In 1847, in the British Institution, there hung a harrowing painting 'An Irish Peasant Family Discovering the Blight of their Store', the first and the last known contemporaneous painting of the Great Irish Famine. The painter was Daniel Macdonald 1820-1853, a young Irish artist recently arrived in London. brbrbrbrNiamh O'Sullivan's fascinating book reveals compelling new subtexts to the work of Macdonald and re-establishes him as a painter of national importance it also sheds original light on the social and visual culture of Ireland in the years leading up to and including the Famine. Themes rarely visited by Irish artists - rural agitation, superstition and folklore, as well as aspects of the national character - were given spirited treatment by Macdonald who insinuated such subject matter in to the salons of metropolitan London, to venues distinctly hostile to Irish poverty, hunger and violence. brbrbrbrSimultaneously courted by the aristocracy and loyal to his roots in Cork, his r