00:00:00.061 --> 00:00:03.311
(Train engine revving)

00:00:07.660 --> 00:00:10.680
- Modernism was what the whole
Irish revolution was about

00:00:10.680 --> 00:00:12.270
in a certain sense and we're trying to

00:00:12.270 --> 00:00:17.270
modernize the society to
throw off the colonial cover.

00:00:17.530 --> 00:00:21.431
And so part of the expression
of a nation is its own art.

00:00:21.431 --> 00:00:26.431
And so Ernie and Helen
participated in the rejuvenation,

00:00:28.240 --> 00:00:32.713
the renaissance, so to speak
off what a modern art could be.

00:00:34.020 --> 00:00:37.103
(upbeat piano music)

00:00:38.360 --> 00:00:40.330
- [Narrator] Ernie O'Malley
was a medical student

00:00:40.330 --> 00:00:42.040
who was swept into the violence

00:00:42.040 --> 00:00:46.990
of Ireland's fight for
independence from England in 1916.

00:00:46.990 --> 00:00:50.280
He emerged badly wounded
after gun fighting,

00:00:50.280 --> 00:00:55.273
torture and hunger strike,
and went to America in 1928.

00:00:57.605 --> 00:00:59.580
(upbeat music)

00:00:59.580 --> 00:01:02.170
Helen Hooker was a talented
young tennis champion

00:01:02.170 --> 00:01:04.710
from a wealthy family in Connecticut.

00:01:04.710 --> 00:01:06.150
She had everything

00:01:06.150 --> 00:01:11.150
except the freedom to pursue
a dream of a life in the arts.

00:01:11.420 --> 00:01:14.980
He escaped from Ireland's
most famous jail.

00:01:14.980 --> 00:01:19.980
She escaped society's expectation
of what her life could be.

00:01:20.510 --> 00:01:22.160
Each would offer the other

00:01:22.160 --> 00:01:25.470
a key to unlocking their potential.

00:01:25.470 --> 00:01:29.300
Drawn to one another by
shared passion for the arts,

00:01:29.300 --> 00:01:33.180
they helped Ireland establish
a bold new vision of itself

00:01:33.180 --> 00:01:35.433
that inspires to this day.

00:01:37.661 --> 00:01:40.200
(upbeat music)

00:01:40.200 --> 00:01:45.200
In freeing themselves, they
would answer a call to arts.

00:01:45.631 --> 00:01:48.214
(upbeat music)

00:02:01.684 --> 00:02:05.160
In 1916, Irish life was interrupted

00:02:05.160 --> 00:02:09.083
by an unexpected insurrection
known as the Easter Rising.

00:02:10.110 --> 00:02:13.780
The Irish Republican Brotherhood,
the Irish Volunteers,

00:02:13.780 --> 00:02:18.350
and the Citizens Army, anxious
for action and independence,

00:02:18.350 --> 00:02:22.200
launched a daring attack
on various sites in Dublin

00:02:22.200 --> 00:02:24.463
that represented British power.

00:02:25.830 --> 00:02:27.770
Ernie O'Malley was transformed

00:02:27.770 --> 00:02:30.130
by the events he witnessed in Dublin

00:02:30.130 --> 00:02:32.910
that Easter week of 1916.

00:02:32.910 --> 00:02:35.500
- He was a medical student and

00:02:35.500 --> 00:02:38.870
he heard of the rising
and he participated in it,

00:02:38.870 --> 00:02:40.820
not in an organized manner.

00:02:40.820 --> 00:02:43.940
But one thing that we
learned about Ernie is that

00:02:43.940 --> 00:02:45.860
he was a man who took action

00:02:45.860 --> 00:02:48.730
when he saw the need to take action.

00:02:48.730 --> 00:02:50.610
- I think his interests

00:02:50.610 --> 00:02:55.240
were intellectual, were
writing and the arts and

00:02:57.000 --> 00:03:00.150
on the way he happened to
be involved in the military.

00:03:00.150 --> 00:03:02.010
But for somebody who
knew nothing about it,

00:03:02.010 --> 00:03:03.800
he did a whale of a good job.

00:03:03.800 --> 00:03:05.610
- [Peavoy] I was in a small way connected

00:03:05.610 --> 00:03:07.590
with the fighting in 1916

00:03:07.590 --> 00:03:09.513
from which the new Ireland emerged.

00:03:10.470 --> 00:03:12.490
Bodily wounded and captured,

00:03:12.490 --> 00:03:15.020
I read of my own death in a Dublin paper

00:03:15.020 --> 00:03:16.763
and a brief account of my career.

00:03:17.840 --> 00:03:20.913
I was to have been executed
by the Free State Government.

00:03:21.900 --> 00:03:24.383
But they hesitated to
shoot me on a stretcher.

00:03:25.520 --> 00:03:30.000
I was in jails and internment
camps for close on two years.

00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:34.043
When released, I was
considered a hopeless invalid.

00:03:35.110 --> 00:03:37.453
- When he refers to
being a hopeless invalid,

00:03:38.310 --> 00:03:40.687
he refers to the numerous

00:03:43.883 --> 00:03:47.320
bullets he'd received, the
bullets during the Tan war:

00:03:47.320 --> 00:03:50.400
War of Independence, as well
as during the Civil War.

00:03:50.400 --> 00:03:53.460
On the last occasion,
when he was captured,

00:03:53.460 --> 00:03:56.450
he had at least seven bullets in his body.

00:03:56.450 --> 00:04:00.310
And we know that when he died in 1957,

00:04:00.310 --> 00:04:02.290
which would be 30 years later,

00:04:02.290 --> 00:04:05.910
he had at least six bullets in his body.

00:04:05.910 --> 00:04:09.570
- People who have gone through
a military experience, that's

00:04:09.570 --> 00:04:14.570
very difficult rarely want
to talk about it themselves.

00:04:14.670 --> 00:04:15.630
It's too painful.

00:04:15.630 --> 00:04:18.280
- He decided, not to
go back into politics.

00:04:18.280 --> 00:04:20.520
He had been elected a member of the Doyle

00:04:21.636 --> 00:04:26.636
and he knew in his heart that
politics and continued action

00:04:27.950 --> 00:04:30.150
was not part of what he wanted.

00:04:30.150 --> 00:04:34.600
And so coming to America
allowed him a freedom

00:04:34.600 --> 00:04:36.780
to be himself.

00:04:36.780 --> 00:04:38.200
- [Peavoy] Here in America,

00:04:38.200 --> 00:04:41.060
I've been cut away from my own country

00:04:41.060 --> 00:04:43.573
where I found I was
developing into a symbol.

00:04:44.910 --> 00:04:47.070
This country has helped me to live my life

00:04:47.070 --> 00:04:49.640
apart from all the associative memories

00:04:49.640 --> 00:04:51.273
that intrude too much at home.

00:04:52.390 --> 00:04:55.260
It's impersonality and detachment

00:04:55.260 --> 00:04:58.910
have helped me to find
something of myself.

00:04:58.910 --> 00:05:02.830
- He had determined in
1929, as he expressed

00:05:02.830 --> 00:05:05.550
that he wanted to spend
his life in the arts

00:05:05.550 --> 00:05:08.260
and that they arts brought him happiness.

00:05:08.260 --> 00:05:13.260
That fundamental drive to
write and to write his memoirs,

00:05:13.730 --> 00:05:16.330
his short stories, his poems

00:05:16.330 --> 00:05:18.790
gave him the freedom to express himself.

00:05:18.790 --> 00:05:22.080
He floated in artistic
and literary circles

00:05:22.080 --> 00:05:25.390
and so he was not an Irishman to them,

00:05:25.390 --> 00:05:30.390
he was just a fellow poet, an
author, a writer, and artist

00:05:30.720 --> 00:05:33.660
going through the challenge of life.

00:05:33.660 --> 00:05:35.300
And he enjoyed that.

00:05:35.300 --> 00:05:38.200
- [Narrator] While in New
Mexico, Ernie wrote his memoir

00:05:38.200 --> 00:05:41.207
of his revolutionary military experience,

00:05:41.207 --> 00:05:43.890
"On Another Man's wound."

00:05:43.890 --> 00:05:45.840
- It was one of the three books

00:05:45.840 --> 00:05:47.460
in my father's library.

00:05:47.460 --> 00:05:49.120
My father was no scholar.

00:05:49.120 --> 00:05:51.083
He left school at the age of 12,

00:05:52.080 --> 00:05:53.730
but he had three books in his library.

00:05:53.730 --> 00:05:56.470
One, the first one of them
was "On Another Man's Wound."

00:05:56.470 --> 00:05:58.670
The second one "Guerrilla Days in Ireland"

00:05:58.670 --> 00:06:01.650
and the third one was "My
Fight For Irish freedom"

00:06:01.650 --> 00:06:03.200
by Dan Breen.

00:06:03.200 --> 00:06:05.080
- [Peavoy] The tradition of nationality

00:06:05.080 --> 00:06:08.240
had been maintained towards
the end of our struggle,

00:06:08.240 --> 00:06:11.070
not by the intellectuals but by the people

00:06:11.070 --> 00:06:11.990
who were themselves

00:06:11.990 --> 00:06:14.713
the guardians of the remnants of culture.

00:06:15.880 --> 00:06:18.370
- [Narrator] While Ernie
was fighting in Ireland,

00:06:18.370 --> 00:06:21.810
Helen Hooker was growing up
in Greenwich, Connecticut.

00:06:21.810 --> 00:06:25.120
She showed a love of
art from an early age.

00:06:25.120 --> 00:06:26.920
- Sculpture was very important to Helen

00:06:26.920 --> 00:06:28.650
because she was a stutterer.

00:06:28.650 --> 00:06:33.650
And my view on her sculpture
is that it gave her

00:06:34.980 --> 00:06:39.250
an immediate expression,
which someone could see.

00:06:39.250 --> 00:06:42.150
- She'd seen the work of William Zorach.

00:06:42.150 --> 00:06:46.920
She wanted to study with him
and kept haunting parents

00:06:46.920 --> 00:06:48.550
to permit her.

00:06:48.550 --> 00:06:51.633
They wouldn't let her.

00:06:52.760 --> 00:06:56.913
They thought, you know,
you're a society young lady.

