On Monday November 30th 2009 I started to write a blog on the google platform Blogger, at the time of the first post I wanted to introduce myself to an audience, say what I did for a living, point out that the economic downturn had left me with a very reduced income. But I was still eager to work. Explained that ,,,,,as it stands I have a lot more time to dedicate to my own photographic practice,
And that is the reason for this blog. it is my intention to talk here about all things photographic! see post here
As it turned out it all worked out fine, I increased my personal output, had huge profile boost amongst my peers, was recruited to do an academic research project, started teaching at degree level and continued making the project that defined my photographic career, “leaving Dublin”
The blog ran to 177 posts to date, and over 260 thousand page reads and so, here I am,
Charting the the building of a project.
It runs from online posts to international exhibition and back home.
Over time my position moved from social observer to artist recording a historic movement.
Through this process the work and most that followed became incrementally more political and asked questions of our government institutions and ultimately questioned their reason for being.
I found my self not so much being critical for the sake of it, but asking the question who do the institutions of the state actually serve.
The works in this presentation span over 10 years, indeed most of the works are from after the financial crash and made between 2010 and 2013, with visitation shots made in 2012-13
And the triple yellow line from a political post made the day theToika ( the European Central Bank, the European Commission, and the International Monetary Fund)left Ireland,The 15th of Dec. 2013 see it here
In a strange coincidence the palm which featured as one of my ludicrous “signs of recovery “ gave speed to al later post
on the political motivations of Dublin City council, when they fast tracked traffic changes in the Grangegorman plaza under the guise of a “ Covid mobility Programme.”
This cynical act proposed to make Dublin safer for pedestrians to move around the city by removing parking spaces and creating a car cul de sac’ at the end of Rathdown road.
My problem with this is explained in the post(here) and traffic metaphor sits well with nature of my migrant photographs and the cry that migration is for sure two way traffic,
but there is always space for a state or agents of the state to put in a road block when it suits their agenda.
