Patrick Vincent Duffy, Landscape Painter
(b. 1832, d. 1909)
Landscape Painter
From A Dictionary of Irish Artists 1913
Patrick Vincent Duffy. Picture by Miss Margaret Saunders.
Was born in his father's house in Nassau Street in 1832, and was baptised on the 4th March of that year in Westland Row Church. He was christened "Patrick"; his second name "Vincent" was taken at his confirmation, and he always used it. His father, James Duffy, was a silversmith and jeweller at 28 Nassau Street, in partnership with his brother-in-law, Thomas Lamb; his mother, Mary Anne, was daughter of Bartholomew Lamb, auctioneer. He received his art education in the school of the Royal Dublin Society, where he was admitted in 1847. While still a pupil he began to exhibit in the Royal Hibernian Academy in 1851, when he sent an "Exterior of St. Patrick's." He was then living in Nassau Street, and afterwards resided in his father's house at Cullenswood until 1860, when he took rooms with his fellow pupil, John Faulkner (q.v.) in Henrietta Street. On the 18th April, 1860, he was elected an Associate of the Academy, and a few months later his name was included in the new charter as a full member. In 1870 he was appointed Keeper, and took up his residence in the Academy House in Abbey Street. This post he held until his death, a period of thirty-eight years, and for the last few years of his life also held the post of Treasurer. Duffy was a regular exhibitor in the Royal Hibernian Academy down to the year of his death; and exhibited once in the Royal Academy in London. His art was confined entirely to landscape, though in his early days he made some essays in sculpture, exhibiting a model of the Cross at Monasterboice in 1854. His pictures show much artistic feeling, but he lacked the power to fully express his conceptions; with wider experiences and opportunities he might have achieved a high position as a landscape painter. After a long illness, during which he was removed to the Richmond Hospital, he died on the 22nd November, 1909. He was survived by his wife, Elizabeth, daughter of James Malone, and a daughter.