Photographer John Minihan: From Athy to international fame 

THE SMELLS, scenes and sounds of a past Athy live forever in the mind of celebrated photographer, John Minihan. A sense of place that became the focus for a great body of work that stands to immortalise not only the town, but its people and way of life from the 60s onwards.

Of butcher meat hanging from hooks and corner boys waiting for the bus on Emily Square to the lively atmosphere of summer life by the River Barrow, people spilling out of pubs and swirly smoke-filled cinemas showing films of cowboys and Indians. These images are ones that keep bringing John and his camera back to his childhood town.

“Athy was a place for me, and it still fascinates me to this day. I’m intrigued by that whole ritualistic lifestyle we had. Going to mass on a Sunday was very important.

“My memories of Athy, the canal bridge, the smells of the old house, and barges,” he said. “It was just a wonderful place to spend my childhood.”

At the age of nine, John left Athy for London with his aunt and uncle – the place where he dived headfirst into photojournalism as an apprentice in the Daily Mail’s darkroom.

“We left Athy and went to London, but I’ve never quite forgotten. For many of the Irish there was only one home – Ireland. We were always going home.”

John is well known for his portraits of playwright Samuel Beckett. At the time, Beckett avoided the spotlight and was not known to pose for photographs.

John puts this impressive feat down to trust. He managed to gain Beckett’s trust, and formed a friendship with the man over the years, which sometimes involved the camera, and sometimes didn’t.

Speaking about his relationship with Beckett, he said: “He came over from Paris to direct Endgame, then Waiting for Godot. He said, ‘John, I’d be happy to see you in Paris, provided you leave your camera at home.’”

John has been described by critics as being able to capture the soul of the subject in his photographs, and this is how he does it.

“It’s about trust and informing yourself about the discipline you’re in,” he said.

With an extraordinary career behind him, photographing figures like Diana Spencer, Gloria Swanson and Alfred Hitchcock, along with musical legends such as Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, The Who, The Animals and The Rolling Stones, John’s attention was never swayed from the tight-knit community he came from in Kildare.

“Having that sense of Athy in my memory was so sharp … I remembered everything,” he said.

In 1962, at age 16, John came back to Athy to take pictures of everything he could remember from his childhood, and he continued to do so for years after.

“You can’t claim to have seen something until you have photographed it,” he said, quoting French novelist Emile Zola.

“I didn’t realise what I was doing then. I was putting together a piece of history of Irish life as it was.”

Probably one of the most poignant collections of photos taken by the photographer was his series on Katy Tyrrell’s wake – a local Athy woman who had passed away in the 1970s.

John documented the experience with his camera, giving viewers a glance into Irish life – a culture which has a special relationship with death.

He spent three days and two nights with the Tyrrell family, photographing them throughout their mourning period, and capturing a slice of intimate Irish life never seen by a world audience.

“I’d been photographing Athy, love, life and death, but the one thing missing was the wake.”

In one of the most striking photographs, we see a departed Katy in bed, wrapped in burial shroud, and surrounded by her family whose facial expressions paint a thousand different iterations of grief.

“For three days and two nights the camera was focused on this ritual. I believe this was all ordained. I was meant to take these photographs. She (Katy Tyrrell) was saying: look at me, for you’re looking at a reflection of yourself.”

It was this collection of photos of Athy in the 60s, 70s,and 80s that brought about his introduction to Samuel Beckett – a major high point of his career.

“I showed him the photographs because he was a bit of a recluse and he was reluctant to be photographed. But, you know, after 20 or so of those images of the wake and other images, he was fascinated.”

But that wasn’t the end of his Athy photographs – a lot of which was published in his popular 1996 collection Shadows of the Pale: Portrait of an Irish Town, including faces of people who lived and breathed Athy.

“A generation I photographed had never been to Dublin. They lived and died without seeing Dublin,” he said.

“I remember the corner boys standing in Emily Square waiting for the bus. Some of those people who got onto the bus, they never came back again.”

Around two years back, John’s whole perspective on his work had been given a fresh meaning. A man of strong Catholic faith and values, John went through a cancer battle, which involved chemotherapy. Throughout it, he never lost faith that he would overcome it.

On his experience with cancer, he said: “You’ve got to keep believing in the miracles ... I’ve always felt I am God’s photographer, and there was a bit more to be done.”

And for the man who just celebrated his 80th birthday some weeks back, that sentiment rings true.

With a never-ending devotion to his vocation, he detailed upcoming projects and plans taking him away from his home in Skibbereen to Liverpool for the Samuel Beckett festival where he will hold an exhibition of his Beckett work.

Also on the agenda is a meeting with award winning actor Gary Oldman in London to photograph him during his production of Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape at the Royal Court Theatre.

When asked if he had any ideas for more work in Athy he said: “Funny enough, I always sneak back to Athy and I’d like to. I still have a few comrades back there.”

For John, the work is never done.