Abstract Artist, Visual Artist, BA Fine Art, MA in Socially Engaged Art Practice
BIOGRAPHY
Geraldine O’ Brien was born in Ireland and is a Galway based Artist. She completed a BA in both Fine Art Painting and Fine Art Sculpture at GMIT and Limerick School of Art & Design. She holds an MA in ‘Social Practice and the Creative Environment’ from Limerick School of Art & Design. She has worked for many years as a lecturer and art practitioner.
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BIOGRAPHY
Geraldine O’ Brien was born in Ireland and is a Galway based Artist. She completed a BA in both Fine Art Painting and Fine Art Sculpture at GMIT and Limerick School of Art & Design. She holds an MA in ‘Social Practice and the Creative Environment’ from Limerick School of Art & Design. She has worked for many years as a lecturer and art practitioner.
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Artist Statement
My current work is an exploration which combines both the use of abstract composition and colour intuitively which in general allude to space, illusions, and states of mind. The compositions emerge both in complex and simple formations at different times; some develop in bold configurations of vivid colours, whilst others are soft, delicate atmospheric compositions alluding to states of tranquillity. By working intuitively, I find that recurring motifs, which emerge such as bars, gates, entrances, allude to a paradox of emotional states of beauty, passageways, and imprisonment.
https://circaartmagazine.net/gmit-castlebar-campus-degree-show-geraldine-obrien/
My current work is an exploration which combines both the use of abstract composition and colour intuitively which in general allude to space, illusions, and states of mind. The compositions emerge both in complex and simple formations at different times; some develop in bold configurations of vivid colours, whilst others are soft, delicate atmospheric compositions alluding to states of tranquillity. By working intuitively, I find that recurring motifs, which emerge such as bars, gates, entrances, allude to a paradox of emotional states of beauty, passageways, and imprisonment.
https://circaartmagazine.net/gmit-castlebar-campus-degree-show-geraldine-obrien/
CIRCA GMIT Castlebar Campus Degree Show: Geraldine O’Brien
By Meadhbh McNutt
Selected for Writers Choice Review, October 2019
https://circaartmagazine.net/gmit-castlebar-campus-degree-show-geraldine-obrien/
Written by Meadhbh McNutt
Meadhbh McNutt is a writer and artist, currently on the board of directors at the 126 Artist-Run Gallery, Galway. She holds an MA in Aesthetics & Art Theory from Kingston University, London (2016)
On first glance, Geraldine O’Brien’s abstract acrylic paintings are simple, eye-catching and unchallenging. After a minute or two though, something else clicks into place. Focusing on the series of geometric compositions, my eyes flitter between positive and negative space. More than mere spatial illusions, these compositions are also emotional shape-shifters. They radiate a joyfulness that gives way to a sense of quiet melancholia.
O’Brien’s palette of sunny yellows, vibrant pinks and muted pastels appeals to a vital, dare I say, primal energy. This aspect of the work leads me to contemplate early Suprematist attempts from the likes of Kazimir Malevich to seek purity and artistic freedom in the sheer power of colour and geometry. The more structural qualities of O’Brien’s paintings lead me down a different path, to the meditative stripes and grids of Agnes Martin’s studies in repetition. The ideal of what Martin called “happiness and innocence” appears present but in a more inquisitive than celebratory vein.
O’Brien tells me that her palette was once dark and murky, before she discovered the ironic potential of bubble gum colours with feminine connotations. The symbolic potency of colour charges abstract forms with implicit gender ideals – ideals which transfigure in titles mentioning ‘pink haze’, prisons, illusions and theories. These titles act as warnings, highlighting the inner conflicts of outwardly tranquil forms. In Structural Illusion, a cage of interlocking lines in gradient tones makes for a fragile, albeit unified system. Placid colours take the edge off this chaotic network. The effect is something like a strained arrangement suspended in time. Beautiful Prison 1 places the viewer below an elongated closed window, looking out at the purple hues of evening. The scene is a quiet and abstracted moment of beauty, curtailed by feelings of finitude and confinement at the arrival of dusk.
However discreet, these images are raw and powerful in conjuring the kind of cognitive dissonance that underlies feminine experience. If they promise aesthetic purity, it is a fragile and fleeting promise. What we get instead is a contorted beauty – a demand for compassion in the place of admiration.
