painted the infants of Spain, but it was not perceived as complimentary. In the eyes of her mother the girl looked like an evil dwarf woman and that hurt the child’s mother’s love and pride. That was probably the only time he hurt someone with a painting. However,  there was often irony in his paintings. Not hurtful, but he probably felt himself superior to the people. But he also needed the people to tell his stories and feed himself with painting their portraits. In a way people were there to prove his identity and give him the feeling that he was something special.”

And about Sean’s habits.
“He was a frequent visitor of the Ardview Inn, a small pub in Port Ellen, as well as the Whitehart Pub at the Whiteheart Hotel there. When asked if one could offer him a dram, he often said ‘If you’re fool enough to buy me one.’ He was very ill before he died, so ill that even when he was offered a Guiness, he refused.”

Ella was one of the people who really cared for Sean.
“When he became older he began to loose his sight and had to use an enlarging glass to read the newspaper and he was ashamed of it. When we lived in Port Ellen, Sean came to our house one night. He should have stayed at Colin’s but he had become so drunk they had thrown him out. Shortly after that he had to go to the hospital in Glasgow. For a time he had a caravan near Lagavulin. The caravan was cosy, he said, but that night he had wet his bed and it was terribly. So I gave him a sleeping bag, the poor man, and let him stay with us for that night.”

Comments

2 Responses to “Painting Sean O’Leary – Episode 5 – Sean on film, a shopkeeper, Caroline and Ella”

  1. JAN on October 3rd, 2011 21:03

    sean used to have a caravan on my the farm where my father in law stayed.
    enjoyed reading your article. there is also a good painting n Jura hotel.

  2. Don MacEachern on May 13th, 2012 12:34

    It may interest you to know that there is now a page on Facebook entitled “OLD ISLAY” with many photos of people and places from bygone times on Islay.
    A few days ago, someone posted a couple of photos of Sean’s paintings. Many comments have now been posted – with a great deal of discussion on “who’s who” in the paintings (seems that quite a few of them are Islay “legends” themselves!)
    Don.

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