TOMORROW AFTERNOON, just over a month after leaving Croke Park in triumph as one of the selectors with the Kilmacud Crokes side that won the All-Ireland club football title, Mark Duncan is back at the venue in more contemplative mode delivering one of the papers at the GAA 125 Sports History Conference.
Duncan, of Boston College, Ireland, will be addressing early photography in Gaelic games in a module entitled “The Camera and the Gael: the Early Photography of the GAA, 1884-1914.” He says one of the most striking aspects of this subject is the lack of material.
“The GAA is conspicuous by its absence from the biggest collections of the period, which tended to be assembled by either landowners whose class preference in sport ran to things like archery, polo or cricket, or commercial interests, such as the Lawrence collection . . . and was driven by the tourist market, with the result that out of 40,000 images not one concerns the GAA even though it dates from the 1880s.”
Duncan says one of the fascinating aspects of early GAA photography isn’t so much the images – which in early years tended to be team photographs and player portraits – as what they can tell us about the evolution of Gaelic games. For instance, the period during which the All-Ireland championships changed from being contested by counties’ club champions to the club champions with a few invited guests from other clubs in the county to a fully-fledged representative selection can be observed.
“By analysing you can see the emergence of the county team. The names on jerseys change from club to county over time and these were the pictures that appeared in newspapers . . .
“The big turning point came with the reproduction of action images in newspapers, as this moved the focus from teams and individuals to what was actually happening: action on the field, the bands playing and the crowds.”
Tickets must be booked from the GAA Museum (adult €15, student/senior €10). Contact Selina O’Regan, GAA Museum education officer, at 01 8192361, or e-mail soregan@crokepark.ie.
