Stephen Doyle

Click image for price and more information

Biography
Stephen Doyle is a Cork based artist and graduate of Crawford College of Art and Design (2017). Doyle’s work references queer identity and queer culture through painting and instillation.
For his graduate show, he received the ’Student of the Year’ Award which included a solo exhibition, ‘Alt Masc’ in the Lavit Gallery and a residency at Backwater Studios. Since graduating last year he has also been shortlisted for various national and international awards including the UK Emerald Pride Art Award and the Zurich Portrait Prize in the National Gallery of Ireland and was the overall winner of the ‘Sunny Art Prize’ and the ‘Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize’.

Doyle explores issues of queer identity through the relationship between figuration and the politics of representation. His latest collection of new works examine the experiences of the Chinese LGBTQIA+ community. Doyle uses the prevailing social control overqueer culture in China as a metaphor to address historic and ongoing discrimination–even stigmatization–of queer people across the globe.

In a series of works informed by a residency in Shanghai, Doyle looks at China’s restrictive social structures and conventions with respect to sexual minorities. The artist focuses on individuals that they encountered during their residency–ranging from a queer activist to anonymous citizens–to ruminate on the tension between the conditions of existence of LGBTQIA+ people and normative sexual morale and behaviour.

Doyle makes portraits of LGBTQIA+ people, and often includes objects in the paintings, a gesture of ‘othering’ the art that mirrors the subject matter it investigates. The artist depicts subjects within everyday settings in a naturalistic manner; they usually sketch a character in situ, then later re-create the drawing in oil paint, sometimes also using their own photographs to finalise the composition.

Painting, and portraiture in particular, is associated with the iconography of power (for example politicians and religious figures), and consequently with mainstream worldviews, of which queer identity and culture have always been excluded. By invoking them, Doyle makes an ironic comment on the subalternisation of the existence of the LGBTQIA+ community, and simultaneously does his part to illuminate it.

Solo Exhibitions
2020 Numb,​ Triskel Arts Centre, Cork. Curated by Miguel Amado, director of Sirius Arts Centre
2019 Post-Binary, SO Fine Art Editions, Dublin
2019 Sunny Art Prize Winner Exhibition London
2018 Alt Masc, Lavit Gallery, Co.Cork. Student of the Year Award.
2018 Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize Shortlist Exhibition and Solo Exhibition, Broadwalk House, 5 Appold St, London

Selected Group Exhibitions
2023 Winter Exhibition, SO Fine Art Editions, Dublin
2023 Decennium, 10th Anniversary Exhibition, SO Fine Art Editions, Dublin
2022 Generation 2022 – New Irish Painting, Butler Gallery, Kilkenny
2021 NUA, SO Fine Art Editions, Dublin
2021 Human Animal, Studio 12, Cork
2021 Boyle Arts Festival, Roscommon
2021 Queer As You Are, Luan Gallery, Athlone
2021 Royal Hibernian Academy 191th Annual Exhibition, Invited Artist, Dublin
2021 New Threads, Crawford Art Gallery, Cork
2021 30th Anniversary Backwater Artists Studio, Blue House Gallery, Cork
2020 Lavit Gallery’s Annual Members Exhibition​, Lavit Gallery, Cork
2020 Royal Ulster Academy 139th Annual Exhibition​, Belfast
2020 Winter Show, SO Fine Art Editions, Dublin
2020 Mason Hayes & Curran Private Annual Exhibition, Dublin
2019 Harmony Art Exchange Program​, Group Exhibition/Residency, Shanghai, China
2019 Sunny Art Prize Winner Exhibition​, London
2019 Royal Ulster Academy 138t​h​ Annual Exhibition,​ Belfast
2019 Small Town Decline: Rural Patterns of Decay​, Glor, Ennis, Clare
2019 VUE,​ National Contemporary Art Fair in association with SO Fine Art Editions, Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin
2019 This is a Painting Show,​ Sternview Gallery, Cork
2019 Winter Exhibition, Lavit Gallery, Cork
2019 Art on a postcard, Online/London, England
2018 Alt-Masc, Lavit Gallery, Co.Cork. Student of the Year Award. Guest Speaker – Curator of exhibitions at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Sean Kissane.
2018 Beyond the Binaries​, UK Emerald Winter Pride Art Awards, The House of St. Barnabas, London, UK. Judges Include Simon Tarrant, Brenda Emmanus, Frances Segelman, Suzanne van Rossenberg, Ki Yoong.
2018 Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize Shortlist Exhibition and Solo Exhibition​, London, UK. Judges Include Conrad Carvalho, Dr. David Bellingham, Aindrea Emelife, Howard Lewis, Briony Marshall, Rosa Sepple, Dr. David Anfam, Anthony Fawcett.
2018 Sunny Art Prize Shortlist Exhibition​, London, UK. Judges include Wu Xiaohai, Zhao Jun, Lin Guanhong, Pedro Ip, Chu Weiming, Fan Yaokai, Jocelyn Burton, Yemyungji, Tim Andrews
2018 Zurich Portrait Prize​, National Gallery of Ireland. Judges Include Geraldine O’Neill, Sue Rainsford and Tanya Kiang
2018 Residency Showcase,​ Crawford College of Art and Design
2018 VUE,​ National Contemporary Art Fair in association with SO Fine Art Editions, Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin
2017 Beyond Dialogue, Crawford College of Art and Design, Co. Cork
2017 ReCollective, St. Peters Event Centre, Co. Cork
2017 6Marks Drawing Collective, C.I.T Wandesford Quay Gallery, Co. Cork
2016 K – Fest, Art Festival, Kilorglin, Co.Kerry
2016 Murmuration, 3rd Year Group Exhibition, Village Hall, Co. Cork
2016 A Good Start Exhibition, C.I.T Wandesford Quay Gallery, Co. Cork
2016 Christmas Art Exhibition, C.I.T Wandesford Quay Gallery, Co. Cork
2015 Reconnect, CCAD Fine Art/ Applied Art, C.I.T, Co. Cork

Awards/Residencies/Bursaries/Accolades
2022 Masterclass Teacher at the RHA
2022 Shortlisted for the Trinity Buoy Wharf Drawing Prize
2022 Individual Art Bursary – Cork City Council
2021 Peer Panelist for the Arts Council of Ireland
2021 Cork Pride Residency
2021 Added to Art History Syllabus for Leaving Cert
2021 Lewis Glucksman Gallery Commission
2021 Butler Gallery Pride Residency
2021 & 2019 Work added to National Art Collection at Crawford Art Gallery
2020 Visual Art Bursary Award – Arts Council of Ireland
2019 Harmony Exchange Program, Shanghai Residency
2019 Top 50 People to watch by Irish Times
2018 Shortlisted for Zurich Portrait Prize in the National Gallery of Ireland
2018 Sunny Art Prize Winner
2018 Winner of Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize
2018 Shortlisted for the UK Emerald Winter Pride Art Awards
2017 Backwater Studios Residency
2017 Student of The Year Award
2015 Chairperson of Crawford Society – Awarded ‘Academic Society of the Year’