William Conor

Celebrated for his warm and sympathetic portrayals of working-class life in Ulster, William Conor studied at the Government School of Design in Belfast in the 1890s.

Born in 5 Fortingale Street, which ran from Agnes Street, off the Shankill Road to the Old Lodge Road in north Belfast, the son of a wrought-iron worker, his artistic talents were recognized at the early age of ten when a teacher of music, Louis Mantell, noticed the merit of his chalk drawings and arranged for him to attend the College of Art.

[1] On finishing his studies at the College of Art he became apprenticed to David Allen and Sons a firm of lithographers where he worked in the poster design department.

Sometime during 1912 /1913 Conor made his way to Paris, studying the Dutch and Italian masters and learning the craft of representational painting.

[2] Following the outbreak of WWI in 1914 William Conor was commissioned by the British government to produce official pictorial records of soldiers and munitions workers.

Statue of William Conor in Belfast
Cafe-bar at Stranmillis , Belfast in 2008, named for the artist who had his studio here. (The café-bar has since been renamed.)
Plaque to the artist, Stranmillis