00:06:59.099 --> 00:07:01.720
We're grooming you as a tennis champion.

00:07:01.720 --> 00:07:03.910
Why do you want to be a sculpturist?

00:07:04.770 --> 00:07:07.640
And she persisted and finally,

00:07:07.640 --> 00:07:12.640
they sent her away to be
consulted by her psychiatrist.

00:07:12.760 --> 00:07:16.370
She was only 16 and she
was with her governors

00:07:16.370 --> 00:07:21.370
and the doctor understood
how hard that was

00:07:21.550 --> 00:07:26.550
and said, "All right, you
come back after a week.""

00:07:26.930 --> 00:07:27.793
Which she did.

00:07:28.800 --> 00:07:30.890
And he said, "What have
you been doing, Helen?

00:07:30.890 --> 00:07:31.990
Tell me."

00:07:31.990 --> 00:07:36.650
And she had gone down in Stockbridge,

00:07:36.650 --> 00:07:38.500
there were lots of wonderful antique shops

00:07:38.500 --> 00:07:42.710
and she'd seen an Italian
carver carve the leg of a chair

00:07:43.610 --> 00:07:47.537
and she asked the owner,
may I please study with you?

00:07:47.537 --> 00:07:51.400
He doesn't speak English, she was told.

00:07:51.400 --> 00:07:54.700
She said, it doesn't matter; he carves.

00:07:54.700 --> 00:07:59.700
And she had enough money to
be able to pay for his time.

00:08:01.230 --> 00:08:05.043
And when she returned
to the doctor, he said

00:08:05.043 --> 00:08:07.520
"Now Helen, please tell me,
what have you been doing?"

00:08:07.520 --> 00:08:10.130
And she pulled from around her back

00:08:10.130 --> 00:08:12.060
the sculpture of an angel

00:08:13.160 --> 00:08:15.050
and it was beautiful.

00:08:15.050 --> 00:08:18.793
And his reply as mother always
condensed the story was,

00:08:20.400 --> 00:08:23.113
Helen, you may go home
and send me your mother.

00:08:25.256 --> 00:08:27.200
- She wrote about sculpture.

00:08:27.200 --> 00:08:29.340
I recognized at age eight

00:08:29.340 --> 00:08:32.140
closely between the hand and the clay.

00:08:32.140 --> 00:08:35.130
The soft, smooth wetness
pleases my fingers

00:08:35.130 --> 00:08:38.003
was cold and slippery, ready to be shaped.

00:08:38.003 --> 00:08:40.820
I think somebody who at the age of eight

00:08:40.820 --> 00:08:43.260
is able to say this,

00:08:43.260 --> 00:08:45.540
that it's very, it's a tactile,

00:08:45.540 --> 00:08:46.720
it's something that's

00:08:46.720 --> 00:08:49.522
essentially a need her
to create something,

00:08:49.522 --> 00:08:52.440
I think that she's on a good road.

00:08:52.440 --> 00:08:53.273
- [Narrator] Ernie's decision

00:08:53.273 --> 00:08:57.305
to dedicate his life to the
arts, led him to Helen Hooker

00:08:57.305 --> 00:09:00.313
and eventually, back home to Ireland.

00:09:01.460 --> 00:09:03.820
- [Peavoy] I met Helen
in Greenwich, Connecticut

00:09:03.820 --> 00:09:06.740
in her own house in June, 1933.

00:09:06.740 --> 00:09:09.130
Helen brought me down to see your studio,

00:09:09.130 --> 00:09:11.000
talked a great deal about sculpture

00:09:11.000 --> 00:09:12.860
and seemed to be
interested in the fact that

00:09:12.860 --> 00:09:15.080
I knew about sculpture and painting.

00:09:15.080 --> 00:09:17.730
Later, I was told by Helen

00:09:17.730 --> 00:09:19.990
that her father forbade me at the house.

00:09:19.990 --> 00:09:24.000
I was a dangerous man, a
revolutionary, he said.

00:09:24.000 --> 00:09:27.100
- She was interested in him,
he had an interesting face

00:09:27.100 --> 00:09:30.543
and she clearly wanted
to sculpt him right away.

00:09:31.670 --> 00:09:36.310
And to have him be exiled from the house,

00:09:36.310 --> 00:09:38.570
I think perhaps added intrigue,

00:09:38.570 --> 00:09:42.110
but also reflected her
own traditional values

00:09:42.110 --> 00:09:45.160
as to what, how our family felt about her.

00:09:45.160 --> 00:09:46.810
- [Peavoy] I had no money.

00:09:46.810 --> 00:09:49.160
I had come to America to roof.

00:09:49.160 --> 00:09:51.790
And though I had met
intellectuals and wealthy people,

00:09:51.790 --> 00:09:54.000
my heart was in Ireland.

00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:57.000
I thought, however, that
Ireland would suit him.

00:09:57.000 --> 00:10:00.470
The country had no purity
materialistic values.

00:10:00.470 --> 00:10:02.290
There was a sense of personality

00:10:02.290 --> 00:10:05.000
which could jump class distinctions.

00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:07.550
Life was not either so thoroughly arranged

00:10:07.550 --> 00:10:09.410
as with the Hookers.

00:10:09.410 --> 00:10:13.870
Nor would Helen, except with
certain Anglo-Irish families

00:10:13.870 --> 00:10:16.453
find an equal sense of the
importance of her name.

00:10:17.290 --> 00:10:22.290
- She decided in view of her
father's position to elope,

00:10:24.430 --> 00:10:26.240
which was probably correct.

00:10:26.240 --> 00:10:28.240
It wouldn't have gone too far otherwise.

00:10:29.130 --> 00:10:33.610
And they did, and she went
on a garden party to Japan

00:10:33.610 --> 00:10:38.150
and then took the Trans-Siberian
to as far as it would go

00:10:38.150 --> 00:10:41.400
and then they went to
London and were married.

00:10:41.400 --> 00:10:45.943
- They moved to Dublin and
the circle of people suddenly,

00:10:46.860 --> 00:10:49.210
not too soon thereafter,

00:10:49.210 --> 00:10:52.010
she was able to speak and not stutter.

00:10:52.010 --> 00:10:56.420
So that there was a freedom
and an ease and a relaxation

00:10:56.420 --> 00:10:58.980
and to be among artists.

00:10:58.980 --> 00:11:03.980
Her parents were financial
incorporation and engineers

00:11:05.470 --> 00:11:08.400
and governmental figures,

00:11:08.400 --> 00:11:12.260
but it was a very conservative circle.

00:11:12.260 --> 00:11:16.493
In Ireland she met painters,
sculptures, actors, dancers,

00:11:18.300 --> 00:11:21.990
writers, poets, and all the things

00:11:21.990 --> 00:11:24.960
that she loved and shared and admired

00:11:25.890 --> 00:11:28.690
that father was so knowledgeable about.

00:11:28.690 --> 00:11:31.570
- [Narrator] Helen and Ernie
moved to Dublin in 1935

00:11:31.570 --> 00:11:34.140
before settling in Burrishoole lodge,

00:11:34.140 --> 00:11:38.170
a farming estate in County Mayo in 1938.

00:11:38.170 --> 00:11:40.470
- They moved to the West
of Ireland and of course,

00:11:40.470 --> 00:11:43.520
there's where Ernie was
in his element because

00:11:43.520 --> 00:11:46.100
that's where he originated himself.

00:11:46.100 --> 00:11:50.490
And he would have been her
guide around the West of Ireland

00:11:50.490 --> 00:11:55.380
and enabling her to capture
the atmosphere of the area

00:11:56.680 --> 00:11:58.410
and of rural Ireland at the time.

00:11:58.410 --> 00:12:02.900
You know, it would have been
a totally alien community

00:12:02.900 --> 00:12:04.990
and environment to her, I imagine

00:12:04.990 --> 00:12:08.063
until she met Ernie and
was able to integrate.

00:12:09.241 --> 00:12:11.690
But what is also very fascinating

00:12:11.690 --> 00:12:14.980
is the way she seemed
to absorb it all herself

00:12:14.980 --> 00:12:18.510
and seem to relish the environment

00:12:18.510 --> 00:12:20.520
and to get to become part of it.

00:12:20.520 --> 00:12:22.920
- The photography was their
introduction to Ireland.

00:12:22.920 --> 00:12:26.200
It wasn't painting, or
poetry or other things.

00:12:26.200 --> 00:12:29.693
It was those weekends and the
bonding of that relationship,

00:12:30.630 --> 00:12:33.130
albeit she was pregnant and
there were difficulties,

00:12:33.130 --> 00:12:38.130
but she and father and sometimes his

00:12:39.660 --> 00:12:43.880
brother Kevin would go on these weekend,

00:12:43.880 --> 00:12:48.880
flights of imagination and
art, and just have a great time

00:12:49.000 --> 00:12:51.160
in discovering in themselves

00:12:51.160 --> 00:12:53.468
their relationship with Ireland.

00:12:53.468 --> 00:12:57.460
- He knew the countryside very well

00:12:57.460 --> 00:12:59.130
throughout the West of Ireland

00:12:59.130 --> 00:13:02.003
because he'd been raising
troops and training them there.

00:13:03.530 --> 00:13:07.570
And he knew where the
archeological artifacts were

00:13:07.570 --> 00:13:12.480
and led her to them and
she photographed them.

00:13:12.480 --> 00:13:17.410
And he excited her about
the stories very near

00:13:17.410 --> 00:13:19.920
where we lived in Burrishoole.

00:13:19.920 --> 00:13:24.250
But that was a collaboration
of her learning about Ireland,

00:13:24.250 --> 00:13:26.380
the history of ancient Ireland

00:13:26.380 --> 00:13:29.190
as well as some of modern Ireland

00:13:29.190 --> 00:13:34.190
and her passion of the country
was as keen as father's.

00:13:34.980 --> 00:13:36.170
- My parents had a great

00:13:36.170 --> 00:13:38.620
symbiotic relationship in a certain sense

00:13:38.620 --> 00:13:41.187
because they fed off
each other in their arts

00:13:41.187 --> 00:13:42.690
and their interests.

