The Journey Of An Irish Artist!

One of the first memories I have, is that there was peace and a calmness in the gallery space, my sense of smell was heightened by the old painting, the polished floors. I think I would have been about 6 maybe 7 years of age. This in my child mind was a wonderful place. Each painting, much larger that me, drew me into their picture of the story the artists were portraying.

The detailing on the clothing, furniture and the way in which the light fell within in the painting set the scene, whether it was a battle, landscape or still life, little Celine was drawn to the story beyond.

The Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin city, during the years that we visited the style of art engaged us in a thoughtful way. Modern art of my time growing up was mostly abstract art, and would look very contemporary in today’s art scene, back then, it made up ponder on the question do we like it, does it draw us in like the older paintings in the National Gallery?

One such painting that both dad and I talked about a lot was  the painting by American artist, Agnes Martin.

A large white canvas painted with gesso and graphite. We stood, we pondered, it was like nothing else, we had ever seen and people were talking about it. In the end, we both were more traditionalist when it came to paintings, the old master’s had us hooked.

Artist: Agnes Martin (1912 - 2004)
Date1980
Medium Gesso, acrylic and graphite on canvas
Dimensions184 x 184 cm

Classifications Paintings
Credit LineCollection & image © Hugh Lane Gallery. Purchased, 1980. © The Estate of Agnes Martin.
(Image & Information courtesy of The Hugh Lane gallery archives)

After I finished secondary school, I knew I wanted to pursue a career in art, visual art was just beginning, but fine art was the main style being taught.  College, introduced me to the vastness of Fine Art, from sculpture, printing, life drawing, history  and photography (SLR style) and so much more.

Every part of this I enjoyed learning, it was in many ways perfect for me, as a person with a neurodivergent brain, where learning in a visual way I can excel but when it comes to writing things down I am terrible, but I have gotten better at this over time.

Back in the 1980’s, Dyslexia, dyscalculia and dyspraxia were in the infancy of learning of what these were and how they affected people. I mention these three as these are the ones I have but there are many more.

Of all the modules that I leant, I found photography was the one that I got, understood it. As my first year in college was coming to an end I knew I was not going to make it through so with the help of my wonderful lecture I got an intern ship with a photographer.  My journey was now heading a different route.

After a year and a half working with him the draw of going further afield was pulling at me, I wanted to see some of the world, I think it’s an Irish thing, when we are young and unattached we want to stretch our wings.

One of my siblings was already in England, and off I went, with many copies of  my CV’s. I gave myself two weeks to get a job, I did. My photography gave me the entrance into publishing, sales and advertising. I was one my way.  I lived away for a couple of years and one on my return I met my late husband. Soon we were married and children on the way. Art had taken a backseat. Life was bringing me on a different journey.

One of the best presents that I got from my family was “Simply Painting” by Frank Clarke, this book brought you through the step by step process of watercolour painting. I was given the basic set of watercolours and brushes. I was all set to beginning painting again, but with a medium I had never used.

Side note; we have to remember in  has to remember back in 1995 YouTube did not exit. DVD’s was one way we learnt and watching TV shows and recording them.

Slowly, over time with many failed attempts I got better with watercolours, and with some I began using Indian ink. One of the many things that I am thankful for is that I did was that  I took many photos while on holidays and even out and about visiting places in Ireland. These were my references for painting, normally I painted many local scenes initially just for fun.

In  early 1998 I took part in my first exhibition, and entered five paintings, they were all of local scenes, painted in watercolour.

All five were bought, and I was thrilled, what a boost to my confidence. From this one exhibition, I began slowly to get commissions from local people in the area. One, local scene was so popular that I painted different angles of it more 10 times! 

I was invited to teach the active retirement club in the area that I lived, and this was another wonderful experience. I taught the club members the basics, we all painted the same scene, and they were all different. From this invitation, I began regular evening painting classes with the community I was living. These classes continued off and on for about 5 years. 

Looking back now at my artwork from the early 2000’s, my style began to develop. Curiously enough, it has developed further today into a more realism style.

Below are two paintings that painted around this time, the old ruin is of Herpoint Abbey, the pen and ink drawing is of The Bitterslip in Kilkenny.

In mid-2005, everything changed for my family and my art. My husband died, and I moved closer to family. For some art is therapy, but for me this was not the case. With a young family time is fleeting, so I spent time with my children. Over time, I flitted into different crafts, as this was manageable, in the evenings.

My mum knew that I needed something to help me, and with her encouragement I stuck with one craft, jewellery making. Like a magpie, I do love things that glint in the light. I repaired, redesigned jewellery for family friends and started designing my own. They were simple designs with fimo clay and silver. What started as a hobby grew, and this was after the “Tiger” had left Ireland!

By, 2007 I had become involved in the bridal industry by word of mouth. I was busy, my kids were happy and art in a unique way was part of my life again.

A selection of my work over the years.

As I look back now, my business was more than I thought it would be. Over the seven years designing and meeting lovely brides and their families made the hecticness of it all worthwhile. My previous work in photography, advertising, sales, and publishing all stood to benefit.

What I did take from this business, is that if you create a piece of art, you must do so with the best quality that you can afford. As it will last the test of time. In saying this, I created pieces of jewellery and accessories for brides who then sold them to other brides. If they had bought something cheap, they would have lost their monies. I do feel that quality will always stand the test of time

As I mentioned above, using the best quality was key in my business. I found that  coming up with new and unusual designs was quite a big part in this sector. You needed to think out of the box. As many of my friends and family were avid knitters along with doing crochet, I tried to knit and crochet with very thin wires incorporating semi-precious beads. There was a lot of trial and error, unlike wool if you dropped a stitch sometimes you might have to start all over again.

