Item 15 - Photograph of Robert Hunter, Patricia Mulholland and Brian Coleman

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Reference code

IE 2135 NDAI N85/3/15

Title

Photograph of Robert Hunter, Patricia Mulholland and Brian Coleman

Date(s)

  • June 1976 (Creation)

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Item

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1 item

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(1949-2020)

Biographical history

Frances O’Hara was born on 3 January 1949 in Belfast as the eldest daughter of Seamus and Phoebe O’Hara. Her paternal aunt, Ann O’Hara, was a dancer with Patricia Mulholland’s Irish Ballet, and it was through this connection that Frances was initially auditioned and accepted into the Irish dancing classes. The weekly lessons took place in Patricia Mulholland’s house in Nevington Street, a short walk from Frances’ home in north Belfast. Her brothers and sisters all followed her to Patricia Mulholland’s classes, but it was Frances who had the grace and enthusiasm to continue dancing through her teens and early twenties. She became part of the Irish Ballet and danced in a range of roles in ballets such as The Children of Lir, Phil the Fluter’s Ball and Cúchulainn. In 1967, she travelled with the company to the Isle of Man to participate in the Viking Festival. She made lifelong friendships through Irish dancing, and also maintained a close relationship with Patricia Mulholland. It was Frances and her friend and fellow dancer Sheelagh Gilligan who organised a celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Irish Ballet in 1976.

In 1987, Frances married Robert Clark Buchanan and emigrated to the Cayman Islands, where she worked as an attorney in a private law practice. She later worked in Geneva, Switzerland for the philanthropic Oak Foundation. She and her husband retired to Ireland in 2013 to the village of Castlerock near Coleraine, where she became an active committee member of the Castlerock Community Association. She died in Coleraine on 27 May 2020.

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Scope and content

Black and white photograph (203 x 153 mm) of Patricia Mulholland being kissed on her cheeks by Robert Hunter, the latest recruit to the Irish Ballet (on the left) and Brian Coleman, the male lead in Mulholland’s first ballet (on the right) during the company’s 25th anniversary celebrations.

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