00:13:42.690 --> 00:13:47.690
And as my father toured my
mother around to Ireland in 1935,

00:13:49.380 --> 00:13:53.470
with his bride showing off to his friends,

00:13:53.470 --> 00:13:56.670
he was introducing her to his culture.

00:13:56.670 --> 00:13:59.390
- The war came along and they worked to be

00:13:59.390 --> 00:14:00.670
self-sufficient.

00:14:00.670 --> 00:14:05.670
And so they did farming and
that was a good idea because

00:14:07.180 --> 00:14:08.230
there were a lot of things

00:14:08.230 --> 00:14:11.050
that were not able to be imported.

00:14:11.050 --> 00:14:13.050
- [Peavoy] We have never been safe here

00:14:13.050 --> 00:14:14.980
yet we have survived

00:14:14.980 --> 00:14:16.570
and in our own small way

00:14:16.570 --> 00:14:18.650
have made a contribution.

00:14:18.650 --> 00:14:22.080
And if we have to die,
we're content enough to die,

00:14:22.080 --> 00:14:25.073
not as individuals, but as a group.

00:14:25.920 --> 00:14:30.200
That's why we prefer to stay
here and to meet what comes.

00:14:30.200 --> 00:14:32.550
- The Second World War, The Emergency,

00:14:32.550 --> 00:14:33.880
as it was called here was

00:14:33.880 --> 00:14:37.767
massively important for the
development of modernist art.

00:14:37.767 --> 00:14:38.830
And it was a kind of

00:14:40.010 --> 00:14:42.700
ironically maybe a kind of a golden period

00:14:42.700 --> 00:14:46.130
in Irish modernism because

00:14:46.130 --> 00:14:49.510
collectors and admires of modernist art

00:14:49.510 --> 00:14:52.170
were not able to travel
abroad during that period.

00:14:52.170 --> 00:14:54.750
So they'd began to focus on
what was happening at home.

00:14:54.750 --> 00:14:57.880
- When Helen Hooker
O'Malley came to Ireland,

00:14:57.880 --> 00:15:00.260
she was not Irish, foreign

00:15:00.260 --> 00:15:01.880
had traveled all over the world

00:15:01.880 --> 00:15:05.803
was seen as somebody from the
kind of privileged, you know,

00:15:06.870 --> 00:15:09.810
aristocratic or semi
aristocratic community

00:15:09.810 --> 00:15:14.260
just like the people that
they were a bit nervous of.

00:15:14.260 --> 00:15:15.700
And who were not in the academy,

00:15:15.700 --> 00:15:18.520
had to be in the Iris
exhibition of living art really.

00:15:18.520 --> 00:15:21.630
And she wasn't a Catholic.

00:15:21.630 --> 00:15:23.880
I don't think they knew
anything about what she was,

00:15:23.880 --> 00:15:25.590
but she wasn't one of them

00:15:25.590 --> 00:15:27.023
and she was a woman. But

00:15:27.023 --> 00:15:31.040
what's interesting is that
because she's married to Ernie

00:15:31.040 --> 00:15:34.420
who, you know, excommunicated
from the Catholic church

00:15:34.420 --> 00:15:36.040
though he might've been,

00:15:36.040 --> 00:15:40.860
was a leading Irish Nationalist
and one of their own.

00:15:40.860 --> 00:15:42.860
- [Narrator] Inspired by a five week trip

00:15:42.860 --> 00:15:45.250
through the Irish
countryside Ernie had taken

00:15:45.250 --> 00:15:49.813
with American photographer,
Paul Strand in June, 1935,

00:15:50.890 --> 00:15:54.880
Helen and Ernie began what
would become a five-year project

00:15:54.880 --> 00:15:57.970
to photograph Irish archeological sites.

00:15:57.970 --> 00:16:00.410
- Then when he returned to our Ireland,

00:16:00.410 --> 00:16:03.540
he tried to replicate
what Strand had been doing

00:16:03.540 --> 00:16:06.370
with the built architecture,

00:16:06.370 --> 00:16:10.590
the vernacular statues and
the portraits of the people.

00:16:10.590 --> 00:16:15.590
So I followed that on and
I was quite amazed to see

00:16:16.190 --> 00:16:19.610
how big the project that Ernie
O'Malley had to undertaken

00:16:19.610 --> 00:16:23.010
along with Helen Hooker
O'Malley traveling the country.

00:16:23.010 --> 00:16:26.660
And it was a very different
way of photography

00:16:26.660 --> 00:16:28.810
being approached in Ireland.

00:16:28.810 --> 00:16:31.300
- One of the finest series of portraits

00:16:31.300 --> 00:16:34.420
in Helen Hooker's work is
the series of portraits

00:16:34.420 --> 00:16:36.730
she took of the Malley family,

00:16:36.730 --> 00:16:38.730
which was her husband's family.

00:16:38.730 --> 00:16:41.620
He was O'Malley, but
they chose to be Malley

00:16:41.620 --> 00:16:43.650
or he chose to be O'Malley.

00:16:43.650 --> 00:16:48.650
And she made these photographs
in about 1937 in Dublin

00:16:49.310 --> 00:16:51.480
under a beautiful set of pictures.

00:16:51.480 --> 00:16:55.430
She also took great care
in picking the location

00:16:55.430 --> 00:16:57.840
for the portraits to be made.

00:16:57.840 --> 00:17:01.360
She really constructed the scene.

00:17:01.360 --> 00:17:03.360
One of the most striking
ones that is a portrait

00:17:03.360 --> 00:17:05.900
of her father-in-law Luke Malley

00:17:05.900 --> 00:17:08.970
and t's really a beautiful
picture and it's really tender

00:17:08.970 --> 00:17:13.340
and he seems really at ease with her.

00:17:13.340 --> 00:17:16.290
There's a slightly more,
self-conscious one of Sweetie,

00:17:16.290 --> 00:17:18.110
which is a beautiful portrait.

00:17:18.110 --> 00:17:23.040
She looks slightly
uncomfortable or self-conscious,

00:17:23.040 --> 00:17:24.920
but it looks more like
a lack of confidence

00:17:24.920 --> 00:17:25.790
than anything else.

00:17:25.790 --> 00:17:28.470
- [Narrator] In addition
to her photography,

00:17:28.470 --> 00:17:31.540
Helen Hooker created
more than 400 sculptures

00:17:31.540 --> 00:17:32.910
of heads and figures

00:17:32.910 --> 00:17:35.800
over the course of her
career as an artist.

00:17:35.800 --> 00:17:36.780
- Helen brought something

00:17:36.780 --> 00:17:38.820
new and fresh into Irish portraiture,

00:17:38.820 --> 00:17:42.740
because she'd seen the
world as it really was

00:17:42.740 --> 00:17:44.150
and she traveled.

00:17:44.150 --> 00:17:45.098
And that came...

00:17:45.098 --> 00:17:46.493
That was there in the war.

00:17:46.493 --> 00:17:48.990
That came across to me very strongly.

00:17:48.990 --> 00:17:51.980
- Not only was she Mrs. Ernie O'Malley,

00:17:51.980 --> 00:17:55.010
but as an artist, she was Helen Hooker.

00:17:55.010 --> 00:17:58.620
And so she would meet a Frank
or Connor at the dinner table,

00:17:58.620 --> 00:18:02.910
but afterwards she would say
to him, could I do your head?

00:18:02.910 --> 00:18:05.000
And she would take photographs off him.

00:18:05.000 --> 00:18:08.630
Totally independent with
the relationship with Ernie.

00:18:08.630 --> 00:18:11.410
- The one thing that comes
across her interest in people,

00:18:11.410 --> 00:18:13.240
different kinds of people,

00:18:13.240 --> 00:18:15.510
their character, their attitude,

00:18:15.510 --> 00:18:16.990
the way they carry themselves,

00:18:16.990 --> 00:18:21.650
their bodily kind of directions,

00:18:21.650 --> 00:18:23.800
the way they project themselves.

00:18:23.800 --> 00:18:27.440
- She was pretty choosy as
to who she did a head of

00:18:27.440 --> 00:18:30.320
and that's another whole
subject matter as to why

00:18:30.320 --> 00:18:33.030
she did one head versus another.

00:18:33.030 --> 00:18:38.030
It was usually relating to
something of a look of an image

00:18:39.160 --> 00:18:42.570
that she just felt needed to be captured.

00:18:42.570 --> 00:18:44.500
- [Narrator] In 1943,

00:18:44.500 --> 00:18:46.410
Helen displayed her heads of sculpture

00:18:46.410 --> 00:18:49.740
at the first Irish
Exhibition of Living Art.

00:18:49.740 --> 00:18:53.570
- Sculpture was I think, a difficult area

00:18:53.570 --> 00:18:56.873
in terms of Irish visual arts
in the 1930s and the 1940s.

00:18:58.970 --> 00:19:03.440
You know, there were, it was
kind of underdeveloped really

00:19:03.440 --> 00:19:07.730
and I think that Helen
was quite rare really

00:19:07.730 --> 00:19:10.600
in being an artist to
concentrated in sculpture

00:19:10.600 --> 00:19:13.640
in that period and who
exhibited that kind of work

00:19:13.640 --> 00:19:16.733
in the Living Art Exhibitions.

00:19:17.910 --> 00:19:19.950
- You can't really
separate her and the artist

00:19:19.950 --> 00:19:22.890
in that context from Helen, the collector

00:19:22.890 --> 00:19:27.110
and Helen, the member of
that circle of friends

00:19:27.110 --> 00:19:28.870
who were involved in setting up the

00:19:28.870 --> 00:19:30.460
Irish Exhibition of Living Art.

00:19:30.460 --> 00:19:33.010
- It was in opposition, or it
was in competition lets say

00:19:33.010 --> 00:19:35.500
with the RHA, with the
Royal Hibernian Academy,

00:19:35.500 --> 00:19:38.350
which was a more
conventional academic forum.

00:19:38.350 --> 00:19:42.270
And the living art was by
far going on media reports,

00:19:42.270 --> 00:19:43.520
far more exciting.

00:19:43.520 --> 00:19:47.343
- She had heads in there
from '43 to about '48,

00:19:48.580 --> 00:19:49.890
five years in a row.

