My studio practice centres on figurative oil painting using folklore and local history to explore Irish identity. Rooted in folklore and historical texts, I approach myth as a living system, one that continues to be distorted and weaponised in contemporary discourse. My degree work focused on the myth of Cú Chulainn, a figure stretched thin through ideological divides. I used paint to reinterpret him through a queer lens, he becomes a vessel for modern tensions surrounding LGBT identities. His body draws on depictions of St. Sebastian, his jockstrap becomes armour, and the “hags” who devour him are reimagined as a playful nod to the term “fag hag”. From there, my work expanded to explore the Cynocephali, a mythical race of dog-headed people once believed to exist by Christian scholars. The question was not whether they existed, but whether they were human. Could they think, reason, be civilised? Today’s discourse around migrants echoes this medieval rhetoric with dehumanising language such as “unvetted” and “fighting age”, focusing not on humanitarian concerns but on their otherness with Irish society. This is particularly ironic in a country shaped by emigration. To satirise this, I painted another medieval creature protesting the Cynocephali. To expose how ancient prejudices continue to haunt contemporary discourse in new guises.
