Paddy Rossmore: Photographs

Paddy Rossmore: Photographs records half a century of the travels made by Lord Rossmore and his companions the Knight of Glin, Desmond FitzGerald, and Mariga Guinness of the Irish Georgian Society. The visual record made by Rossmore provides a unique archive dedicated to preserving the landscape of a bygone era. With accompanying essays by fine art historian Robert O’Byrne, Rossmore’s photographs capture the bittersweet beauty of an uncertain era for Ireland’s architectural heritage, with many of his subjects now fallen to ruin, and others enjoying restoration and new life in modernized Ireland.

Paddy Rossmore was born into an old Monaghan landowning family in 1931. After attending Cambridge, Rossmore was introduced to the Irish Georgian Society by Desmond FitzGerald, Knight of Glin. Rossmore and Mariga Guinness, along with FitzGerald, travelled Ireland with a camera. Despite his amateur status, Rossmore’s photographs were sought after by books and periodicals such as Country Life , with his collection eventually being placed in the Irish Architectural Archive. Robert O’Byrne is a trustee of the Apollo Foundation and the Artists’ Collecting Society. He is author of more than a dozen books, including Hugh Lane 1875-1915 (2018) and The Last Knight: A Tribute to Desmond FitzGerald, 29th Knight of Glin (2013). He writes an award-winning blog, The Irish Aesthete.