00:19:49.890 --> 00:19:52.508
Again, with the product that she was using

00:19:52.508 --> 00:19:55.290
with the friends that she
would sculpt at the time.

00:19:55.290 --> 00:19:58.940
And she had created her
own studio in Dublin.

00:19:58.940 --> 00:20:02.630
- Most presume also that
the sort of the landscape

00:20:02.630 --> 00:20:03.670
was an influence,

00:20:03.670 --> 00:20:06.570
the fact that she had to spend
so much time in Burrishoole

00:20:08.033 --> 00:20:12.340
and that it was so obviously
her expeditions with Ernie,

00:20:12.340 --> 00:20:16.600
the photography and so on
would have made her very aware

00:20:16.600 --> 00:20:20.557
and knowledgeable about
the range of the landscapes

00:20:20.557 --> 00:20:23.010
and the monuments within the landscapes.

00:20:23.010 --> 00:20:24.470
- It's in our work, all our work,

00:20:24.470 --> 00:20:27.793
like as I say, drawings,
photography, all of that.

00:20:29.270 --> 00:20:33.490
And the earth force, the
thing coming from the art,

00:20:33.490 --> 00:20:35.880
Yates said something
about that, didn't he?

00:20:35.880 --> 00:20:38.989
About everything must come from the earth

00:20:38.989 --> 00:20:42.090
and Rodin's work certainly
came from the earth

00:20:42.090 --> 00:20:45.800
and so was Helen's and she
was interested in landscape.

00:20:45.800 --> 00:20:48.410
The two are interrelated,
mightn't seem like that

00:20:48.410 --> 00:20:50.407
when you talk about
sculpture and landscape,

00:20:50.407 --> 00:20:52.423
but they do have a relationship.

00:20:53.610 --> 00:20:54.980
- [Narrator] During this time,

00:20:54.980 --> 00:20:57.700
Helen and Ernie continued
to explore Ireland

00:20:57.700 --> 00:20:59.630
through photography.

00:20:59.630 --> 00:21:01.490
- Their photographs

00:21:01.490 --> 00:21:04.729
and sculptures and the
paintings that they collected

00:21:04.729 --> 00:21:08.550
really captured in a unique way,

00:21:08.550 --> 00:21:10.820
Ireland of the '30s and '40s.

00:21:10.820 --> 00:21:14.150
A time of great poverty,

00:21:14.150 --> 00:21:16.160
much migration, emigration from Ireland

00:21:16.160 --> 00:21:19.100
to better, you know, life elsewhere,

00:21:19.100 --> 00:21:21.880
but also captured the
magnificent and troubled past

00:21:21.880 --> 00:21:25.670
of Ireland documented
monuments across the country.

00:21:25.670 --> 00:21:27.173
So it was,

00:21:28.230 --> 00:21:30.010
a monument in many ways

00:21:30.010 --> 00:21:34.830
to an extraordinary marriage
of equals between two artists.

00:21:34.830 --> 00:21:36.903
- [Peavoy] Misty, indefinite,

00:21:38.030 --> 00:21:41.130
the land changed its surface
in the mind from gady

00:21:41.130 --> 00:21:43.260
to brooding melancholy.

00:21:43.260 --> 00:21:47.150
But it gripped hard when one
knew it or had lived there.

00:21:47.150 --> 00:21:49.663
In rain or sun, we love this country.

00:21:50.530 --> 00:21:52.860
It's haunting in personal bareness,

00:21:52.860 --> 00:21:56.390
it's austerity aloofness small lakes,

00:21:56.390 --> 00:21:59.510
the disproportate of
bulking of the mountains.

00:21:59.510 --> 00:22:01.260
- Coming, as I've said
from America to Ireland,

00:22:01.260 --> 00:22:03.050
in that particular period,

00:22:03.050 --> 00:22:05.850
they're looking at things in
a completely different way.

00:22:05.850 --> 00:22:07.407
They're looking at these almost

00:22:07.407 --> 00:22:11.870
as so-called works of
art within the landscape.

00:22:11.870 --> 00:22:15.273
That is a very refreshing and novel way

00:22:15.273 --> 00:22:16.590
of thinking about things.

00:22:16.590 --> 00:22:18.210
- She has taken ones
of the black and whites

00:22:18.210 --> 00:22:19.770
in the fair day.

00:22:19.770 --> 00:22:22.800
And I would have done that with my father.

00:22:22.800 --> 00:22:25.680
I would have gone to those
fairs, driving the cattle,

00:22:25.680 --> 00:22:27.810
getting up at five o'clock in the morning,

00:22:27.810 --> 00:22:31.330
a day off school it was like
all my Christmases together.

00:22:31.330 --> 00:22:35.670
And to get the cattle
into a prime location

00:22:35.670 --> 00:22:39.330
at the fair in the center
of the village, if possible,

00:22:39.330 --> 00:22:41.750
and waiting for the vultures to arrive,

00:22:41.750 --> 00:22:44.490
the cattle buyers to
beat us down and so on.

00:22:44.490 --> 00:22:46.350
So I remember it very distinctly.

00:22:46.350 --> 00:22:50.070
So it brought back a lot of
those kinds of memories to me.

00:22:50.070 --> 00:22:51.930
- We've spent some time here
in Gallery of Photography

00:22:51.930 --> 00:22:55.480
looking and researching
modernist photography in Ireland

00:22:55.480 --> 00:22:59.000
and it was really interesting
to see Helen Hooker's work

00:22:59.000 --> 00:23:03.350
and see how her photography was informed

00:23:03.350 --> 00:23:04.780
by a modernist aesthetic.

00:23:04.780 --> 00:23:06.950
I do like what we call Irish Gothic,

00:23:06.950 --> 00:23:10.240
which is her photograph of a
farming family near Burrishoole

00:23:10.240 --> 00:23:13.120
and that is a really
nice 'cause I love the

00:23:14.040 --> 00:23:16.290
uncertain, quizzical look

00:23:16.290 --> 00:23:18.853
in the various people
that she photographed.

00:23:19.800 --> 00:23:24.130
There is a power balance
within that photograph

00:23:24.130 --> 00:23:27.140
I think that you don't
often see in portraits.

00:23:27.140 --> 00:23:28.510
You know, people are you know,

00:23:28.510 --> 00:23:29.650
she's looking at them straight on

00:23:29.650 --> 00:23:32.290
and they're looking straight back at her

00:23:32.290 --> 00:23:34.220
and there seem to be quite powerful.

00:23:34.220 --> 00:23:37.550
And they've been interrupted
in saving the hay.

00:23:37.550 --> 00:23:40.440
So, you know and they
look like busy people

00:23:40.440 --> 00:23:43.540
and she manages to photograph
them in a way that's

00:23:43.540 --> 00:23:45.300
ennobling without being patronizing.

00:23:45.300 --> 00:23:48.080
- The myths in Ireland and the geography

00:23:48.080 --> 00:23:51.610
and history of Ireland were
written on the landscape

00:23:51.610 --> 00:23:53.810
so that you could actually drive through

00:23:53.810 --> 00:23:55.790
and see the older castles.

00:23:55.790 --> 00:24:00.430
The tombs that you would
see, the burial arrangements,

00:24:00.430 --> 00:24:04.283
the castles that were
built in medieval times,

00:24:05.380 --> 00:24:10.380
the monasteries that she saw
and the more recent houses.

00:24:10.980 --> 00:24:14.860
And so these sort of spoke
to her in a certain sense.

00:24:14.860 --> 00:24:18.340
She understood them because
she had this sort of

00:24:18.340 --> 00:24:23.340
eerie connection with the
myths of human existence

00:24:25.030 --> 00:24:28.180
and brought a certain
spirituality to that,

00:24:28.180 --> 00:24:30.363
which she then tried to capture on camera.

00:24:32.160 --> 00:24:37.160
- This kind of very modernist
approach to photography,

00:24:39.090 --> 00:24:42.810
seeing something kind of
monumental in the structures.

00:24:42.810 --> 00:24:45.846
You know, the way in
which the turf was cut,

00:24:45.846 --> 00:24:50.846
the sort of detail that she
looks at that kind of context.

00:24:52.370 --> 00:24:55.690
Again, looking at it from an
Irish visual art point of view,

00:24:55.690 --> 00:24:58.490
that's very innovative and very different.

00:24:58.490 --> 00:24:59.480
- In the exhibition,

00:24:59.480 --> 00:25:04.290
we included a section of
which we informally called

00:25:04.290 --> 00:25:07.460
"Elusive Ernie," and in
that set of photographs,

00:25:07.460 --> 00:25:12.460
you see a fine portrait made
of Ernie by her New York.

00:25:13.080 --> 00:25:16.810
But beside it, are a series of
photographs that were perhaps

00:25:16.810 --> 00:25:21.810
the start of their journey of
discovery together in Ireland,

00:25:22.600 --> 00:25:25.440
where Ernie introduced Helen to Ireland,

00:25:25.440 --> 00:25:29.260
by taking her to the sites,
first of all where he had been

00:25:29.260 --> 00:25:30.830
interrogating Dublin castle

00:25:30.830 --> 00:25:34.490
and where he had been
imprisoned in Kilmainham.

00:25:34.490 --> 00:25:38.610
- Well then fathered had
a tiff on some subject

00:25:38.610 --> 00:25:40.180
and father begged me,

00:25:40.180 --> 00:25:43.430
outside his bedroom there
were always in the summer,

00:25:43.430 --> 00:25:45.930
huge strawberries.

00:25:45.930 --> 00:25:50.477
And he said, "Please take a
strawberry to your mother."

00:25:52.180 --> 00:25:55.290
And so her bedroom was at
the other end of the hall

00:25:55.290 --> 00:25:59.940
and so I walked down and
it took three strawberries

00:25:59.940 --> 00:26:01.863
to mother and she started to cry.

00:26:03.050 --> 00:26:05.330
It was a moment of peace.

00:26:05.330 --> 00:26:08.230
- [Narrator] Helen returned
to the US after World War II

00:26:08.230 --> 00:26:11.200
and began spending more and more time

00:26:11.200 --> 00:26:14.600
away from her home and family in Ireland.

00:26:14.600 --> 00:26:17.025
- I do remember earlier on,

00:26:17.025 --> 00:26:20.430
she had some wonderful
friends from Dublin.

