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McCourt bust to be unveiled in Limerick next week


A BRONZE bust of author Frank McCourt, which has been sculpted by Kilbaha’s Seamus Connolly, will be unveiled in Limerick on May 13.
Some of his other well-known pieces include a life size statue of John B Keane in Listowel, one of Richard Harris in Kilkee and one of Olympian Paddy Ryan in Pallasgreen.
He said that the statue has actually been ready for some time. “The piece has been finished for months. It was originally supposed to be erected last November or December. It’s a sculpted bust on a five foot plinth, it’d be slightly larger than life size.”
Frank McCourt’s portrayal of Limerick made him a target for criticism in his own city but Seamus, who was educated in the city, recognised the world of Angela’s Ashes and enjoyed McCourt’s work.
“I loved the books. I would have been in school in Limerick in the late-’70s and early-’80s and parts of it were still tatty. Since then, some of those areas have been pulled down and rebuilt.”
The statue will be in front of the Leamy Art School on Hartstonge Street and was commissioned by Limerick artist Una Heaton, a friend of McCourt’s.
Sculpting it required a fairly intense period of application. “It was very painstaking. It would have taken about six weeks of concentrated works. I would have been working from photographs and reading about him. I’d start in the morning at about 9.30am and I’d keep going until around nine at night.”
In his work, he tries to give a sense of the person the sculpture represents. “When I’m doing a portrait, I like to get a feel for the person, so it’s not just accurate but so you can get a sense of the man. With John B Keane, his family wanted to show him walking and I studied videos of him. He had a very, very distinctive walk, he just kind of rolled and his shoulders moved a lot, so in a static piece, I had to try and convey that,” Connolly said.
Seamus also has a bronze foundry in Kilbaha, where he works with painter Adam Pomeroy. “People would come to me when they have finished a sculpture and they’d ask me to cast it in bronze for them.”
Some of his clients have included Ennis artist Barry Wrafter and Jeanne Rynhart, who made the Molly Malone statue in Dublin.
The piece is to be unveiled by Frank McCourt’s widow, Ellen.

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