It might be tempting to regard the removal of the four statues from the front of the Shelbourne Hotel as a silly season story of little consequence. But there are important issues in play here.
Let’s get one thing straight at the start. The statues do not depict slavery in any way. The figures are not manacled. They are not even servants. They are clothed in flowing gowns. They were commissioned in the mid nineteenth century from a catalogue of statuary published by a French bronze foundry which reproduced the sculpture of Mathirin Moreau. Kyle Leyden, an art historian, has traced their origins and the evidence is clear – there is no hint of slavery. All four statues feature anklet jewellery. All four are clad in a manner that rules out any suggestion of slavery.
A recent newspaper story claimed that the four statues are worth € 300,000
The false suggestion that two of the statues are Nubian princesses and that two of them are their slave attendants dates back at least to Elizabeth Bowen’s history of the hotel published in 1951. It appears that this untruth became conventional understanding in the following half century. Someone apparently decided that the anklets worn by all four figures – including the princesses – were manacles or leg-irons!
Fast forward to summer of 2020. An “angry Irish American”, we are told , complained to Irish Central, an on-line Irish American news service founded by Niall O’Dowd, about the statues claiming they depicted slavery. Irish Central took up the hue and cry. They contacted the hotel about the statues and published a piece on-line describing the statues as manacled slave girls and stated “For shame, they must be replaced with true Irish anti-slave heroines”.
The Shelbourne Hotel building is owned by the Kennedy Wilson international property group, controlled ultimately in California and having Irish subsidiaries and properties. The hotel’s business is run by Marriott Hotels International, based in Maryland. Kennedy Wilson invested in a magnificent refurbishment of the building for which they received an award from the Irish Georgian Society in 2016.
It isn’t clear whether it was Kennedy Wilson or Marriott which issued a statement on 27th July attributed to the hotel. The statement stated that the statues had been removed in the light of what was happening in the world.
On the on-line news site, Extra.ie the general manager of the hotel was quoted as saying that the decision to remove the statues was “internal” and had not been prompted by external complaints. He stated that the 2015 restoration had been carried out “in consultation with Irish Heritage and the Irish Georgian Society and that the advice of those bodies would be sought once more when it came to replacing the statues.”
Mr O’Dowd of Irish Central hotly contested the suggestion that the removal had not been as a result of its published complaint. But the general manager told the Irish Times’ Hugh Linehan had been coming for some weeks in the light of what was happening in the world, presumably a reference to the Black Lives Matter campaign against slave-related statuary.
The Irish Georgian Society immediately denied any involvement in the removal or replacement of the statues. The hotel’s published statement claimed that “we are working in collaboration with Irish Heritage to identify and plan for replacement in line with the heritage and values of the property”.
Who or what is Irish Heritage? It definitely isn’t the Irish Heritage trust, a respectable charity based in Parnell Square. Could it be a reference to Heritage Ireland, a division of the Office of Public Works? Or could it be a reference to the Heritage Council, another statutory body.
It seems inconceivable that the OPW or the Heritage Council or any other state body would collaborate in the removal or replacement of the four statues which are part of a “protected structure” for the purposes of the Planning Act of 2000. Planning permission has to be sought for the removal or alteration of protected structures.
And so the saga commenced. I raised the matter in the Seanad and asked that the Minister with responsibility for culture, Catherine Martin, could inform the House of her attitude to the removal. Frank McDonald of this parish and I separately wrote to the planning authority, Dublin City Council, asking them to enforce the law in relation to the removal of the statues.
The Council has stated that it is not aware of any permission having been granted for the statues’ removal and has commenced the enforcement process by issuing a warning letter under section 152 of the Planning Act. The Act sets out a very powerful set of sanctions and remedies for any unauthorised development including alteration or removal of a protected structure. Penalties of up to €10 million or two years imprisonment and High Court civil injunctions are provided for.
Various academics have suggested that wider issues of race, gender, colonialism and public images are engaged, as though it was irrelevant whether or not the statues were depictions of slavery at all. One even suggested that the statues and the hotel were symbols of white privilege and that the statues conveyed a sense of subjugation of women.
Now that it has been conclusively established that the statues are not slave-related at all, it seems only right that the “Shelbourne Four” should be liberated from storage and allowed to resume their pedestals without wasting the courts’ time. Their removal was a classic over-reaction to a false notion that they glorified or depicted slavery. There is no case for persisting with their storage
If we cannot defend our protected structures from the misplaced sensitivities of misinformed, angry “woke” activists, it is a poor look-out.
Look at the present Phoenix Park re-opening controversy. If hyper-sensitive “woke” opponents of imperialism and colonialism pondered the Wellington Testimonial, Europe’s tallest obelisk, and read its inscriptions, they might claim to be offended as they passed through the park. But it is now part of the fabric of our history. Luckily, the money ran out before the Iron Duke could be physically commemorated with its planned equestrian statue. Otherwise a previous generation of “woke” patriots would have had another victim.