00:26:20.430 --> 00:26:22.310
The head librarian from where she worked

00:26:23.350 --> 00:26:26.940
and some other women who
were really outstanding.

00:26:26.940 --> 00:26:31.000
I guess he resented her
having friends there,

00:26:31.000 --> 00:26:32.160
which was too bad.

00:26:32.160 --> 00:26:34.100
He was happy with books

00:26:34.100 --> 00:26:37.190
and would talk to the local fishermen

00:26:37.190 --> 00:26:42.040
and record the stories
that they had and so forth.

00:26:42.040 --> 00:26:43.147
But my mother was an artist

00:26:43.147 --> 00:26:47.470
and she needed other creative people

00:26:47.470 --> 00:26:50.670
and friends to stimulate her.

00:26:50.670 --> 00:26:53.270
And so that was the shame

00:26:53.270 --> 00:26:55.770
and that was, I think part of the thing

00:26:55.770 --> 00:26:58.920
that tore that relationship apart.

00:26:58.920 --> 00:27:01.920
- She wasn't interested in being a mother.

00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:03.520
She didn't know how.

00:27:03.520 --> 00:27:04.920
I mean, every time she came home,

00:27:04.920 --> 00:27:06.653
it was a major disturbance,

00:27:08.712 --> 00:27:09.723
major.

00:27:11.120 --> 00:27:15.030
So it was much better
when she wasn't there.

00:27:15.030 --> 00:27:19.220
- He so sensitive and
that's what attracted her

00:27:19.220 --> 00:27:21.560
it seems about him.

00:27:21.560 --> 00:27:26.080
And so far as I can judge,
he must have been as well.

00:27:26.080 --> 00:27:30.435
But then again, not alone
was he so sensitive,

00:27:30.435 --> 00:27:33.839
but he was opinionated and strong minded

00:27:33.839 --> 00:27:36.950
and strong-willed like herself.

00:27:36.950 --> 00:27:39.943
So I could see how they would clash.

00:27:41.090 --> 00:27:43.170
- [Peavoy] You have your
now carefree opportunity

00:27:43.170 --> 00:27:44.760
to do what you please.

00:27:44.760 --> 00:27:46.040
But maybe you prefer to be

00:27:46.040 --> 00:27:48.230
a Greenwich lady and reactionary

00:27:48.230 --> 00:27:52.060
that I expect has its advantages also.

00:27:52.060 --> 00:27:54.003
Love Ernie.

00:27:55.940 --> 00:27:58.820
- Quite often the
characteristic of Helen was

00:27:58.820 --> 00:28:03.550
she would follow her heart and
tend in the latest venture.

00:28:03.550 --> 00:28:07.820
Again, that's a reflection
sometimes of what Ernie was.

00:28:07.820 --> 00:28:10.510
He had the capacity to be independent

00:28:10.510 --> 00:28:15.510
and he too would pursue whatever
his latest interest was.

00:28:16.840 --> 00:28:19.660
- [Narrator] In 1948,
Helen gave up the lease

00:28:19.660 --> 00:28:21.930
on the family house in Dublin.

00:28:21.930 --> 00:28:24.890
Ernie and the children
remained at Burrishoole.

00:28:24.890 --> 00:28:28.680
- Your brother and sister
were sent to the Gaeltacht

00:28:28.680 --> 00:28:31.990
in Ring and I think that
would have been Ernie's doing,

00:28:31.990 --> 00:28:35.920
I'm not sure where exactly
Helen was at that time,

00:28:35.920 --> 00:28:38.790
but anyway, she was anxious

00:28:38.790 --> 00:28:42.810
to get the children to join her

00:28:42.810 --> 00:28:46.310
and of course Ernie wanted
them to remain here.

00:28:46.310 --> 00:28:47.740
- [Narrator] In March 1950,

00:28:47.740 --> 00:28:50.040
as the marriage was breaking down,

00:28:50.040 --> 00:28:52.090
Helen took drastic measures.

00:28:52.090 --> 00:28:54.540
She kidnapped her two eldest children,

00:28:54.540 --> 00:28:57.830
Cathal and Etáin from
Ring college in Ireland

00:28:57.830 --> 00:28:59.710
and brought them to New York.

00:28:59.710 --> 00:29:02.360
The experience affected
each of the three children

00:29:02.360 --> 00:29:03.690
differently.

00:29:03.690 --> 00:29:08.671
- So we went out for lunch
from the Irish speaking school.

00:29:08.671 --> 00:29:11.330
And I think at the end of lunch,

00:29:11.330 --> 00:29:14.480
my mom mentioned that by the way,

00:29:14.480 --> 00:29:16.293
we were going to the United States.

00:29:17.140 --> 00:29:21.590
- I adored my father and
I missed him profoundly.

00:29:24.220 --> 00:29:25.220
I did not appreciate

00:29:26.360 --> 00:29:31.360
not being able to leaving Ireland

00:29:31.690 --> 00:29:34.643
with just my school
uniform when I was nine.

00:29:36.530 --> 00:29:37.930
- [Narrator] After the kidnapping,

00:29:37.930 --> 00:29:40.400
Ernie kept Cormac's location a secret

00:29:40.400 --> 00:29:41.823
and restricted his travel.

00:29:42.920 --> 00:29:44.100
- No one knew where I was.

00:29:44.100 --> 00:29:49.100
Therefore my mother could
not find me and take me away.

00:29:51.310 --> 00:29:55.290
It never felt scary, in
fact it felt quite secure.

00:29:55.290 --> 00:29:58.640
It felt partially like
a game of hide and seek.

00:29:58.640 --> 00:30:03.640
But I was taken care of, fed, educated

00:30:04.200 --> 00:30:06.430
and felt happy and content

00:30:06.430 --> 00:30:11.430
as I had my father in
charge in charge of my life.

00:30:11.840 --> 00:30:14.940
So there was no misgivings

00:30:14.940 --> 00:30:17.940
about missing the rest
of the family because

00:30:19.110 --> 00:30:21.230
I think children adapt very quickly

00:30:21.230 --> 00:30:24.357
to the circumstances
they find themselves in.

00:30:24.357 --> 00:30:27.963
- She deeply missed Cormac.

00:30:30.530 --> 00:30:35.433
And would cry, cry, cry, cry, cry.

00:30:36.510 --> 00:30:41.510
And I remember nightly coming
over, especially in Colorado,

00:30:41.800 --> 00:30:43.250
I had to massage her.

00:30:43.250 --> 00:30:45.640
She taught me how to massage

00:30:45.640 --> 00:30:48.823
because of the stress of everything.

00:30:51.420 --> 00:30:53.893
She rued what she had done.

00:30:54.880 --> 00:30:56.220
- [Narrator] Helen took legal action

00:30:56.220 --> 00:30:58.330
to evict Ernie from Burrishoole,

00:30:58.330 --> 00:31:01.790
but the effort was
ultimately unsuccessful.

00:31:01.790 --> 00:31:04.910
She moved with the two
older children to Colorado

00:31:04.910 --> 00:31:07.910
and was granted a divorce in 1952.

00:31:07.910 --> 00:31:12.910
- Almost the minute that
the divorce went through,

00:31:12.940 --> 00:31:17.940
she regretted it and
wanted to remarry him,

00:31:20.240 --> 00:31:22.731
persuade him to remarry her.

00:31:22.731 --> 00:31:27.530
She was totally unsuccessful
because by that point,

00:31:27.530 --> 00:31:32.530
father in 1953, I went
with mother to Newton Hall,

00:31:32.910 --> 00:31:37.903
to stay with Babs Rolston
and her husband for Christmas

00:31:37.903 --> 00:31:39.811
and father was there.

00:31:39.811 --> 00:31:42.270
Father and Cormac were both there.

00:31:42.270 --> 00:31:45.910
But father had had a heart
attack and he was not well

00:31:45.910 --> 00:31:48.362
and was in a darkened room.

00:31:48.362 --> 00:31:52.900
- When a family is split
apart, you always regret that.

00:31:52.900 --> 00:31:56.800
And coming back and visiting with him

00:31:59.330 --> 00:32:03.010
was exciting, but sad

00:32:03.010 --> 00:32:05.990
because we both, I guess felt awkward.

00:32:05.990 --> 00:32:10.600
He, I think had the
feeling that I deserted him

00:32:10.600 --> 00:32:12.770
which really wasn't the case.

00:32:12.770 --> 00:32:16.130
- My interpretation of his life
is that his life was broken.

00:32:16.130 --> 00:32:18.433
Everything that he tried to do fail.

00:32:19.550 --> 00:32:23.553
The Irish Republic, his health, the war,

00:32:25.420 --> 00:32:27.633
the treaties that he was against,

00:32:30.400 --> 00:32:32.610
the publication of his book

00:32:32.610 --> 00:32:35.490
which resulted in a libel suit.

00:32:35.490 --> 00:32:38.070
The non-publication of
the book of photography

00:32:38.070 --> 00:32:39.320
that he was hoping to do,

00:32:41.400 --> 00:32:43.613
the breakup of his marriage,

00:32:44.560 --> 00:32:46.363
the loss of two of his children,

00:32:47.860 --> 00:32:50.810
later very bad health that
he had at a very early age

00:32:50.810 --> 00:32:52.860
of early fifties.

00:32:52.860 --> 00:32:55.230
And so one thing after another,

00:32:55.230 --> 00:32:58.280
as I sort of summarized what he was doing,

00:32:58.280 --> 00:33:01.487
he just turned up to be broken.

00:33:03.480 --> 00:33:06.810
- [Narrator] On March 25th, 1957,

00:33:06.810 --> 00:33:10.690
after decades of pain and
hardship from his war wounds.

00:33:10.690 --> 00:33:12.653
Ernie O'Malley died of a heart attack.

00:33:15.030 --> 00:33:17.870
Éamon de Valera, a former
partisan with Ernie

00:33:17.870 --> 00:33:20.240
was prime minister at the time.

00:33:20.240 --> 00:33:22.870
He honored Ernie with a state funeral.

00:33:22.870 --> 00:33:25.570
- It was very timely because

00:33:25.570 --> 00:33:30.430
if he had died say six
months or a year earlier,

00:33:30.430 --> 00:33:32.250
he wouldn't have had the state funeral

00:33:32.250 --> 00:33:36.630
because the government in
power was not the same.

