A portrait of the artist Michael Kane
Read MoreArtist Michael Kane, photographed in his studio on 11th March 2024
Cecilia Bullo - Oh Toads of the river, grieve. Oh Toads of the wetlands, Lament for me. Oh Land, grieve for me. 2023/24. Photographic print on vinyl 300x150 cm
Oh Toads
I was delighted to collaborate with Cecilia Bullo on making her new artwork, “Oh Toads of the river, grieve. Oh Toads of the wetlands, Lament for me. Oh Land, grieve for me. 2023/24”.
It was an intense shoot, not least because she had approximately 18.5 kilos of jesmenite sculptures of toads perched on her airways throughout. I first met Cecilia by chance when I saw her show Being Haunted by the Breezes, Now How Will You Exist? at the Royal Hibernian Academy. I was very taken with the horde of toad sculptures all facing into a corner of the dimly-lit gallery, and was intrigued when I saw a note on the wall saying that they were available to buy. When I asked about this at the reception desk downstairs they told me I could just take whichever ones I wanted from the exhibit. I went back upstairs, announced to the several people watching that I’d been given permission to remove some toads and made my way towards the exit. A figure came out the darkness, wreathed in smiles. This was Cecilia. She was delighted I liked her toads and informed me they were made from ‘Jesmenite, toad DNA and spells”. “What kind of spells?” I asked.
“Good ones” she replied.
This work is part of Distinct, an exhibition in Project Arts Centre curated by Alan James Burns which explores the climate crisis through the perspective of disability. From the exhibition notes: “Cecilia Bullo presents a large-scale photographic work that reformulates cast sculptures of toads as a wearable assemblage on her body, exploring material cultures relating to rituals of healing and transformation through mythological, archaeological, feminist and ecological lenses.”
Artwork by Cecilia Bullo.
Curatorial direction by AlanJames Burns.
Production support by Marie Farrington.
Photography by Conor Horgan.
Photographic assistance by Sara Pirani
Makeup by Christopher Mc Cormack.
The exhibition runs until April 20th in Project Arts Centre, Dublin.
Thanks to Leanne Sullivan for the gallery photo of me with Cecilia and my intern Sara Pirani, who assisted on the shoot.
I made this portrait of one of Cecilia’s toads in my studio. Apparently she’s called Lucille.
Emma
When you’re making a portrait of someone, it helps to fall in love with them a little. It was very easy indeed to fall in love with Emma.
Read MoreLOUISAHHH!!!
These are my portraits of LOUISAHHH!!!, the queen of French industrial techno. She's just announced her first album, The Practice of Freedom, which is available to pre-order here:
Cecilia Danell
Painter Cecilia Danell, photographed at the Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris.
Congratulations to Cecilia Danell, who has been awarded the ESB Keating Award and Silver Medal for an Outstanding Art Work at this year’s RHA Annual exhibition. She’s also shortlisted for the RCSI Art Award, which will be announced in December. This image is an out-take from a portrait I was commissioned to make by the Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris, which will be part of a semi-permanent exhibition of 18 portraits of artists-in-residence there from later this month. I’m really looking forward to seeing them up on the walls.
CECILIA DANELL - IN THE BIRCH PLANTATION. Oil and acrylics on canvas, 95 x 130 cm
You can see more of my portraits of artists in this gallery .
I set a Bait for the Unknown
Cecilia Danell photographed in the Centre Culturel Irlandais, January 2020.
This my portrait of painter Cecilia Danell, taken earlier this year when she was an artist-in-residence at the Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris. Her show “I set a Bait for the Unknown” has just opened in the Kevin Kavanagh Gallery, Dublin, and is very much worth a look.
You can see more of my portraits of artists here.
Amelia and The Bloods
My friend Amelia Stein is one of Ireland’s best photographers, and I did a portrait of her recently to mark the occasion of her new exhibition “The Bloods” being shown in the newly reopened Butler Gallery in Kilkenny.
With a slight homage to Mapplethorpe
This is Amelia’s preferred image, which I can understand because she looks like such a boss.
The show is a series of portraits of members of the Defence Forces from the 3 Inf Bn, known as The Bloods, based in James Stephens Barracks, Kilkenny. It’s great work, and you can book (free) tickets here.
There are more of my portraits of artists in this gallery.
About Beauty
I first met conceptual artist Dorothy Cross while training at a dive centre in Connemara. I knew and liked her work, which included many pieces inspired by sea creatures or made with found objects from the sea.
A couple of years later I approached her about making a film and she quite unexpectedly invited me to accompany her on a trip to make work about native shark-callers on New Ireland, a small island off Papua New Guinea that is one of the last true wildernesses left on Earth.
(click image for caption)
It was a tough shoot, not least because a capsized canoe ruined one camera and I had to finish the shoot with Dorothy’s one, which she was also using to make work. Eventually a shark was caught, and after a very moving traditional ceremony it was divided among the villagers on the beach.
(click image for caption)
Kids in Kontu
You can hear a Lyric fm interview I did about the film here.
Annaghmakerrig People
Some of the great people I’ve met in Annaghmakerrig over the years.
Robbie McDonald, who will be leaving next January after ten years as director of the Tyrone Guthrie Centre at Annaghmakerrig. The post is currently being advertised
Dancer and choreographer Emma O’Kane
Emma O’Kane in action
Native American playwright Larissa Fasthorse with her husband, sculptor Edd Hogan
Author Diana Souhami
Painter Roisin McGuigan
Sheila Pratschke, the Centre’s second director
Annaghmakerrig
I’m staying at the Tyrone Guthrie centre in Annaghmakerrig, getting some writing done. It’s a fantastic place, which I wrote about for The Dubliner magazine a few years ago - you can read the article here.
I found this couch yesterday on a walk near the centre, and one of the artists sat in for the picture.
The big house
Dominique and the Lobster
Amanda Feery
Amanda Feery is one of Ireland’s most successful young composers. She has written many orchestral pieces, as well as music for stage and screen, including for Rouzbeh Rashidi’s Phantom Islands. She is currently working on an opera, as you can hear in this great podcast interview that was released today. We did this portrait beside the Royal Canal in Dublin.
There are more of my portraits of artists here.
Two Irish Artists in Paris
Aindrias De Staic, storyteller, actor and musician.
Macdara Smith, artist and musician.
Clare Langan in Paris
Clare Langan photographed in Paris, May 2018.
Video artist Clare Langan is a national treasure, and I was very glad to get an opportunity to photograph her in Paris last year. I’d already seen her piece that’s currently in the Moving Woman show at La Galerie Danysz, but I went to see it again on Saturday. It’s so beautiful.
Galerie Danysz
You can see other portraits of artists in this recently updated gallery.
Portraits of Anthony Palliser, painter.
Portraits of Anthony Palliser for his forthcoming memoir. Anthony has lived and worked in Paris since 1970, and his work can be seen here.
