The artists nominated by
Recent graduate Berta Mars presents her latest work The Loudest Silence – a nostalgic look back at the artist’s childhood memories while also reflecting on a slower way of life exemplified in the represented place. While the topic may not be loudly political, it remains current. The jury praised Mars’ composition in the images, but also the “raw emotional intensity” of them.
Leon Nevill Gallagher explores the lacuna that exists between people influenced by our relationship with the online. Informed by his experience of temporary separation from his girlfriend, he proposes a narrative by visualising the emotions around the spaces created between loved ones in times of distance and reliance on online communication.
Debbie Castro conveys memory loss through the family story of her father and his dementia through the sensitive and considerate editing and narration of his personal family photographs and archives. Her work talks about mental health, especially in the case of the project Age is a Privilege, Unless You Forget!, which reflects on her personal experience of the effects of Alzheimer's on a loved one.
Similar to Castro’s work, Sarah Navan’s ongoing project Care in Progress serves as a cathartic practice to understand a mental state of being – in this case examining her own experience with bipolar disorder. With Care in Progress, she shifts the lens back onto herself and her everyday life as she learns to live anew following her diagnosis.
Also using his everyday life but with a very different approach is Chris Finnegan with his project The Grammar of Home. At times collaborating with his child to present ideas around the definition of a ‘home’, Finnegan critically interrogates ideas of home-making, childhood and the domestic sublime.
Recent graduate Berta Mars presents her latest work The Loudest Silence – a nostalgic look back at the artist’s childhood memories while also reflecting on a slower way of life exemplified in the represented place. While the topic may not be loudly political, it remains current. The jury praised Mars’ composition in the images, but also the “raw emotional intensity” of them.
Leon Nevill Gallagher explores the lacuna that exists between people influenced by our relationship with the online. Informed by his experience of temporary separation from his girlfriend, he proposes a narrative by visualising the emotions around the spaces created between loved ones in times of distance and reliance on online communication.
Debbie Castro conveys memory loss through the family story of her father and his dementia through the sensitive and considerate editing and narration of his personal family photographs and archives. Her work talks about mental health, especially in the case of the project Age is a Privilege, Unless You Forget!, which reflects on her personal experience of the effects of Alzheimer's on a loved one.
Similar to Castro’s work, Sarah Navan’s ongoing project Care in Progress serves as a cathartic practice to understand a mental state of being – in this case examining her own experience with bipolar disorder. With Care in Progress, she shifts the lens back onto herself and her everyday life as she learns to live anew following her diagnosis.
Also using his everyday life but with a very different approach is Chris Finnegan with his project The Grammar of Home. At times collaborating with his child to present ideas around the definition of a ‘home’, Finnegan critically interrogates ideas of home-making, childhood and the domestic sublime.
Berta Mars is a photographer from Barcelona based in Dublin. Her practice is a mix of Portraiture, Documentary and Fine Art Photography, and often explores topics that involve human relationships to capture the essence of people and places from an intimate perspective.
Berta graduated from an Advanced Vocational Training on TV and Media Communications in her hometown.
In Dublin, she enrolled in Griffith College where she graduated in 2023 from a BA (Hons) in Photography. During her final year, she produced “The Loudest Silence” as her graduate project, with which she was shortlisted on the RDS Visual Media Awards and selected to be part of the RADAR program run for PhotoIreland.
Berta’s work has also been part of the annual print fair Halftone in the Library Project several times.
Chris Finnegan is a visual artist and arts educator from Cork who works primarily through photography. His work explores everyday occurrences, mundane objects and events.
Recently moved back to Ireland after a decade in the UK, his current practice centres on the home and suburbia; critically interrogating ideas of home-making, childhood and the domestic sublime. He regularly collaborates with his young sons.
He has exhibited work extensively in Ireland, the UK and internationally, including; the 192nd RHA Annual Exhibition, Institute of Photography Penryn, GoMA Glasgow, Fringe Arts Bath, the LA Centre for Digital Arts.
Solo exhibitions include Someone Else’s Somewhere at the Mills Centre, London in 2015 and House Rules at 6 Central Avenue in 2022. In 2023 his photographic series House Rules was published by PhotoIreland as a TLP Edition. He is a recipient of the Agility Award 2023 from the Arts Council Ireland.
He holds a BA Fine Art from TUD, Dublin and has recently completed a Masters in Photography with Falmouth University.
Debbie Castro, an Irish Conceptual Documentary Artist currently based in London, UK, seamlessly intertwines photography, poetry, and moving image in her artistic practice. Positive, reliable, motivated working both in a team and individually. Enjoys building a community, organising and problem solving. Calm but passionate with excellent management skills working towards a budget. Educator with a Degree in Psychology and a MA in Photographic Arts. Freelance Co-ordinator and teacher for London Institute of Photography, curating and executing exhibitions.
Leon is a contemporary Irish lens-based artist, living in Berlin. His practice lies in conceptualising the space between people and communicative technology, creating documents reflecting on the emotional and physical shift occurring as the surface of our communicational needs reposition themselves. Leon refers to his work as a hybrid ‘documentary’ form, drawing from fact and fiction to realise a reality that exists in-between.
Sarah Navan is a Photographic Artist living in Co. Clare. Sarah graduated her BA in Photographic Media from Griffith College Dublin in 2022.
Sarah is in receipt of the inaugural RADAR Research and Development Artist residency. Having been selected by Inspirational Arts and PhotoIreland from nominations by eleven Photography programmes across Ireland.
Her project Care in Progress has been longlisted for the RDS Visual Arts Award 2022 and was awarded the Agility award from the Arts Council in 2023.