00:33:36.630 --> 00:33:40.420
I think he was the only sixth
person to be honored by that

00:33:40.420 --> 00:33:43.560
in the Irish Free State,
since it was founded.

00:33:43.560 --> 00:33:48.560
Of course they were happy, I
think, to celebrate a comrade.

00:33:50.280 --> 00:33:52.270
And so it was really quite amazing.

00:33:52.270 --> 00:33:56.113
I mean, I was somewhat overwhelmed

00:33:56.113 --> 00:34:01.113
by the state pulling out
all the stops because

00:34:02.300 --> 00:34:04.870
I perhaps didn't appreciate at the time,

00:34:04.870 --> 00:34:07.870
but I just realized that
wasn't an every day event.

00:34:07.870 --> 00:34:12.580
- I was only 14 and it was
the most impressive process

00:34:12.580 --> 00:34:17.580
of long lines of military
of carrying the coffin

00:34:18.210 --> 00:34:20.500
draped in the tri color,

00:34:20.500 --> 00:34:23.760
of having the President and the Taoiseach

00:34:24.780 --> 00:34:29.570
be readily recognized even by me

00:34:30.910 --> 00:34:34.280
be present in their long black coats.

00:34:34.280 --> 00:34:38.180
And then to have the procession
go slowly through Dublin,

00:34:38.180 --> 00:34:41.720
over to the Glasnevin cemetery.

00:34:41.720 --> 00:34:42.553
- There was such

00:34:44.155 --> 00:34:46.163
a profound sense of loss.

00:34:48.130 --> 00:34:49.810
I remember the throngs of people.

00:34:49.810 --> 00:34:53.780
I remember six deep or nine deep

00:34:53.780 --> 00:34:55.633
lining both sides of the street.

00:34:56.600 --> 00:35:01.166
People coming into Dublin, from the Howth.

00:35:01.166 --> 00:35:04.120
- I can understand how much it meant

00:35:05.430 --> 00:35:08.630
to those people who still
were alive at the time

00:35:09.646 --> 00:35:11.800
for the fight for Ireland's freedom

00:35:11.800 --> 00:35:13.540
and the recognition

00:35:15.270 --> 00:35:17.763
of somebody who gave his life really.

00:35:20.750 --> 00:35:22.690
- [Narrator] Shortly before Ernie's death,

00:35:22.690 --> 00:35:25.710
Helen married her second,
husband, Richard Roelefs

00:35:25.710 --> 00:35:27.920
and settled again in Greenwich.

00:35:27.920 --> 00:35:29.250
She embraced her new life

00:35:29.250 --> 00:35:32.223
while continuing to pursue
sculpture and photography.

00:35:33.110 --> 00:35:35.423
Roelefs died in 1971.

00:35:36.760 --> 00:35:39.460
Helen then renewed her commitment to work,

00:35:39.460 --> 00:35:41.820
entering an era of tremendous productivity

00:35:41.820 --> 00:35:44.100
in America and Ireland.

00:35:44.100 --> 00:35:48.019
She again was back with her
camera this time sometimes

00:35:48.019 --> 00:35:51.939
with the Rolleiflex which
allowed her to do color

00:35:51.939 --> 00:35:53.156
in Kodachrome but quite often

00:35:53.156 --> 00:35:55.390
just on the old black and white.

00:35:55.390 --> 00:35:58.240
- What's really interesting
when you look at Helen's

00:35:58.240 --> 00:36:00.490
artistic practice over
the span of her career,

00:36:00.490 --> 00:36:03.770
you know, it's a Testament
to how much Ireland changed

00:36:03.770 --> 00:36:06.540
from the 1930s to the 1960s.

00:36:06.540 --> 00:36:08.860
Because it feels like a
much longer period of time

00:36:08.860 --> 00:36:09.990
when you look at the work.

00:36:09.990 --> 00:36:12.680
The 1930s pictures are quite austere,

00:36:12.680 --> 00:36:15.360
the countryside and particularly
some of the buildings,

00:36:15.360 --> 00:36:17.760
some of the key side buildings

00:36:17.760 --> 00:36:19.050
that you see in the west part.

00:36:19.050 --> 00:36:21.510
Very impoverished
sometimes without a roof,

00:36:21.510 --> 00:36:23.170
it's very paired back.

00:36:23.170 --> 00:36:27.020
It's quite a plain country
at that period of time.

00:36:27.020 --> 00:36:28.820
And you could see that
people were struggling,

00:36:28.820 --> 00:36:31.330
you know, it was equally
difficult economic times.

00:36:31.330 --> 00:36:36.330
Whereas by the time Helen
moves into color in the 1960s,

00:36:36.340 --> 00:36:40.000
you really start to see Lemass'
modern Ireland appearing.

00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:42.120
You know, people are much more relaxed

00:36:42.120 --> 00:36:43.650
in front of the camera,

00:36:43.650 --> 00:36:46.060
there's prosperity and you
start seeing the commercial

00:36:46.060 --> 00:36:48.340
dyes coming through even
in people's clothing.

00:36:48.340 --> 00:36:52.132
So the whole place is much more colorful

00:36:52.132 --> 00:36:54.160
and it's interesting that Helen is then

00:36:54.160 --> 00:36:56.170
representing Ireland through color.

00:36:56.170 --> 00:36:59.630
- When she's coming to Dublin
and she's making work in color

00:36:59.630 --> 00:37:02.870
and slightly more sort of
street photography vibe

00:37:02.870 --> 00:37:03.980
of the work,

00:37:03.980 --> 00:37:08.980
she is getting people to
relax for the camera more.

00:37:09.180 --> 00:37:11.560
- I think it really feels
a little bit more like

00:37:11.560 --> 00:37:14.890
Helen's Ireland than the
people that she encountered.

00:37:14.890 --> 00:37:17.720
So it's as much portrait of a milieu,

00:37:17.720 --> 00:37:22.420
portrait of a community and
the people that she mixed with.

00:37:22.420 --> 00:37:25.080
So there are different
elements within them.

00:37:25.080 --> 00:37:27.600
But, you know, from a
technological point of view,

00:37:27.600 --> 00:37:31.340
the Kodachromes very much pinpoint

00:37:31.340 --> 00:37:34.580
and I think this is something
that photographic processes do

00:37:34.580 --> 00:37:37.150
that can become very much attached

00:37:37.150 --> 00:37:40.880
and evoke the atmosphere of a period

00:37:40.880 --> 00:37:44.790
and the Kodachromes do
that for our street scapes

00:37:44.790 --> 00:37:47.010
in particular, the shop signage,

00:37:47.010 --> 00:37:48.670
the colors of cars and

00:37:50.530 --> 00:37:53.660
different aspects of the
street scape are highlighted

00:37:53.660 --> 00:37:55.590
depending upon the process.

00:37:55.590 --> 00:37:59.130
- Ireland was coming out
of the monochrome Ireland

00:37:59.130 --> 00:38:01.685
of the post-treaty and post-war years

00:38:01.685 --> 00:38:06.685
and was coming into if you
like this, not quite technical,

00:38:08.482 --> 00:38:13.482
but multicolored raincoat
of the 1960s and '70s.

00:38:13.520 --> 00:38:15.457
- She had a whole second breath of life

00:38:15.457 --> 00:38:20.457
and in fact she created 50%
of her artwork after 1971.

00:38:21.720 --> 00:38:24.290
- Her relationship with Ireland
seems to be very different.

00:38:24.290 --> 00:38:28.040
I mean, she's, there are
people that she knew very well,

00:38:28.040 --> 00:38:31.780
artists and writers, that
there seems to be a more

00:38:31.780 --> 00:38:35.030
and more intimate, more
direct connection going on.

00:38:35.030 --> 00:38:37.020
- You can see her developing our own

00:38:37.020 --> 00:38:39.170
circle of friends and acquaintances.

00:38:39.170 --> 00:38:41.890
So some of the later photographs,

00:38:41.890 --> 00:38:45.710
also the key people in
her life like Mary Lavin

00:38:45.710 --> 00:38:49.150
are very relaxed, they're
real intimate insiders.

00:38:49.150 --> 00:38:52.110
Helen seems very confident and robust

00:38:52.110 --> 00:38:54.560
in the way that she
photographs these people.

00:38:54.560 --> 00:38:55.840
- You know, some of these

00:38:55.840 --> 00:38:58.380
portraits were taken in order to make

00:38:58.380 --> 00:39:00.650
a sculpted head of the person.

00:39:00.650 --> 00:39:05.650
So there is a memoir for when
she's making the sculpture

00:39:06.101 --> 00:39:08.700
and possibly it's because

00:39:08.700 --> 00:39:12.800
they are aware that they're
not these aren't photographs,

00:39:12.800 --> 00:39:14.660
that she's just kind of doing these things

00:39:14.660 --> 00:39:16.820
that they're very kind of comfortable

00:39:16.820 --> 00:39:18.920
in their own skin as well
and they're not really put,

00:39:18.920 --> 00:39:21.620
they're not kind of concerned
about their expression,

00:39:21.620 --> 00:39:22.453
If you know what I mean.

00:39:22.453 --> 00:39:25.140
They're not saying in a
way, they're not smiling.

00:39:25.140 --> 00:39:29.470
They're not doing all
the usual kind of sort of

00:39:30.383 --> 00:39:33.310
little dramas people do
in front of a camera.

00:39:33.310 --> 00:39:36.080
- [Narrator] While in
Ireland in the 1970s,

00:39:36.080 --> 00:39:38.630
Helen collaborated with
the Dublin Art Foundry.

00:39:38.630 --> 00:39:41.410
- The company here's trading name is CAST

00:39:41.410 --> 00:39:43.860
previously Dublin Art Foundry

00:39:43.860 --> 00:39:47.050
which we started with John Behan
way back in the early '70s.

00:39:47.050 --> 00:39:48.520
So we've been, I've been casting work

00:39:48.520 --> 00:39:51.800
for Irish artists and indeed
arts from abroad since then.

