Caoimhghin O'Croidheain - Dublin

Irish artist Caoimhghin O'Croidheain, Dublin

Caoimhghin O'Croidheain (pronounced Kee-veen O Cree-awn) is an Irish artist who has exhibited widely around Ireland. His work consists of drawings and paintings and features cityscapes of Dublin, images based on Irish history and other work with social/political themes.

Caoimhghin studied at the National College of Art and Design in Dublin where he obtained a BA (Hons) degree in Fine Art. He subsequently undertook post-graduate study in the interdisciplinary field of Cultural Studies in Dublin City University obtaining a Masters degree in Communications and Cultural Studies. Caoimhghin is an Irish speaker and holds a PhD in Language and Politics which is published under the title Language from Below: The Irish Language, Ideology and Power in 20th-Century Ireland. He completed work in Dublin City University as a Post-Doctoral researcher on the TRASNA project (a web-based database of references to translations of Irish literature globally). He currently works as a part-time lecturer on Aesthetics and History of Irish Art for Boston University and Intercultural Communication for Champlain College in Dublin while doing research on a database of Realist and Social Realist art from around the world. These paintings can be viewed country by country on his blog.

Artist Statement:
"Art facilitates the creation of solidarity and awareness between peoples in struggle against common forces of oppression. At the same time, the process of making art is about developing forms of visual expression that raise social issues to higher levels of cultural significance.

Following Sartre's dictum that 'to reveal is to change', I have endeavoured to learn about the many dire situations people have found themselves in around the world and to make paintings that would in a sense 'reveal' these problems to those like myself who had never come across them before.

The globalisation of the economy and the media has not led to more democracy but the concentration of power and wealth in fewer and fewer hands. It is in the gift of the culture producers (artists, writers, composers) to re-present and symbolically strengthen those on the ground fighting for social justice in many different and difficult situations."

Website: www.GaelArt.net Blog: gaelart.blogspot.com