Michelle Boyle is a visual artist with a studio base in Cavan, Ireland and a developing base in Mumbai, India. She works in painting and drawing, applying the observational skills of these to a broader artistic practice which includes video, installation and journalling. Her work explores themes from everyday life expressed in her distinctive spontaneous and fluid way. ‘ I identify first and foremost as a painter, and although my inheritance shapes my worldview, my work is informed by my everyday observations and experiences of people and place.’
Boyle’s work as a painter began in 2003 with a need to visualise emotions and the history of her adoptive and mixed race Irish / Indian inheritance.
This intense auto biographical work was the subject of four solo exhibitions in public galleries in Ireland and India resonating with contemporary themes of identity, displacement and home.
IN THE LANDSCAPE
Paintings and work around water
Under Covid travel restrictions the artist began working out in the landscape immersing and responding to her local lake and the water rich landscape of Cavan. Immersion in water holds feminine, maternal, spiritual and life affirming associations for the artist.
‘She swims year round in Lough Ramor and now sees this as a performative collaboration with nature. While being conscious of the preciousness of freshwaters, she is giving this essential element- with which all life depends- a voice through her expressive liquidlike gestural paintings’
Patricia Watts Ecoartspace Founder/ Curator. ‘Freshwater’ Catalogue 2023
CONVERSATIONS
Boyle brings her academic background in Cultural Anthropology (BA) and Landscape Archaeology (MA) to her art to ask where in place and time trust and veneration of water. She is engaged in conversations around water internationally from the intersection of art / geo-humanities and local communities. She is currently curating ‘Conversations from the lake ‘ with the support of Cavan Arts Office and curated ‘Conversations from the fountain’ as part of the Earth Rising Festival Sept 2023 at IMMA (The Irish Museum of Modern Art).
She is member of international collectives including EcoArtspace and Thinkaboutwater.
SURFACE TENSION
Click here to sign up to the artist’s journal and writings around water.
https://michelle1a6c3.substack.com/embed
RECENT EXHIBITIONS 2023
‘Freshwater‘ June 22nd -Sept 14th 2023. Solo exhibition of paintings celebrating freshwater in the landscape- Ramor Theatre Virginia Cavan Ireland.
Click on ‘Exhibitions’ tab to top
Woven May- June Group Exhibition-The Sasse Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angelus USA
Nine Fish Gallery Ongoing Mumbai, India
Common Threads Feb- March- Invited artist-Collaborative textile exhibition Dept. of Foreign Affairs Ireland
2022- ‘The Clothes on our backs’ Solo exhibition of paintings and textile works reflecting on the artist’s personal history and identity .Jehangir Gallery Mumbai.