Lot 37
A RARE GEORGE V IRISH ARTS AND CRAFTS SPOON
with a hammered, near circular bowl, a chased leaf rattail and a part-twist stem, the terminal laced with laurel leaves and berries and cabachon-set with a navette-shaped, garnet boss within a corded wire border, by Mary Montgomery (of Fivemiletown, Co Tyrone), hallmarked Dublin 1912; 9.7 (24.5cm) long; 3.4oz
* Mary Montgomery wife of the local landowner in Fivemiletown, Co Tyrone was the driving force between the establishment of an art metalwork industry in the town in 1892. For fifteen years she had been successfully running embroidery and sewing classes for local girls and enabling them to sell their work. Now she wanted to create employment for boys and young men so that they could earn money in their spare-time. So, in 1891 she set off for London to learn Repoussé metal-work and by the following year she was skilled enough to start teaching the craft, beginning what was to become one of the most successful cottage art industries in Ireland.
The importance of good design was recognised from the start. Mary Montgomery contributed some of the designs and among the other designers were her husband, Hugh de Fellenberg Montgomery and John Williams, an art teacher from England who had considerable experience of Repoussé metalwork. He was also one of the first members of the Guild of Handicraft, founded in London 1888 by Charles Ashbee. Hugh Montgomery's designs won a gold star for the Fivemiletown class at the Home Arts and Industries Association exhibition in London in 1893. Williams' designs, often incorporating foliate forms, drew inspiration from Persian and Gothic Art.
The art metalwork produced in Fivemiletown was mainly in copper and brass although from 1906 some silver pieces were made. The work was highly regarded by art critics, quickly attracted fashionable patrons and was purchased by members of the royal family including Queen Victoria, the Duke of York and the Princess of Wales. It won numerous awards at exhibitions throughout the British Isles and by 1906 had become a profitable industry: in its first fourteen years the workers shared remuneration of about £2000. Between 1895 and 1913 Mary Montgomery organised very successful Home Arts and Industries exhibitions every year in Fivemiletown, attracting exhibitors from all over Ireland and from well known craft industries in England. The local Clogher Valley railway made Fivemiletown very accessible and Mary Montgomery paid all the carriage expenses for exhibits. The industry came to an end at the beginning of the first World War.
