Ciara Curtin - Irish Artist
Hello
I am an East Cork Artist in love with creating and allowing my heart to explore.
I have floated back and forth from my Art over the years as Life pulled me in different directions but settling with my creative space has enlightened me, has opened the heart and mind, it has found apart of me I thought lost and has rebirth something within that I just can't put words to right now but puts a smile on my face.
It is a form of therapy, a way of looking at reality but escaping through imagination. It's that combination of floating between worlds, creating a flow between life and death, ying and yang, the black and white gradient vs the colour spectrum....
In all to see the Balance, to portray the light and the dark.
This continues throughout my themes that I bounce between depending on the mood.. (See my themes below)
1. Animal Kingdom - Animal Portraits
The beauty and teaching's our fellow earthlings give vs the destruction to their lives by human selfishness.
To show the aspects within the animal kingdom and the world around us that needs a voice,
therefore some of my artwork will not only portray the beauty within nature
but the cruelty that is forced upon it.
To show the vulnerability in mammals, their instinctively caring and healing ways
without forgetting their strength, grace and instinct to survive.
To display the creatures at play as well as the victims of man's game.
2. Mother Earth
Nature in all it's glory, the pure wonder.
I paint from dreamy ideas and my photography studies
but also with a little imagination, painting pictures from photos
that have a wee surprise in the capture, naturally caught characters, some with meaning and some for fun.
For a demo here is a photo I captured in West Cork, displaying the wind being blown by .....
This was the seed for painting Father Sky below...
3. DraÃocht na hÉireann (Magic of Ireland)
The land, using my own photo studies, alongside the stories long gone by but not forgotten
which each carries a lesson or message for the generations of today and to come.
To display the Magic, Mystery & Celtic Mythology with sometimes a little imagination thrown in!
Can't let the fairies and leprechauns have all the fun ;)
4. Interconnections & Divided Worlds
World Joys, Depths and Divisions.
This is a theme I began in my late teenage years but slightly swirled away from but have returned back to over time.
Here I paint the ying and yang to life, the forestry in it's beauty and in its death, it's poisoning!!
The connections but also the disconnections.
Painting Art to stir the emotions and maybe people to question or take action.
The light and the dark co-existing alongside each other,
one unrecognising the other but both two sides of the same coin.
At times a concentration on the individual in a crowd,
where is the vibrancy and power of one,
to the mass of many that seems to consume.
More on the individual themes can be seen within the gallery above...
The Beginning
I began my passion for art at a very young age, apologies to those adults whose walls I destroyed
with pen or paint or whatever I could get my hands on :-)
I fell in love with painting more and more with every year that passed.
I did two years in Limerick Art and Design School where I began my studies in Print.
I continued my Art education solo, finding more exploration and satisfaction in my work,
to create without boundaries.
My subject matter, when young, used to be mainly animals
but as I experimented with different mediums,
I roamed and explored many topics,
allowing my heart to grow but finding what subjects stimulated my creative passion more.
My fingers/hands roamed into Landscapes both near and far,
life-drawings to topics that encourage the viewer to form emotions or/and questions.
To deepen the viewers relationship with themselves.
Depending on what imagination does with the information it has been given,
my heart depicts through the hands to paper or other.
I work mainly with Oil on Canvas or board, Acrylic and Charcoal/ Graphite/ Pen
but do from time to time return to watercolour where my adventure first began.
I also do etchings when I can gain time to get to print studio.
The interest to create and learn also ventures into Wood carving, clay, pottery/ ceramics and knitting
but these are more for fun and creativity outlets.
My father introduced me to photography as a child which I fell in love with,
that idea of capturing moments in time or the perfect scene.
In my artwork I use them a lot as studies or with imagination bring ideas to canvas.
When asked what inspires my work, sometimes it is hard to answer, my mood at the time,
to convey a message that I feel needs a voice, photography of a place or moment, fellow artists,
a book or movie or even an event that creates a feeling or atmosphere.
Irregardless it is a moment in time I wish to capture through my eyes transferred to paper/ canvas via my hands ….
If you wish to know more about me, follow along on Facebook or Instagram @CurDaneArtStudio
or click the events button above and pop along to the next event... :-)