
Kingdom of Hounds
- Publisher
- RRB Photobooks
- Year
- 2023
- ISBN
- 9781739702342
- Specifications
- Softcover
First Edition
124 pages
Standard and Special Editions
Black-and-white photographs
Kingdom of Hounds gathers photographs made by Tony O'Shea around the Irish hunting traditions and rural communities he encountered across decades of work as a press photographer for In Dublin magazine and the Sunday Business Post. Born on Valentia Island off the Iveragh Peninsula in County Kerry and now long resident in Dublin, O'Shea has spent his career documenting Irish life from the inside, with attention to the particular textures of countryside and capital, working-class neighbourhoods, religious gatherings, fairs and markets. Here he turns his attention to the world of beagle and hare-coursing meetings, point-to-point race days, foxhunting and the surrounding rural fabric of pubs, farms, livestock auctions and the people who keep it all going—keepers and trainers, gamblers and stewards, the elderly punters with their racing papers and the young handlers with their dogs. The photographs are made with O'Shea's characteristic patience and respect, holding the rituals of a country tradition without sentimentality and without exposé.