Who Are We?: The Power of Gender & Identity in Art & Design
Guest speakers on the night will be:
Joe Caslin (Artist)
Kyle Sven (Designer, Fine Art Photographer)
Kate Drinane (Tours, Talks, Training & Interpretation Officer, National Gallery of Ireland)
In many people’s view, the role of art and design in society is primarily to ‘induce human feelings within us’. Feelings of comfort, joy, security, guilt, empathy, and so on. Art and design, allows us to occasionally stop, recognise and reflect on our humanity and who we are. The question of ‘who we are’ has been a hot topic in recent years - especially with so much progress in the rights and representation for our friends and family within the LBGTQIA+ community. And with so much social discourse all around the world relating to gender & identity, we invited two top Irish creatives speakers who have explored these topics in their work to join us for our November night of creative nourishment. Let them entice you with their amazing work feed your creative soul with their unique insight bites on this hot topic.
About the Speakers
Joe Caslin
Joe Caslin is an Irish street artist, art teacher and activist. Best known for his beautifully rendered pencil drawings, which manifest as towering pieces of street art.
His highly accessible work engages directly with social issues connected to an evolving Ireland. Caslin confronts often difficult subjects such as suicide, consent and equality. The unavoidable scale of his work speaks to us gently and ask us in turn to be gentle with the people portrayed in each installation.
The monochrome drawings Caslin creates live with us and against many of us for some time before washing away. They hold a mirror up to the kind of society that we are, whilst asking us individually what kind of society we want to be a part of.
Kyle Sven
Kyle Sven is a South African born, Dublin based fine art photographer and design director.
Kyle’s personal work is heavily influenced by his relationship with gender and sexual identity. Exploring themes of masculinity, vulnerability and the human form.
Creating bold, graphic and often provocative imagery that introduce the viewer into an alternate world. His practice has a strong focus on creating surreal, imaginative and conceptual perspectives from real world narratives. Using creative lighting, colour and in camera techniques in dramatic, unconventional ways with the goal of reimagining our human existence.
Subverting gender roles and challenging the status quo, Kyle's images always expand the imagination and expectations of beauty.
Kyle has most recently been selected by the Royal Hibernian Academy as part of their Annual Exhibition. His work has also been featured in Schön, PAP, Totally Dublin, Kaltblut and Slippage magazine. Kyle also has a growing body of work commissioned from the commercial sector, producing campaign imagery for TBWA\Dublin, Samaritans and BeLonG To Youth Services.
Kate Drinane
Kate Drinane has been part of the Education Team at the National Gallery of Ireland for ten years. She has introduced and developed LGBTQIA+ programming at the Gallery, including the management of OUTing the Past: Festival of LGBT History in Dublin since 2019. Kate is the co-founder of the Queer Culture Ireland network. She volunteers with ShoutOut and Gaisce LikeMinded, through which she mentors young people in the LGBTQIA+ community. She holds a BA and MA in Art History from the University College Dublin.