Mary O’Neill

O’Neill is an artist, author, and educator whose practice engages with profound cultural issues that often leave us mute, such as isolation and loss. Through her writing and artworks, she explores the search for meaning in the face of life experiences that can render existence chaotic and incomprehensible.

Her recent projects draw on maritime language and the laws of salvage as metaphors to reflect on both personal grief and the collective losses inherent in an ever-changing world. From an original interest in ephemeral art and notions of mortality and immortality, her research has developed to explore intangible culture, in particular the lost skills that are embodied in museum objects. These works weave together moving images, sculpture, text, and sound, ranging from spoken word to recordings of the natural environment. The Wolfe Island Collection is a series of artefacts and fictive academic publications that document the history of the now abandoned island and its inhabitants.

Recent short filmsRe-creative Practice: Learning from the Past, and Museum of Leathercraft – Ordinary Objects: Extraordinary Stories, in collaboration with film maker Nik Trzcinowicz, explore the role of museum as repositories of knowledge and the potential of re-creative practice to afford a deep engagement with history and to re-vivify museum objects.