32 Facts About Bea Orpen

Bea Orpen HRHA was an Irish landscape and portrait painter and teacher.

Bea Orpen aided in the establishment of the Drogheda Municipal Gallery of Art.

Beatrice Esther Orpen was born at Lisheens, Carrickmines, County Dublin, on 7 March 1913.

Bea Orpen was one of a pair of twin girls and was the youngest of five daughters and one son of Charles St George Orpen and Cerise Maria Orpen.

Bea Orpen's father was a solicitor and served as the president of the Incorporated Law Society from 1915 to 1916.

Bea Orpen's sister Kathleen Delap was an activist and feminist.

Bea Orpen was educated privately at home by a governess until age 13, when she attended the French School, Bray, and then Alexandra College, Dublin.

Bea Orpen took private lessons on the fundamentals of colour and line under Lilian Davidson, going on to enrol in the Dublin Metropolitan School of Art and the Royal Hibernian Academy from 1932 to 1935.

Bea Orpen moved to London to continue studying at the Slade School of Fine Art from 1935 to 1939.

Bea Orpen excelled at decorative design, going on to win first prize in decorative composition in 1936, earning her diploma in design in 1939.

Bea Orpen attended the School of Typography, Fleet Street, and was trained in textile and commercial design at the London County Council Central School of Arts and Crafts.

On 5 July 1940, Bea Orpen married Chalmers Edward FitzJohn Trench, who was the founding secretary and former president of An Oige.

Bea Orpen made her debut at the RHA while still a student in 1939, and she exhibited with them every year until 1980, exhibiting over 100 paintings in total.

Bea Orpen exhibited with the Water Colour Society of Ireland almost every year from 1936 to 1980.

Bea Orpen returned to Ireland in 1939 and mounted her first solo show that October in the Country Shop, St Stephen's Green which was managed by Muriel Gahan.

Bea Orpen is best known as a landscape artist, favouring gouache and a sombre palette on tinted paper.

Bea Orpen perfected a rapid method early in her career, which was a requirement for this quick-drying medium.

Bea Orpen often worked in watercolour, and apart from a period in the 1960s, rarely worked in oil paint.

Bea Orpen travelled to Norway and Brittany early in her career, and later went to continental Europe in the 1960s and 1970s to paint.

Bea Orpen mounted a number of solo shows over the course of her career, at the Grafton Galleries in 1947 and 1954, the Neptune Gallery in 1977, and in Drogheda in 1978.

Bea Orpen was a regular contributor at the Oireachtas, the Irish Exhibition of Living Art from 1943 to 1958, and the Exhibition of Modern Irish Art, Wexford from 1945 to 1980, as well as several local exhibitions and festivals.

Bea Orpen taught art in a number of schools in Drogheda, the technical school from 1973 to 1974, the Drogheda Grammar school from 1946 to 1959, and St Peter's national school from 1949 to 1974.

Bea Orpen gave talks on art appreciation to school children and adults all over Ireland as an Arts Council of Ireland lecturer under the Charlotte Shaw Trust from 1957 to 1978.

Bea Orpen was a member of An Taisce, and served as the government appointee to the governing body of the National Institute for Higher Education, Dublin from 1975 to 1978, and the Stamp Design Advisory Committee from 1977 to 1980.

Bea Orpen was member of the Irish Countrywomen's Association from 1939, acting as chairman of the executive committee in 1952.

Bea Orpen established and directed an annual arts course for primary school teachers at the college from 1959 to 1977.

Bea Orpen served as the president of the ICA from 1974 to 1976, and focussed on environmental protection, urging the adoption of recycling, and the creation of local history groups with the aim of fostering pride in local areas.

Bea Orpen led the Irish delegation at the 14th triennial conference of the Associated Country Women of the World in Perth, Australia in 1974, and was a speaker at the 15th conference in Nairobi, Kenya in 1977.

Bea Orpen suffered a brain haemorrhage in May 1978, which left her permanently invalided and hospitalised.

Bea Orpen was elected an honorary member of the RHA in May 1980.

Bea Orpen died on 12 July 1980, at the Cottage Hospital, Drogheda.

Bea Orpen's body was donated to science through the Trinity College, Dublin medical school.