Curator Eamonn Maxwell has been an advisor and passionate advocate for emerging artists in the visual arts for more than 20 years. In addition to creating the Emerging Artists Programme during his tenure at the University of the Arts London, he continues to mentor artists to this day. He first met mentee and Irish contemporary artist Serena Caulfield when he was delivering a workshop in 2017.
Caulfield recalls: “Eamonn has consistently mentored and encouraged me since we met in 2017, which has been a tremendous help to my practice and my career. He has become a great friend too, and one whose advice and experience I greatly respect and admire.”
Specialising in painting and drawing, Caulfield likes to combine different painting processes as well as entangle stories, histories and memories in her beautiful mashed-up allegories. She says: “Myths were the maps of communities, intimately dialoguing with their environment, and I like to think my paintings work similarly.
“I am an artist of a time with no time. My sources range from classical artworks to children’s drawing books, aural histories to local myths. Disobeying a linear art history while reclaiming it somehow in the present, I repurpose art history to play with its power, both visually and conceptually, imbuing the anachronisms of the past with the attitudes of the present.”
She has exhibited regionally and nationally in Ireland including group shows at the National Gallery of Ireland and Crawford Art Gallery.
She says: “I was really proud to have a portrait of my father shortlisted for the Zurich Portrait Prize 2021 at the National Gallery of Ireland and then at Crawford Art Gallery in Cork. My Dad was very proud too, and told everyone that he met that we’d ‘won’ the prize! It made me laugh a lot and I smile when I think of it now. He had a small bit of dementia due to Parkinson’s disease, but I totally went with our story. He passed away very recently. Happy memories, in a time that was tough for us all.”
In 2023, you’ll be seeing a lot more of her work too – she is currently working towards three solo exhibitions at Wexford Arts Centre, Ballina Arts Centre, and Hang Tough Contemporary, Ireland’s newest commercial gallery, plus a number of group shows.
About the champion
After studying fine art at Camberwell College of Arts, Eamonn Maxwell became a contemporary art curator, advisor, and mentor, working with organisations including the Arts Council of Ireland and other collections. He has curated numerous exhibitions across the world, including the Irish Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2011, and exhibitions by leading international and Irish artists during his seven-year stint as director of Lismore Castle Arts.