Eventually, I got the hang of it, researched a lot about wire structure. I honed in on old Irish lace designs and produced designs that would work with wire structure. 

In doing so, as my developing designs were unusual, I was asked to represent Carlow Crafts, at Show Case 2009 in the RDS in Dublin. This was such an honour and achievement to be recognised as a jewellery designer.

Winning Designs at Showcase 2009 in RDS Dublin

I continued designing jewellery and bridal accessories for three more years. I found with my children growing that I needed to take a step back. In 2016, with the encouragement of my family I wanted to explore where I could go with my art and designing hats.

I enrolled into a full-time foundation course for university. The course I chose was Product Design. My eldest son was also studying it, it piqued my interest. As it had been years since I was in an educational scene, I felt that this course would help me.

Parts of the course I enjoyed, the technology in photography  was very new to me, as a mature student this part was quite daunting. Finding the right  course that fitted my needs as an artist, this course was not it. What I did realise and where I excelled was drawing, painting, exploring more of what technology in photography could give me. Product Design was not the course, the calling for Fine Art was where I felt I should be. 

2014 Sketchbook drawings for graphic design. A still life of a popcorn kernel 

Before I made the plunge into four years of university, I did one more year in a fine art advanced certificate. This course was the right fit for me. It gave me modules that I really enjoyed, painting, history of art, drawing, photography, and the technology side of photography. The classes were small, and the tutors were amazing. Their encouragement was the guiding light I needed to make such a huge decision. Four years is a long time to give to art other that family.

On a personal level, I needed the backing from my kids. Once I had that and from speaking to the college myself, I made the decision to apply. I accepted my course choice in August of 2018.

A selection of paintings of my portfolio for university

To some, going back to college over fifty may seem mad, why not just paint at home?

 I agree for some painting at home is the way to go, for me, I like a challenge. I enjoy learning new ways of seeing things, developing ideas, from a sketch, to a painting. Having the confidence to express how I feel about an object or scene through painting. Being surrounded by young enquiring minds is wonderful, I was for some of my classmates  their ‘college mammy.’

What I did realise, is that fine art and visual art different enough. Some have said that fine art is a dying, personally I do not think so. There is always a good market for fine art artists.

This is what college gave me, a desire to understand, question why people think differently about things in art. In hindsight, I personally do not know if I would have got all the questions answered for my mind if I did not go.

Visual art gave me an insight into the world of art through different disciplines. What I enjoyed the most was how technology is now very much part of visual art. Artists are using technology to help their peers how they visualize the world.

Some have kept their art very traditional, where others have taken on the development of technology and allowed this to be part of their art.

What I took from my college education, that there is a place for both traditional and technological art. At the end of the day, there  are some basic necessity you need to be able to draw. I believe that anyone can draw, with immense practice, be open to ideas, inclusion of what some see as a craft, it's actually not, it is now a part of visual art by definition.

Towards the end of 4^th year in university, one to two lectures questioned us as to where we saw ourselves in five years’ time. Many of us, did not really know. This made me think, and I did a little research to find out how many animal artists there was in my area. I was drawn to doing this style of art, even though I never touched on it in university.

You Tube was my first stop on the research trail, I already had a collection of polychromo colour pencils so I went initially in that direction. I looked for youtubers that explained the basics how draw an animal, how to use the colour pencils correctly, how to add layers of blended colour, what surfaces worked well and what did not.  Bonny Snowdon was the first artist that I could follow and I joined her Patreon, the basic level. I drew dogs and cats for about three months daily and soon progressed onto soft pastels.

The cat was my first colour pencil drawing, it was a friend's cat that died and she only had a few pictures and I chose this as it was his favourite place to sunbathe.

The elephant was my second, and the fluffy cat was my thrid drawing. 

Even now when I look at these, I see how I could improve them, by slowing adding  more layers  of colour and blending more.

This drawing was done this year just after Christmas, it took me about a month to complete, the difference is huge between two years ago.

The reason for me for switching was that to gain the amount of layers you needed was quite time consuming. Colour pencils is for people who are patient, not one of my strengths. I came across Jason Morgan on YouTube and again great at explaining the basics in animal drawing. Like all art mediums, some you will like, some you won’t.  I invested in soft pastel pencils, soft pastels, pan-pastels and with hours and days of practice I was able to draw dogs, cats and horses, I love to challenge myself.

 Where I live, and family members would be the first to tell me if I got the proportions of a horse completely wrong.

First picture is what pan-pastels look like (image courtesy of panpastels.com) 

Baby Gorilla was my first attempt of using soft pastels and pencils

Copper was my second attempt, I do love a challenge.

Soon, I experimented with drawing wild animals, elephants are my favourite and I practiced and practiced them until I was happy to draw them on the expensive paper.

Again, from research I found that many artists use pastel mat card/ board. It's expensive, but the amount of layers you can achieve is wonderful.

Of course I had to try and transfer these same techniques onto canvas and use acrylics, it was trial and error but I got there.

For the last two years since graduating from university, I draw, paint every day for about seven hours. I treat it like a job, I go into my studio and first do quick five minutes sketched on either scrap paper or a sketchbook, I have many, all with different types of paper. This process helps me loosen up, stretch my fingers and arms. It calms my mind so I can focus.

Kingfisher was painted at the beginning of 2023 and the Rooster was painted towards the end of 2023, the kingfisher was painted on a small canvas, the Bokeh effect was done using an airbrush. The Rooster was painted on a wooded panel. I  enjoy painting on these as the bounce effect on canvases can for me be slightly annoying. It is a personal preference for each artist.