Mary Harriet (Mainie) Jellett (1897-1944)

The abstract artist and figure painter Mainie Jellett was born in Dublin. She studied drawing and fine art painting at the National College of Art in Dublin and under Walter Sickert at the Westminster Art School in London. It was in London that she met her lifelong friend and fellow artist Evie Hone.

Jellett had precocious talent as a painter, and while starting out as a follower of Impressionism she began - as a result of her association with the Parisian abstract painter and teacher Albert Gleizes - to develop a greater interest in modern abstract art like Cubism. Along with Evie Hone and Mary Swanzy, Jellett was one of the earliest abstract painters in the history ...