A NUMBER of Donegal's islands will feature in an exhibition of photos taken up to 75 years ago.

The beauty and harshness of life on Ireland's islands will be explored in a new exhibition of photographs on display at the National Photographic Archive in Dublin.

Island Life The Islands of Ireland will have its official launch today, but is already open for public viewing at the archive's gallery in Temple Bar.

The photographs, taken between 1930 and 1960, feature images of people and landscapes from many islands around the coast, as well as those on inland lakes.

Several of the images relate to Tory Island and the Arranmore and Achill Beg disasters.

However, the exhibition concentrates on Achill Island, the Aran Islands, Valentia and the Blasket Islands.

The exhibition has more than 71 photographs from seven collections, as well as four albums.

It includes selected images from the recently acquired collections of Tomas O'Muircheartaigh and Colman Doyle.

O'Muircheartaigh was an amateur photographer and former president of Conradh na Gaeilge, and this exhibition will mark the 50th anniversary of his death. His work was acquired by the National Library in 2005.

Colman Doyle is considered to be one of the most important Irish photographers of the last century. The National Library acquired his collected photographs last year.