Sir, – I cannot let Bernice Harrison’s TV column (Weekend Review, April 21st) go freely into the ether. She dealt with Masterpiece: Ireland’s Favourite Painting which I had the pleasure of presenting. Disconcertingly for me, I’m in total agreement with all she posited.
The programme announced the 10 shortlisted paintings from which the public is invited to select a winner. By any standards, it was a beautifully made piece of work. But, as Bernice Harrison queried: “Selected from what long list?”
There is a long list, in fact, consisting of 100 paintings, chosen by a combination of the nationwide public galleries, the public (through the Pat Kenny Show) and a panel of judges which I chaired.
When asked to present the programme, I expressed my incredulity that we were making only a single show. To me, here was a golden opportunity to make 10 half-hour programmes, each featuring 10 pictures and recorded in one of the galleries that had nominated five of the same. The stated objective being to encourage nationwide engagement with the visual arts.
The transmission time, 10.15 at night, was also an issue for me. Here we have the Cromwellian edict of arts programming being banished into the Connacht of broadcasting, ie, at, or past most people’s bedtime. Look at The Works. I never have, not because it’s not a fine programme, (I believe it is just that), but because it’s on too late. On the night Masterpiece was transmitted it was preceded at peak time (9.30) by the most excruciating boring Prime Time on record – two semi-coherent wannabe front-benchers shouting at each other about the water charges, and a thrilling dead-handed exposition on internet copyright piracy. There, I thought is where the Cromwellian edict should be enforced.
The same top-class team that made Masterpiece filmed some wonderfully articulate pieces featuring unexpected guests describing their passion for one or other of the short-listed paintings, people such as Ardal O’Hanlon, Ken Doherty and Sister Stan. And where will we see these? Why, during The Works, of course. Or if you really want to check them out go to the RTÉ website. Would it have been too much of an imaginative leap to broadcast these three- minute pieces during, say Nationwide, where there’s at least some chance of them being seen by those we are actually trying to reach?
I have conveyed my views on the above forcibly to RTÉ. To no end.
Who, in Donnybrook, schedules these things? – Yours, etc,