About
I am an Irish artist based in the west of Ireland. My family life, studies and work opportunities have taken me around the world, from the Middle East to Barcelona, Honolulu and Montreal before settling in Galway. While rearing my family, I returned to college to complete a degree in Art & Design from the Centre for Creative Arts and Media in GMIT. I also have a degree in Applied Languages from DCU.
Today I work in Galway in my studio overlooking the countryside of the Wild Atlantic Way. I have strong roots in the Ivereagh peninsula in Kerry where I work during the summer months.
Elaine Quinlan
Why I Paint
I paint to feel rooted. It’s important to me to have a sense of belonging to a place. Possibly as a result of moving from place to place in my earlier years, I’ve always wanted to be able to answer definitively when someone asks “Where are you from?” If I don’t feel firmly rooted to a place, there’s a constant feeling of impermanency and no sense of belonging. Painting and investigating my surroundings helps me feel rooted.
My Inspiration
I’m lucky to live in the West of Ireland. It’s impossible not to be inspired by the Irish landscape. It has a special feel, a particular kind of light, a constantly changing sky. I’m hugely influenced by my watery surroundings. I live in an area of Galway in the West of Ireland close to what’s known as a Turlough or a vanishing lake. It frequently floods the land so the landscape changes constantly. I like to track the changes, the different colours and textures that appear during the seasons. I like to paint not so much the landscape itself, as how it feels to live here.
I sometimes feel a bit overwhelmed being out in the landscape – there is so much to see. So once back in my studio I like to focus on the small details I’ve noticed – sky reflected in puddles of rain, mist hanging over flooded fields, reeds floating on the vanishing lake. In the summer months, my paintings are inspired by the sea, rock-pools, shoreline and colour of the Kerry landscape.
My Work
My paintings are intuitive rather than formally planned. I like to work on different surfaces including canvas, wood and paper. I paint with a variety of materials and tools and I like building up layers of paint and glazing to create depth and translucency.
I love process, I love starting a painting with no formal plan. I like to use delicate lines, expressive mark-making, colour, ambiguity, delicate layers of colour and drawing to indicate elements hiding behind other elements. I like the unexpected to emerge and then as the work develops, bring formal elements into the painting so what I’m left with is a sense of landscape but in a balanced yet fluid abstract composition.