Fine Art Staff
Oliver Whelan, ANCAD, MA
Lecturer, Painting
Oliver Whelan is a Multi Media artist working from Dublin. He has exhibited in major solo shows in Australia Mexico Britain and Ireland, and has represent his country in Europe and Australia, He has also had, extensive representations in group exhibits, organised by the state, art community, art critics, institutions and galleries.
Over the twenty years working as an Artist Oliver has received a number of major awards, The Australian European award, which covered a period of one year in Australia, and included a studio, extensive travel and exhibition, he also received awards from Richard Demarco, for, travel throughout Europe and Exhibition, Department of Foreign Affairs exhibition awards, with a number of other travel, exhibition and Bursary awards. He was the founder member of the first Artist studio / complex in Ireland, he has also been a committee member of the Irish Exhibition of living Art, one of Irelands Premier Exhibitions, He is also Board member and Chairperson of CIRCA, an Irish and International arts Magazine.
Painting as a process, depiction as an enactment.
The Digital surface, Oliver Whelan
The work questions the inherent nature of painting, its processes, depiction, and function as other. These are all examined through the mediums of digital scanning /photography / video.
The digital image allows for different vantage points of surface, material, and space.
The works set out to give the viewer a new position, an alternative relationship to a painted image, to this end, the paintings are digitally scanned, disseminated, slowed and extended, developing a new location, were the actual process of painting, examines itself.
It also permits a stretching of time, creating a dialogue over the extended view, with each principle element existing in its own time and space, each having an effect on the previous, and in so doing, reflecting the art processes itself. The outcome therefore, is to create a new type of reentry, a claiming back of the inner world of process. A space that is very difficult to explore or define within a static art frame.
The use of a high-resolution camera, allowed for a deeper examination of the surface. Using this I could digitally scan the surface, move around it, and more importantly, enter in and out of the spaces created by gestures/mark, to look at them as a location or event, a place which reflected the actions of the studio, reliving the decisions, time, and thought process, slowing them down and allowing for their own intrinsic nature to be revealed. In this sense it still pursues a dialogue with painting but equally allows for a vital new ways of perceiving it.
Although there remains a substrate of expressionistic abstraction in the final result, it takes a very different direction once you negate the pictorial object, giving priority to the residue of actions.
Exhibitions / Group Shows
- Retrospective Show, Project Arts Centre, Dublin
- One Person Show, Royal Melbourne Institute, Australia
- Three Artists Exhibition, Projects Arts Centre, Dublin
- Aboriginal Art & Artefacts – own collection, Project Arts Centre, Dublin
- Irish Exhibition of Living Art, Black Church Print Studios, Dublin
- The Fruit Market Gallery, Edinburgh
- Four Artists at the Project, Dublin
- Guinness Peat Aviation Exhibition, Royal Hibernian Gallery, Dublin
- Edinburgh/Dublin Group Show – invited artist
- EVA, Limerick
- Wexford Arts Centre, Group Show
- NCAD Decade Show, Project Arts Centre, Dublin
- One Person Show, Project Arts Centre Dublin
- A Collectors Show, Kilkenny
- One Person Show, Realities Gallery, Melbourne, Australia
- Skibbereen Arsts Centre, West Cork
- Three in a Landscape, Guinness Hop Store, Dublin, Travelled to 7 venues in Ireland, including Sligo, Butler Gallery Kilkenny, and the Wexford Arts Centre
- Banquet Show, Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin
- Two pages for “The Great Book of Ireland”
- Banquet Exhibition, RHA Gallagher Gallery, Dublin
- Living Landscape, Skibbereen Arts Centre, Cork.
- One Person Show, RHA Gallagher Gallery, Dublin
- National Maternity Hospital Centenary Exhibition, RHA Gallagher Gallery
- The OPW State art collection travelling exhibition to European capitals
- One Person Show, Temple Bar Gallery, Dublin
- One Person Show, Marie de France Gallery Xalapa Mexico
Awards / Scholarships
- Richard Demarco Travelling Scholarship throughout Europe.
- Australian European Award, one year studying in Australia.
- Independents Bursary Award
- Department of Foreign Affairs Travel Award, Australian Bicentennial Exhibition
- Traveling scholarship from the department of foreign Affairs to exhibit in Mexico
Memberships
- Founder Member of the Visual Arts Centre, Dublin
- Founder Director of the Dun Laoghaire Arts Studios
- Committee member for Irish Exhibition of Living Art
- Board member and Chairperson of CIRCA, an Irish & International arts magazine
- Associate member of Temple Bar Studios and Galleries.
The National College


