Evie Hone

Who was Evie Hone?

Evie Hone was a Dublin born Irish painter and stained glass artist.

She was related to Nathaniel Hone and Nathaniel Hone the Younger. Her most important works are probably the East Window for the Chapel at Eton College, Windsor and My Four Green Fields, now located in Government Buildings. They were commissioned for the Irish Government's Pavilion at the 1939 New York World's Fair. They graced CIE's Head Office in O'Connell Street from 1960 to about 1983. From December 2005 to June 2006, an exhibition of her work was on display at the National Gallery of Ireland.

Like her companion Mainie Jellett, Evie Hone studied under Walter Sickert at the Westminster Technical Institute in London and worked under André Lhote and Albert Gleizes in Paris before returning to become influential in the modern movement in Ireland and become one of the founders of the Irish Exhibition of Living Art. She later studied stained glass with Wilhelmina Geddes.

Evie Hone was extremely devout; she spent time in an Anglican Convent in 1925 and converted to Catholicism in 1937. This may have influenced her decision to begin working in stained glass. Initially she worked as a member of the An Túr Gloine stained glass co-operative before setting up a studio of her own in Rathfarnham.