I am a full time artist with a studio in Co. Waterford. My main focus is creating artworks directly from the subject. I paint in oils, sculpt the portrait in clay and design one-off, painted ceramic forms. I also help other artists to start or improve their painting experience. I am a fully qualified, registered (with The Teaching Council) teacher.

Funnily enough I didn’t set out to be an artist. My primary degree was in Science where I majored in Botany, and became a secondary school teacher. My passion for plants has remained with me throughout my life. I’m bewitched by their aesthetic and fascinated by their structure, form and biochemistry. And of course if you love plants, it’s quite natural to want to design beautiful spaces into which you can plant them. So I found my way into Landscape Architecture and took an MA in Landscape Architecture while working in the UK.

Underlying my day job and running parallel to it, I started to learn how to draw. Not because I wanted to know how to draw specifically, but rather because I wanted to learn how to see in the deepest sense of the word, that is see to know and know to develop understanding. I felt it would help my work especially as it involved looking at and analysing landscapes, in the design process. And it did help hugely.

I was amused to watch my interest in drawing, which developed into painting and eventually into 3D sculpture, take on a life of its own! At 61 I began to plan the next years of my life and decided I would like to become a full time artist, so I went to Cambridge School of Art and took an MA Fine Art, which was wonderful and kick started my career.

On my return to Ireland, I had an exhibition at The Old Market House Art Centre in Dungarvan, showing some of my college work.