I am a Ireland-based Interdisciplinary artist of Irish/Dutch descent with an extensive movement, aerial and performance background. I hold a first class hons Fine Art Degree and my practice spans the use of Harness/Vertical Dance, Authentic Movement, Butoh, Body Weather, Clown, Installation, Archive, Drawing, Digital/Analogue Film and Sound as languages. Movement in water is also integral to my ongoing inquiry using different spatial modalities to explore physical and psychological states of suspension. My roots, life and mixed experience of intense ballet training from infancy all influence the work to contemplate universal themes of self and society such as identity, institution, transience, perception, pathos and play. I aim for an aesthetic that is poetic, absurd and spectral. Whilst trying to maintain an open approach and process, I continually investigate new ways to merge and refine the different strands of my work into a unique & coherent language that tinkers on the fine line between humour and dark.
As part of my practice since 2014, I have developed a body of performance and short film works featuring Coneface, a performance alter ego whose face is covered by a long, semi-transparent cone narrowing perception and providing both protection and slight sensory deprivation for the effaced wearer. Navigation through light indication is key, similar to a camera. This motif was originally designed to refer to filtration devices developed with age or a dissociative state caused by technological over-stimulation in ever-advancing modern life. I use this anonymised absurd figure to explore themes by activating thematically specific tableaux and guises, which often include site response to less conventional performance settings and the use of harness/suspension. Coneface continues to evolve, having appeared in numerous live and filmic events around Ireland, Italy and Sweden. I am currently working on a feature length experimental film, with support of the Arts Council, called Concrete Keys featuring Coneface as the central figure in multiple guises, sites and states of suspension to poetically examine the individual’s place in a rapidly transforming vision of capitalist society. I am also working on a future ambitious site specific performance work with initial development support of the Cork City Council.
Since 2007, I have been involved in a broad range of solo & group projects, exhibitions, workshops, residencies and collectives and having presented work at events and venues across Ireland and Europe. Such events include IndieCork, Deepfocus, Disappear Here & Cork International film festivals; EFS screening at Filmbase Dublin and Sonicvigil Cork; Body Noise Work with Kirkos Ensemble & Jennifer Walshe, The Dock, Leitrim & Templebar Gallery Dublin; Aisteach Project with Jennifer Walshe, The Model Sligo; Feile Na Laoch, Cork; Dublin Live Art & Livestock Festivals, Dublin; Nest Performance festival, Kilkenny; K-Fest Killorglan; Glow festival, Cork Puppetry festival, Quarter Block Party festival, Cork Midsummer festival, St Finbarrs festival , Pitch’d Circus Festival & multiple Circus Factory events, Midleton Arts Festival & Zolala, Cork; Sample studios, Triskel & Sirius Arts Centres, Wandesford and Lavitt Galleries, Cork; Greywood Arts official opening, Cork; Cork Culture night Guest Performing Artist 2014-16 at Black Mariah/Project space & Gulpd Café Triskel Arts Centre, Cork; Multiple performances & exhibitions at MART Gallery, Dublin; Studio 6 performance series at Templebar gallery; Vest & Page /IPA performance art event, Forte Marghera, Venice; Moving Bodies Festival in Dublin & Turin, Italy; Going Solo Performance & Film festival, Sweden; She has also been recipient of several awards including an Arts Council Film Project and Travel & Training Awards, Cork City Council Project Award, Kirkos Ensemble participating Artist for Body Noise Work; CIT Graduate Bursary Award, Cork Film Centre Best Film and installation Graduate award and Echo Echo Dance Festival Bursary; Selected for the International Vertical Dance Forums in Ireland and Croatia.
