Vibrant portraits of Cork city’s homeless go on show

MARIE Bryan is a Cork artist who spent last summer painting portraits of high-support housing residents with Cork Simon.

She wanted to capture a sense of each person’s personality and interests, rather than their experience of homelessness.

Inspiration

Marie says she was struck by the strangeness of walking past people in doorways in Cork city, not knowing anything about them, and feeling concern for them.

“We categorise them as ‘the homeless’ and distance ourselves from knowing them as individuals, as ordinary people who are simply down on their luck,” she said.

“I think that if we could know them as ordinary people, then the people of Cork could realise that any of us could be in their situation. They are in unfortunate circumstances, and they need our help.

I wanted to do something for Cork Simon and touch the lives of people. I hoped that getting a portrait could be a fun and positive experience.

The artist certainly did her best to make that aspiration a reality.

“I met them in the Simon premises and interviewed everyone on a one-to-one basis. I didn’t fish for information. Whatever topic they spoke about, I got involved with it, and got more detail. I went with the flow.

“I was acting as a professional and as an artist and they were looking to me for guidance. I wanted them to be very comfortable. We settled on topics that might work.

“I photographed them in good light. I wanted them to be happy with the topic and with the photograph. I consulted with them, always wanting to check if they were happy.”

Marie feels she got a lot from the process too.

“It was very enjoyable because it was collaborative, and it was fascinating getting to know what they are interested in.

“I called into them at Christmas and then again in recent months. I think we’ve a good rapport. And they were just delighted to have their own prints.”

The brilliance of Marie’s work is in how she captures the spirit, the essence of each one of her sitters.

“To give you an example,” she elaborates, “One of the ladies had a liking for art, and particularly for golden autumn leaves. I used gold leaf on her painting as my interpretation of that.

“Another sitter was a backstroke swimmer with Dolphins swimming club so I painted a swimming pool full of dolphins. I did another piece with a chessboard flying around for a chess champion.”

High Supports

The people who sat for Marie’s portraits are long stay residents. Marie is impressed with what the organisation, Cork Simon, provides.

It’s great that they can get on with whatever they want and move forward and to have that community around them.

“The people working in those houses are extremely kind people. It is a family set-up as much as is possible. They have beautiful gardens and there are wonderful things happening. Such as on Victoria Road, where they are working on carving limestone with another artist. It’s a positive space to be in,” she says.

Marie is open about her reason for choosing to work with homeless people. Her husband died unexpectedly at the age of 50, and it changed her completely.

I had to start something new after that. It was such a big change and a big loss. I hadn’t done art beforehand. I had worked in the Central Statistics Office and then later as a dairy farmer with my husband.”

She took every step bravely, simultaneously working through her grief.

“I took an online course to get my portfolio together and then completed a Level Five course in Douglas Street. 

The art got me through my grief and, thankfully, I was good at it.

The following year, Marie did her Level Six course in Kinsale campus and found she was happy again, a different person.

“That came from the art. I should have been doing it all my life. I discovered that I could draw, and paint portraits and I went to Paul Sheehan in Cork Simon and suggested I paint residents and they decided that I could give it a go.

“I finished my Level 6 and moved to Wilton in June to start the project. Now I’m doing a degree in Fine Art in MTU’s Crawford College of Art and Design.”

Connection

The artist says working with homeless people had deep resonance for her, because of what she had been experiencing since her husband’s death.

“I had been through an expected hard time myself, and I realised it could be anyone. It hit home.

 I hadn’t expected him to die at 50. It hammered home that anybody can have losses and bad luck. And I wanted to do something for other people.

“Personally, I wanted to fill my summer. I had endured lockdown for my bereavement, grieving alone.”

The sitters at Cork Simon were delighted with the results.

“At first, people were a little bit curious, or shy maybe, but over the moon to be honest. They were so happy to see me coming and it really was such a positive experience. Their stories about their interests and hobbies were source material for me to go away and research, to generate my ideas.

“For example, for Derek, I visited the docklands. I was down on the Port of Cork watching the ships, and the grain being off-loaded, because that’s what he loves.

“When I’d the research part done, I would go away and do my online research. I spent about five or six days on each painting, including three days of painting. I’m very proud of what I’ve produced.”

Paul Sheehan, of Cork Simon, is similarly enthusiastic.

“Marie has taken homelessness out of the equation. The focus is on people, their interests, their hobbies. She has left homelessness at the door.

From the moment homeless people wake up to when they go to sleep, everything is about being homeless. So, I am very appreciative of Marie’s work.

The Exhibition

Cork people will undoubtedly enjoy the exhibition that is set to tour eight libraries in the next nine months. It will be launched at Cork City Library in Cork tomorrow, Wednesday, June 5 at 6pm, and subsequently be exhibited in Tory Top (July), Mayfield (August), Douglas (September and October), Blarney (November) and Bishopstown (December).

“I’m really very excited. I’m into my first year in my degree and I hope to start painting another body of work soon,” said Marie. “I’m interested in doing something with musicians next. So, that might be an idea. I played piano and went to The School of Music myself, so it is an area of interest for me.”

The talented artist is keen to express her gratitude to Cork Simon; she is also grateful to the colleges with whom she has worked.

“It has turned my life around. I am an out and out visual artist. 

It has been such an important new avenue in my life since my loss. But it is a serious career for me. 

"It is just wonderful to be taken seriously with it, to be assessed and instructed. Coming to art as a mature student, you bring more experiences with you. I’m enjoying it all.”