Education
2019 BA in Fine Art Painting 2019 GMIT Mayo, Castelbar
2011 MA in Social Practice and The Creative Environment Limerick School of Art and Design
2000 BA in Fine Art Sculpture Limerick School of Art and Design
1995 National Diploma in Art & Design Sculpture GMIT, School of Art, Galway
2011 MA in Social Practice and The Creative Environment Limerick School of Art and Design
2000 BA in Fine Art Sculpture Limerick School of Art and Design
1995 National Diploma in Art & Design Sculpture GMIT, School of Art, Galway
Awards
2019 RDS Visual Arts - Long List Award
2019 Circa Writers Choice for GMIT Mayo, BA Fine Art Graduates
2001 Claremorris Open, prize winner
1996 Galway Arts Centre, Artist in Residence Bursary Award
https://www.instagram.com/geraldine.obrienartist/
Geraldine O Brien | INTERFACE – where science meets art (interfaceinagh.com)
https://interfaceinagh.com/members/geraldine-o-brien/
Geraldine O Brien | INTERFACE – where science meets art (interfaceinagh.com)
https://interfaceinagh.com/members/geraldine-o-brien/
Work
1990 to 2024: Lecturer in Design and Drawing at ATU Connemara Campus, Co. Galway, Ireland
Art Practice - List of Exhibitions
2025 RHA Exhibition - Abstract painting - Threshold II, Beautiful Prison Series
2025 Oughterard Group Summer Show
2025 Group Exhibition - White Noise Seven - Renzo Gallery, Galway
2025 Solo Exhibition at Renzo Gallery, Galway
2024 The Linen Hall, Castlebar, Co Mayo - Group Show
2024 McGinns Exhibition, Westport, Co Mayo
2024 Stamp Publication - ATU Castlebar, Co Mayo
2020 Interface Innagh, Co Galway, Summer Show
2019 Custom's House Studio, Westport, Co. Mayo, Christmas Show December
2019 Westival 2019, Open Submission, Group Show, Westport
2019 Green Fuse Gallery, Westport, Co. Mayo, Summer Show
2019 Cairde Visual Exhibition at Model Arts Centre, Sligo
2019 Customs House Studios, Westport, A Display of Difference an exhibition of work of the 2019 Graduates of BA Fine Art (Hons), GMIT mayo campus, Castlebar, Co. Mayo
2019 GMIT Graduate Exhibition at Castlebar , Co. Mayo
2018 Green Fuse Gallery, Summer Group Show, Westport, Co. Mayo
2017 Galway Print Studio Exhibition at The Arts Corridor UCHG. Galway
2016 PRINTED MATTER , Galway Print Studio’s annual members' show, Galway
2016 Lorient Celtic Festival Submission, Galway Print Studio. Galway
2015 Design Week/ Galway Print Studio, Photography, Galway
2015 Open Submission Print Exhibition 2015 Limerick Printmakers, Limerick
2011 Masters Exhibition at L.S.A.D (MA in Social Practice and The Creative Environment ), Limerick
2008 - Lorg Printmakers annual exhibition of Print making, Galway
2007 - Clifden Art’s Festival, Group show, Clifden, Co. Galway
2001 - Claremorris Open International Exhibition , prize winner., Co. Mayo
Sensuality …rebirth, Video and Photography Installation
2000 - Degree Show, L.S.A.D. Limerick
Sensuality …rebirth, video and photography installation
1999 - Galway Film Fleadh, video, unemployed men’s group, Galway
Spotlight on Rahoon
1997 - Schools Video/Film fleadh, Limerick, Refusal to Mourn
1996 - ev+a, International, Your precious time, Video and Photography Installation, Limerick
1995 - Diploma Show at G.M.I.T. Galway.
Your precious Time, Video and photography installation.
2025 Oughterard Group Summer Show
2025 Group Exhibition - White Noise Seven - Renzo Gallery, Galway
2025 Solo Exhibition at Renzo Gallery, Galway
2024 The Linen Hall, Castlebar, Co Mayo - Group Show
2024 McGinns Exhibition, Westport, Co Mayo
2024 Stamp Publication - ATU Castlebar, Co Mayo
2020 Interface Innagh, Co Galway, Summer Show
2019 Custom's House Studio, Westport, Co. Mayo, Christmas Show December
2019 Westival 2019, Open Submission, Group Show, Westport
2019 Green Fuse Gallery, Westport, Co. Mayo, Summer Show
2019 Cairde Visual Exhibition at Model Arts Centre, Sligo
2019 Customs House Studios, Westport, A Display of Difference an exhibition of work of the 2019 Graduates of BA Fine Art (Hons), GMIT mayo campus, Castlebar, Co. Mayo
2019 GMIT Graduate Exhibition at Castlebar , Co. Mayo
2018 Green Fuse Gallery, Summer Group Show, Westport, Co. Mayo
2017 Galway Print Studio Exhibition at The Arts Corridor UCHG. Galway
2016 PRINTED MATTER , Galway Print Studio’s annual members' show, Galway
2016 Lorient Celtic Festival Submission, Galway Print Studio. Galway
2015 Design Week/ Galway Print Studio, Photography, Galway
2015 Open Submission Print Exhibition 2015 Limerick Printmakers, Limerick
2011 Masters Exhibition at L.S.A.D (MA in Social Practice and The Creative Environment ), Limerick
2008 - Lorg Printmakers annual exhibition of Print making, Galway
2007 - Clifden Art’s Festival, Group show, Clifden, Co. Galway
2001 - Claremorris Open International Exhibition , prize winner., Co. Mayo
Sensuality …rebirth, Video and Photography Installation
2000 - Degree Show, L.S.A.D. Limerick
Sensuality …rebirth, video and photography installation
1999 - Galway Film Fleadh, video, unemployed men’s group, Galway
Spotlight on Rahoon
1997 - Schools Video/Film fleadh, Limerick, Refusal to Mourn
1996 - ev+a, International, Your precious time, Video and Photography Installation, Limerick
1995 - Diploma Show at G.M.I.T. Galway.
Your precious Time, Video and photography installation.
