Nevill Johnson: Paint the smell of grass - Eoin O'Brien

124 Nevill Johnson l Paint the Smell of Grass
who may tell the tale
of the old man?
weigh absence in a scale?
mete want with a span?
the sum assess
of the world’s woes?
nothingness
in words enclose? 1
Johnson’s perception of Dublin in the fifties is important. He saw the city as one from without
and unlike indigent commentators, such as Cronin and Ryan, he had no need to eulogise the
‘characters’ of the city who, unlike those, such as Joyce and Beckett, with the guts to give the
place the treatment it deserved by gazing back from afar, were being assiduously packaged and
labeled for export to an outer world, which believed that leprechauns in green tweed strode the
sidewalks of Grafton and O’Connell Street – and who would disillusion them? Johnson’s view of
Dublin did not deny the eccentricities of its people, the peculiarities of their behaviour, the
hypocrisy of their beliefs, rather he saw the city for what it was and loved it all the more deeply:
“Through its people, thronged as they were by dogma and tacitly in thrall to the hereafter, ran a
maverick undertow; these folk laughed and winked like boys behind Godmaster’s back. Wit and
a casual intelligence was the key to this society; today was fine – nd tomorrow would be very
welcome.” Johnson regarded Dublin of the fifties as a stimulating place and he may well have
been right. It certainly bred an interesting array of talent provided the talent survived. “The price
was sometimes high; some drifted in a whirlpool of lost endeavour, some drowned…The bar stool
supported some, others it captured, and for some the snugs were tombs.”
The artist in Johnson sensed in Dublin what Dubliners themselves could not sense and what
the planners of the next decade were oblivious to, namely that this capital microcosm had been
suspended in time, its people as though from another age had been untainted by the evils of
affluence that was contaminating the denizens of other capitals of the world; an aura of innocence
and purity pervaded the place. “Buttressed by piety, capped and shod by wit and crafty indolence,
even the poorest lived out a strange Dickensian scenario. Behind elegant Georgian facades lay an
intimate world of brick and iron, timber, and fine though crumbling plaster. The city had not yet
undergone the humiliating submission to planners, and that frenetic consumerism which had
begun to afflict the capitals of Europe. Day to day living passed unhurried, inexpensive, and a
light-footed sanity prevailed.”
1. Beckett S. Watt. Calder and Boyars. London. 1972. p. 274
Nevill Johnson’s studio
The painter in Johnson set out to capture the uniqueness of Dublin but he substituted the
lens of a camera for brush and canvas, and the result was a striking artistic success. Assisted by the
artist Anne Yeats, Johnson walked Dublin of the fifties “circling like a hunting dog, nose and ear
taking as much as my eye: the smell of hay and feeding stuff in a store off Smithfield, the yard
paved with grassy flags and setts of old blue limestone. And there used to be a knackers’ yard in
Newmarket, whence came on west wind an evil stench of bones and hide.” In his introduction to
the book he puts his case as a photographer: “As Koestler says, quoting Paracelsus, ‘God can
make an ass with three tails but not a triangle with four sides.’ So, in my photo-hat I cannot build
or rub out – only select, and accept. I cannot in words translate the signals; I can only hope to
match the image.” Johnson’s images of a Dublin lost are probably more valuable than any of the
many notable photographic archives, such as Lawrence or Valentine, simply because in Johnson’s
case the photographer’s eye is that of a painter; Johnson’s images have a wonderful pathos
because though intent on capturing a sense of place he did so by endowing place with its
personalities, the residents, the joxers on the dole, the dockers, the clergy, the poor and down and
outs, hosses and bicycles, pubs and booze. Johnson’s photographs of Dublin were not published
A Personal Memoir l Eoin O’Brien 125