Mayo arts group look to purchase Camille Souter island cottage

A CAMPAIGN has been launched by an Achill group to raise funds for the purchase and renovation of the cottage owned by acclaimed Irish artist Camille Souter.

The English born artist lived in a cottage in Dooagh on Achill Island from 1958 into the early 1960s and on a permanent basis from the 1980s until her death at the age of 93 in March 2023. Previous to this she lived in London, Italy as well as her childhood home in Co Wicklow.

The cottage has remained empty since her death last spring but now the Heinrich Böll Association on Achill Island has launched a campaign to raise funds for the purchase and renovation of Souter’s home. They propose to establish The Camille Souter Artists Residency, a funded artists’ residency in her memory where professional artists will be invited to live and work, with financial support for a given period of time.

Camille Souter was widely admired by generations of Irish artists, writers, poets and critics alike and was the recipient of numerous awards and honours including doctorates from UCD, Trinity College and the Sustained Contribution to the Visual Arts Award from IMMA. She was also the founding member of Aosdána and has inspired generations of Irish painters.

In supporting the campaign, Patrick Murphy, Director of the Royal Hibernian Academy of Arts said that the studio in Achill 'yielded some of the most important paintings in the history of art in Ireland’.

Legacy

“I CAN think of no better way to celebrate this legacy than establishing a residential studio programme in her studio/home on Achill. This would be a national resource for contemporary artists who struggle continuously to find a place at a time to make their work,” he said.

The cottage is a traditional cottage and one of the oldest, original and continuously lived cottages in the historic centre of Dooagh. Her studio is constructed within the boundaries of an adjacent cottage with stone walls and the cottage dates back to the early 1900s.

Fundraising is being led by the Heinrich Böll Association and the local community with a plan to purchase the property at the current market value of €200,000. Renovations, including roof, chimney, bathroom and kitchen upgrades, rewiring, heating, insulation, cleaning and painting are expected to come to €114,000.

The residency will be operated by the Heinrich Boll Association who have 30 years experience of running a writers/artists residency at the Heinrich Böll Cottage in Dugort on Achill Island.

The annual Heinrich Böll Memorial Weekend takes place on Achill Island from May 3 to 5 with an array of international panel of writers and speakers lined up to take part over the May Bank Holiday Weekend.

One of the highlights of the weekend will be a talk by Lindsey Hilsum, the International Editor with Channel 4 News entitled ‘The Bulwark of Freedom: Reporting today’s wars’.

For more information on the Heinrich Böll weekend and the Camille Souter cottage campaign visit the website https://heinrichboellcottage.com.