00:39:51.800 --> 00:39:54.890
And I would truly say that
all of the major sculptures

00:39:54.890 --> 00:39:56.180
in the country that had been cast

00:39:56.180 --> 00:40:00.680
and unveiled over that time
have come to this Foundry

00:40:00.680 --> 00:40:02.040
at one stage or another.

00:40:02.040 --> 00:40:03.390
- She told me

00:40:03.390 --> 00:40:07.320
that she needed some bronze
castings of heads mainly.

00:40:07.320 --> 00:40:10.140
And I said I'd be delighted to help her.

00:40:10.140 --> 00:40:13.470
And Helen struck me as a very formidable,

00:40:13.470 --> 00:40:16.503
but very positive person
from the word go. And

00:40:16.503 --> 00:40:20.400
we had a very good relationship
because I understood her,

00:40:21.280 --> 00:40:24.600
her needs, and I was able to fulfill them.

00:40:24.600 --> 00:40:26.150
- Helen O'Malley, now,

00:40:26.150 --> 00:40:30.430
I met, it was an exhibition
here in Dublin and

00:40:31.730 --> 00:40:35.290
she was telling me about New
York and she was talking about

00:40:35.290 --> 00:40:39.740
doing a sculpture, she loved
to do my head for some reason.

00:40:39.740 --> 00:40:44.730
And so when I was in New York,
I met her a couple of times

00:40:44.730 --> 00:40:49.540
and she was set up here in
Dublin at Lansdowne Mews.

00:40:49.540 --> 00:40:53.760
And so I went along
there and she photographs

00:40:53.760 --> 00:40:56.101
and so I went back a couple of times

00:40:56.101 --> 00:41:00.480
and so she started to
work on the sculpture.

00:41:00.480 --> 00:41:03.840
- Helen was very realistic
person, a very real person.

00:41:03.840 --> 00:41:08.840
She could operate in a
space that was just a space.

00:41:09.220 --> 00:41:14.220
It wasn't a kind of a dolled
up studio with comforts.

00:41:14.580 --> 00:41:16.460
- It was a very busy room.

00:41:16.460 --> 00:41:18.810
Let me tell you there
was pieces everywhere.

00:41:18.810 --> 00:41:22.638
And then I start to wonder, goodness

00:41:22.638 --> 00:41:25.180
is this is this for real?

00:41:25.180 --> 00:41:27.600
And of course it was very much so.

00:41:27.600 --> 00:41:29.560
But I could still see the light,

00:41:29.560 --> 00:41:31.540
tremendous light that was in the studio.

00:41:31.540 --> 00:41:33.710
We were engrossed in
all sorts conversations

00:41:33.710 --> 00:41:36.560
that bared all different
subjects and to do with Ireland,

00:41:36.560 --> 00:41:39.090
to do with everything
and the arts in general.

00:41:39.090 --> 00:41:41.460
And I think it was only two sittings.

00:41:41.460 --> 00:41:46.460
You know, I went back
once and she was halfway

00:41:46.470 --> 00:41:48.750
and then I didn't have to go anymore.

00:41:48.750 --> 00:41:53.634
- We had tea with the President
De Valera in (mumbles)

00:41:53.634 --> 00:41:55.910
in 1973.

00:41:55.910 --> 00:42:00.150
And she came home to the
Russell Hotel that night,

00:42:00.150 --> 00:42:03.400
hired a second room,
got the plasticine in,

00:42:03.400 --> 00:42:05.150
didn't sleep for 24 hours

00:42:05.150 --> 00:42:08.250
and produced a head of Éamon de Valera.

00:42:08.250 --> 00:42:11.890
Just a remarkable head, no
photographs were allowed

00:42:11.890 --> 00:42:13.580
and she didn't ask.

00:42:13.580 --> 00:42:17.330
She didn't speak throughout
our three quarters of an hour

00:42:17.330 --> 00:42:21.830
interview with De Valera and
she just studied his head.

00:42:21.830 --> 00:42:25.400
And that's what an artist
can do in most uncanny way.

00:42:25.400 --> 00:42:28.910
- She could established the
parameters of a likeness

00:42:28.910 --> 00:42:31.120
of somebody very quickly in clay

00:42:31.120 --> 00:42:33.060
and then she would detail the work.

00:42:33.060 --> 00:42:35.957
So she had that gift of working with clay

00:42:35.957 --> 00:42:38.747
and getting an image down very quickly.

00:42:38.747 --> 00:42:40.970
- And De Valera would have been

00:42:40.970 --> 00:42:43.670
part of the myth of friendship

00:42:43.670 --> 00:42:46.240
that Helen was trying to capture.

00:42:46.240 --> 00:42:49.230
And so there was this
continuity in a certain sense of

00:42:49.230 --> 00:42:53.620
between the nationalist cause
of those friends of Ernie

00:42:53.620 --> 00:42:56.500
that she commemorated in sculpture.

00:42:56.500 --> 00:42:59.230
- She was concerned about
artists and their livelihoods

00:42:59.230 --> 00:43:01.600
and how they managed.

00:43:01.600 --> 00:43:04.110
I remember a conversation with her

00:43:04.110 --> 00:43:06.280
when she visited the Foundry
one time to look at something

00:43:06.280 --> 00:43:08.580
with John Behan and she was very kind,

00:43:08.580 --> 00:43:11.760
very interested in how
he was doing as an artist

00:43:11.760 --> 00:43:14.140
and how he was managing,
he had young children.

00:43:14.140 --> 00:43:15.690
So there was a great compassion
there towards artists

00:43:15.690 --> 00:43:19.640
and a real natural affinity
with other artists.

00:43:19.640 --> 00:43:24.430
- I met Helen in the
corridor of the Art College,

00:43:24.430 --> 00:43:29.070
and she asked for directions
to the sculpture department.

00:43:29.070 --> 00:43:33.440
I brought her down,
pointed to what I was doing

00:43:34.520 --> 00:43:39.520
and it started a conversation
because she said,

00:43:39.720 --> 00:43:43.140
I saw something similar this morning

00:43:43.140 --> 00:43:46.920
in Fran Fagan's boutique.

00:43:46.920 --> 00:43:50.180
She looked at one of mine

00:43:51.740 --> 00:43:53.273
very critically,

00:43:54.220 --> 00:43:57.600
she described one arm as a broken wing.

00:43:58.831 --> 00:44:01.123
And she said, if he is a warrior,

00:44:01.123 --> 00:44:04.513
you could have a broken wing of an arm.

00:44:06.300 --> 00:44:09.830
And that critical thing was,

00:44:09.830 --> 00:44:12.553
yes I see it from now on.

00:44:14.840 --> 00:44:19.840
She did offer to buy it if
I fixed the broken wing.

00:44:22.300 --> 00:44:24.500
- [Narrator] After meeting
sculptor, Michael O'sullivan,

00:44:24.500 --> 00:44:26.830
Helen became close with his family

00:44:26.830 --> 00:44:28.513
including his father, Tom.

00:44:29.410 --> 00:44:31.310
Tom agreed to drive Helen to some of the

00:44:31.310 --> 00:44:33.800
archeological and monastic sites

00:44:33.800 --> 00:44:36.840
that she had visited
with Ernie in the 1930s.

00:44:36.840 --> 00:44:41.840
- My father loved going for a drive.

00:44:42.790 --> 00:44:46.050
I suppose my father fulfilled the role

00:44:46.050 --> 00:44:47.220
that Ernie had

00:44:48.910 --> 00:44:52.247
done with Helen of

00:44:52.247 --> 00:44:53.500
revisiting a lot of sites
that she would have visited

00:44:58.939 --> 00:45:02.470
I don't know how many years before.

00:45:02.470 --> 00:45:06.290
But the revisiting, the re-looking,

00:45:06.290 --> 00:45:09.170
the reacquainting herself with them.

00:45:09.170 --> 00:45:13.750
- Helen kept on pursuing Ernie's
legacy long after he died

00:45:13.750 --> 00:45:15.800
and that she stayed on here

00:45:15.800 --> 00:45:18.250
and went to the various locations

00:45:18.250 --> 00:45:19.760
that he would have been familiar with.

00:45:19.760 --> 00:45:21.700
Went to Kilmainham and
where he was a prisoner,

00:45:21.700 --> 00:45:26.260
went to the Four Courts where
he was during the Civil war.

00:45:26.260 --> 00:45:27.580
So and that

00:45:28.900 --> 00:45:32.080
she managed to tie that
all together with her art.

00:45:32.080 --> 00:45:37.080
- They were up in Kidteal,
very beautiful stone carvings .

00:45:39.981 --> 00:45:41.533
They went to up to photograph.

00:45:43.030 --> 00:45:48.030
And again, Helen would
often look at the pieces

00:45:48.520 --> 00:45:53.520
and say, no if we come back in an hour,

00:45:53.550 --> 00:45:55.570
the light will be better.

00:45:55.570 --> 00:45:59.780
There was a very old fashioned Irish pub,

00:45:59.780 --> 00:46:02.460
it's one of these mountainy pubs.

00:46:02.460 --> 00:46:06.000
Helen was looking on the shelf

00:46:06.000 --> 00:46:10.713
and there was a bead lizard from Africa.

00:46:12.330 --> 00:46:16.927
And she asked the young bar boy to,

00:46:19.590 --> 00:46:21.907
could she take a look at it?

00:46:22.929 --> 00:46:26.217
And he said,

00:46:26.217 --> 00:46:29.857
"No, my father wouldn't
like me take anything down."

00:46:31.607 --> 00:46:33.543
And she said,

00:46:35.597 --> 00:46:37.520
"Would you tell your father

00:46:38.730 --> 00:46:42.770
that I was here with my
husband, Ernie O'Malley

00:46:43.720 --> 00:46:45.920
who hid in this area."

00:46:47.530 --> 00:46:51.920
The owner came out from the kitchen.

00:46:51.920 --> 00:46:55.623
He was ear waiting our word you know.

00:46:57.110 --> 00:47:02.110
He came out, came to full
attention, saluted her

00:47:07.080 --> 00:47:12.080
told the son to take
the beaded lizard down,

00:47:12.660 --> 00:47:15.810
wash it, and present it to her.

00:47:15.810 --> 00:47:18.300
- She came to the
attention of lot of radio

00:47:18.300 --> 00:47:21.185
and Cathal Shannon did
an interview with her.

