(fl. 1770 - 1812), Dominican friar, architect and painter; exh. FS 1778; Prior of Athy 1799.
1770 - 8 [Ireland] Rome (1770), Mantua, Cremona, Asola, Naples, Turin, Genoa (21 Mar. - Jul. 1778) [London 1778]
1786 - 1798 [[Dublin], Cremona (by 24 Jul. 1786 - 15 Jun. 1789), Florence (by 21 Sep. 1798) [Dublin 1799]
O'Brien was ordained in Rome in 1770, and spent the next seven years in Italy, mostly in the north.1 On his second visit he had settled in Cremona by 24 July 1786, when he described himself 'both as a Dominican and as a Dillettante of Architecture'.2 O'Brien entered two architectural competitions at the Academy in Parma: in 1787 a drawing was sent from Cremona for a bishop's palace and in 1789 another of a public granary, but both entries were unsuccessful. He was still in Cremona on 15 June 1789 when he wrote in French to Bodoni enquiring about the competition.3 On 21 September 1798 'Obrien Tommaso, Irlandese Pittore' was elected to the Accademia del Disegno, Florence.4
1. Paciaudi cart., cass.85 (O'Brien, Genoa, 21 Mar., 6 Jun., 22 Jun., 23 Jul. 1778). 2. Add.36495, f.142. 3. Bodoni cart., cass.49. 4. Wynne 1990, 537.
N. F.