I believe in (2014)

Dimensions - ( H x W x D ) - 30 x 17 x 35cm

Medium – Matches , wood, paint.  

The title of this piece is a homage to the Buzzcocks and my older brother Dermot and really the inspiration that he instilled in me that anything is possible. The neighbours used to say that you could hear the Lamberts from the end of the road. At the weekends punk and post punk music blaring, Point Blank practicing on their electric guitars. 

In my own work the house became a metaphor of different periods of struggle and strife, a group of people a family going through many things together, good times and bad times. 

Our estate was like a concrete Island surrounded buy sea of savage wilderness that lead to the Dublin mountains and the coolest word for a time as a kid in the eighties  was BRILLO which later I discovered in Spanish is BRILLAR meaning to shine. This estate was part of a  mammoth task taken on by  the Irish government from 1948 until 1961 building 180,000 such council houses. More than likely the architect Herbert Simms had a hand to play in this.

How architect Herbert Simms transformed Dublin (rte.ie) 

The rudimentary and functional design of this house portrayed many characteristics on our street alone. I began to see the house as a collective portrayal of my whole family and I used different symbols to suggest certain things usually relating to catholicism, the flag we generally flew under. The 'blindfold' was inspired by Goya's executions of the third of May 1808. 

This quirky house moving ever forward maybe even bound together in it's blindfold. On awkward stilts of thorn branches. A mothers love is always forgiving,  trying to make the best she can with what she has. It was austere, cosy and clean as a whistle, I say austere but that's not really true .I don't know she did it with such a large family and a single bus conductors wage but the Christmas presents were always top drawer.

Dimensions - ( H x W ) - 40 x 20 cm

Medium – Pencil and gouach, gold leaf on vellum paper

I cast this house in concrete and have played around with it a few times, it's still unfinished. I though about doing a type of iconic Baroque style crown using matches covered in gold leaf, then I thought it was too much and it was better to leave it bare but I'm still not totally happy with the piece.

Safe house ( 2016 - 

Dimensions - ( H x W x D ) - 44 x 10 x 11.5 cm

Medium – Poured cement, cloth and cast bronze.

I do like the spindly legs of the thorn branches and the roughness of the bare cement or maybe the blindfold is too blocky, knots of cloths might look better.  

I have a tendency to overwork things and then strip them back and work on them again. It used to drive me nuts and I guess it still does but I have to accept at some stage it's the way I work. I like to have pieces hang them on my wall in the studio or at home and ponder over them for years sometimes. But I do know when pieces are finished. The piece below was one of those rarities that came together quite quickly. 

The middle door - 2012

Dimensions - ( H x W x D ) - 

Medium – Glass, wood, plaster, found fabric , gold leaf, paint.  

I found the fabric for this piece underneath the stairs at home, I don't know how it ended up there but I do remember the texture and pattern being also on a sofa. The arms of which were wooden so I tried to find a similar type of wood for the frame. It's like the INSIDE / OUTSIDE thing. Reflections and memories submerging to the surface,  taking the elements of varnished wood and fabric and placing them on the exterior. Even the reinforced glass is from my perspective a more delicate thing in the middle of the house an interior door. 

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