00:47:21.185 --> 00:47:23.710
And it was very broad ranging interview

00:47:23.710 --> 00:47:27.410
done in her home in Burrishoole.

00:47:27.410 --> 00:47:32.410
And she was asked a
leading questions as to

00:47:32.600 --> 00:47:35.390
what she thought of Ernie
O'Malley and who he was

00:47:35.390 --> 00:47:39.670
or why she was an artist
and what art meant to her.

00:47:39.670 --> 00:47:41.560
- I'd never met an Irishman and this

00:47:41.560 --> 00:47:46.560
absolutely dedicated
face that I'd never seen

00:47:46.700 --> 00:47:50.670
like a cliff or the prow of a ship

00:47:50.670 --> 00:47:55.580
and hungry, lean and I caught
it there in the portraits.

00:47:55.580 --> 00:47:57.641
I think I caught it in the portraits.

00:47:57.641 --> 00:48:02.641
But it was simply fascinating to me.

00:48:02.870 --> 00:48:04.930
But he came just three sittings

00:48:04.930 --> 00:48:06.920
and I was so in love with
him at the end of the third,

00:48:06.920 --> 00:48:09.020
I never finished it (laughs)

00:48:09.020 --> 00:48:12.020
It was extraordinary
really Helen that you,

00:48:12.020 --> 00:48:15.250
the daughter of a
well-to-do old established

00:48:15.250 --> 00:48:17.150
Protestant family, I suppose.

00:48:17.150 --> 00:48:21.100
And Ernie, the Irish
Revolution or an IRA man

00:48:21.100 --> 00:48:22.872
should have come together
in the first place.

00:48:22.872 --> 00:48:24.020
What did your parents think of it.

00:48:24.020 --> 00:48:25.699
What did your father think of him?

00:48:25.699 --> 00:48:28.290
- Well, they were horrified,
absolutely horrified.

00:48:28.290 --> 00:48:30.723
I ran away, I had to marry in London.

00:48:31.640 --> 00:48:32.780
Father never...

00:48:32.780 --> 00:48:35.931
Father banned from the house that night.

00:48:35.931 --> 00:48:36.793
He said, "I don't ever want you to see

00:48:36.793 --> 00:48:38.850
that young man again."

00:48:38.850 --> 00:48:41.728
Well I said father you can't do that.

00:48:41.728 --> 00:48:46.320
And I went around the
world, around China, Russia,

00:48:46.320 --> 00:48:50.510
and met Ernie in London two years later.

00:48:50.510 --> 00:48:55.510
- It was an exciting
personal eye opener for me

00:48:58.090 --> 00:48:59.830
as you saw this person speak

00:48:59.830 --> 00:49:02.660
about things that she rarely spoke about.

00:49:02.660 --> 00:49:07.660
- A pioneering spirit is
really what Helen Hooker nails

00:49:07.730 --> 00:49:10.840
and particularly, I
think in her life story

00:49:10.840 --> 00:49:12.460
from the very beginning

00:49:12.460 --> 00:49:16.510
where she is really an independent person.

00:49:16.510 --> 00:49:19.550
And being able to be an independent person

00:49:19.550 --> 00:49:23.510
and seeing what somebody
has done with that,

00:49:23.510 --> 00:49:26.610
you know, it's actually
a very challenging thing.

00:49:26.610 --> 00:49:28.840
You know, personally to actually say,

00:49:28.840 --> 00:49:31.400
here's somebody who was free here.

00:49:31.400 --> 00:49:32.893
And what did she do with it?

00:49:34.090 --> 00:49:38.090
- On April 2nd, 1993,
Helen Hooker passed away

00:49:38.090 --> 00:49:40.823
in Greenwich, Connecticut
at the age of 88.

00:49:41.840 --> 00:49:45.160
Her youngest son Cormac
took it upon himself

00:49:45.160 --> 00:49:47.960
to ensure his parents' legacy.

00:49:47.960 --> 00:49:52.960
- My father Ernie died
when I was 14 in Ireland.

00:49:53.380 --> 00:49:56.143
And so for some years,

00:49:57.070 --> 00:50:01.890
there was sort of no
male figure in my life

00:50:01.890 --> 00:50:06.270
and it was really only later
that I discovered first of all,

00:50:06.270 --> 00:50:08.510
that I was missing one and secondly

00:50:08.510 --> 00:50:12.840
that there was a great
man who was my father.

00:50:12.840 --> 00:50:17.818
And so what I wanted to do was
discover who that person was

00:50:17.818 --> 00:50:21.920
and I went around the world literally

00:50:21.920 --> 00:50:24.890
collecting copies of his letters.

00:50:24.890 --> 00:50:28.830
So today I'm headed to the archives

00:50:28.830 --> 00:50:31.903
of the Ernie O'Malley papers
at New York University.

00:50:33.150 --> 00:50:36.218
And it's yet another leg in
the discoveries so to speak

00:50:36.218 --> 00:50:39.510
of who Ernie O'Malley was

00:50:39.510 --> 00:50:43.240
by reading his own words and
seeing the letters he wrote

00:50:43.240 --> 00:50:45.198
and the letters he received.

00:50:45.198 --> 00:50:48.250
And it's almost like interviewing a person

00:50:48.250 --> 00:50:52.070
because you actually hear the person speak

00:50:52.070 --> 00:50:55.280
literally for what he intended
to say to an individual.

00:50:55.280 --> 00:50:57.920
- When we started scouting
in Stonington with Cormac,

00:50:57.920 --> 00:51:01.110
we did a very rapid mapping exercise.

00:51:01.110 --> 00:51:03.740
We scanned the letters
and in some cases, prints

00:51:03.740 --> 00:51:06.530
and we went to through the archive

00:51:06.530 --> 00:51:09.380
box by box and folder by folder.

00:51:09.380 --> 00:51:13.300
- We spent long hours doing the scanning.

00:51:13.300 --> 00:51:16.521
And it was one of those kinds
of very strange experiences

00:51:16.521 --> 00:51:21.260
of kind of like diving
into somebody's world.

00:51:21.260 --> 00:51:24.420
And it's diving into the past in a way,

00:51:24.420 --> 00:51:27.650
but also with Cormac himself being there,

00:51:27.650 --> 00:51:32.650
it was such a, we felt we were
sort of being guided through.

00:51:33.160 --> 00:51:36.750
And I thought, obviously Cormac
obviously knows a lot about

00:51:36.750 --> 00:51:38.710
his mother and his father.

00:51:38.710 --> 00:51:43.710
But I did get the sense that
Cormac himself was also making

00:51:43.940 --> 00:51:47.720
a kind of discovery
about his mother, who is,

00:51:47.720 --> 00:51:50.730
almost a kind of a
fairly mysterious figure.

00:51:50.730 --> 00:51:55.180
- It's hard to come up with
another couple in Ireland

00:51:55.180 --> 00:51:57.730
at that time, or indeed since

00:51:57.730 --> 00:52:00.480
who had the same breadth of interests

00:52:00.480 --> 00:52:03.450
and made the same range
of contributions to

00:52:03.450 --> 00:52:07.870
art, to sculpture, to collecting
and encouraging painters,

00:52:07.870 --> 00:52:12.100
to photography, to archival
work, historical work.

00:52:12.100 --> 00:52:16.510
They were both extraordinarily
prolific and energetic.

00:52:16.510 --> 00:52:18.700
- One of the reasons to

00:52:18.700 --> 00:52:23.320
look back at Helen's career and life now

00:52:23.320 --> 00:52:28.320
is that, I mean like many
women, she was neglected.

00:52:29.360 --> 00:52:32.160
or she's seen as part of
somebody else's story.

00:52:32.160 --> 00:52:35.340
I mean, she's very much been
seen as part of Ernie's story

00:52:35.340 --> 00:52:37.710
in terms of an Irish context.

00:52:37.710 --> 00:52:42.710
But of course, in reality,
she had a very long

00:52:43.170 --> 00:52:47.660
and very interesting and
very multi-faceted I suppose,

00:52:47.660 --> 00:52:49.050
career in the arts.

00:52:49.050 --> 00:52:50.655
- I think you have to
look at the whole person.

00:52:50.655 --> 00:52:54.490
I would not separate her as
an artist from Helen Hooker

00:52:54.490 --> 00:52:56.980
as a collector, as a traveler,

00:52:56.980 --> 00:52:58.980
as an educated woman of the world

00:52:58.980 --> 00:53:03.560
and a woman of some influence
because of her position.

00:53:03.560 --> 00:53:04.860
Because all of those...

00:53:04.860 --> 00:53:07.320
Because she used that well, right?

00:53:07.320 --> 00:53:10.560
I mean, people can have
position similar to hers,

00:53:10.560 --> 00:53:12.140
it definitely helps to

00:53:12.140 --> 00:53:15.290
come from a fairly privileged
background and so on.

00:53:15.290 --> 00:53:18.810
But where a lot of people use that to

00:53:18.810 --> 00:53:21.710
separate themselves off
from the wider culture,

00:53:21.710 --> 00:53:25.740
she used it all the time as platform

00:53:25.740 --> 00:53:30.740
from which she could
enlarge peoples' horizons.

00:53:30.770 --> 00:53:33.940
- There're very few
people you'll ever meet

00:53:33.940 --> 00:53:38.740
that had Helen's abilities
and vision of life

00:53:38.740 --> 00:53:40.190
and an embracing of life.

00:53:40.190 --> 00:53:43.363
It's like, as Joyce said,
"I go forward to forge in

00:53:43.363 --> 00:53:47.906
the smithy of my soul the
uncreated conscience of my race."

00:53:47.906 --> 00:53:52.906
She had that about herself
going forward into the world.

00:53:53.680 --> 00:53:55.750
- There were two artists who met together

00:53:55.750 --> 00:53:59.550
and wanted to bring a
dream together in Ireland,

00:53:59.550 --> 00:54:03.970
and bring some novelty
and new ideas to Ireland

00:54:03.970 --> 00:54:05.560
where both of them could be happy

00:54:05.560 --> 00:54:07.963
and that's really the
essence of this story.

00:54:09.322 --> 00:54:12.239
(orchestral music)