Prince Albert of Monaco has opened up his palace to show Irish people a James Joyce painting that he bought from the Donegal artist Mark McFadden.
McFadden, a self-taught artist who spent years working as a barman in the south of France before taking up his paintbrush, features in a new RTÉ series on the Irish who cater to the super-rich and famous. In the documentary Irish in Wonderland, presented by Yasmine Akram, he is allowed to bring the camera crew into the Monaco palace to film the Joyce portrait thanks to his friendship with the monarch.
He reveals how the prince has a strong connection to Ireland through his mother, the Irish-American actress Princess Grace. “He is very proud of his Irish heritage,” McFadden…
The above is a Snippet from the thetimes.co.uk
Today, his works can be found in some prominent private collections, including the collection of H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco who purchased a portrait of James Joyce, two pieces by the Levett family trust and three pieces by Julian Lennon.
Speaking to the Donegal News from his home on the Cote d’Azur this week, Mr McFadden urged anyone with big dreams not to be afraid to pursue them.
“Sometimes, you just need to make the leap,” he said.
The above is a Snippet from the Donegal News
Mark will be exclusively exhibiting his own pieces. Below is a selection currently on display in the Gallery. Don’t hesitate to give Mark a call for a visit, or just drop in at your leisure.
Ph +33 (0)629936884
Mark’s portrait of Oscar Wilde is an interpretation of the photograph by Napoleon Sarony that has come to be the image through which Wilde is universally recognised. The portrait, with the hints of degeneration that serve as reminders that Wilde was the inventor of the most celebrated of all portraits in fiction, is more a complex dialogue between painter and subject than a simple representation of an admired writer.
“I first started painting literary figures when reading Robert Graves’ “Goodbye to All That”, his beautifully written account of a harrowing experience serving the full term of World War One.
The next task seemed the most daunting, to do justice to one of my favourite authors, to try and encapsulate in a painting all that was Oscar Wilde.
I read Oscar from a young age and he quickly became one of my all time favourite authors.
He has inspired me not only artistically but also personally.
I have always appreciated his insight into the society that he lived in but also into the human condition, which he sometimes very cleverly mocks, sometimes subtly, sometimes with great and humorous irreverence.
Oscar Wilde, a writer whom I’ve admired most of my life not only for his politically and socially perspicuous plays, depicting with great humour and insight the era in which he lived. I have always enjoyed Oscar’s sharp and poignant wit and have quoted him in my daily life for many years.
The painting had to have many elements in an attempt to come close to portraying everything this great man was.
It had to have subtlety, beauty, intelligence, mystery, elegance and flamboyance to name but a few of his qualities”.
His distinctive technique is oil on large canvas using only a palette knife, which provides a rich texture, adding to the intensity
one feels when looking at his complex figurative paintings, revealing the human condition.
He tries to capture the essence of his chosen subject, to give them depth and a presence on the canvas that portrays the intricacy
of our human existence. He often feels as if he is sculpting on the canvas.
Mark explores the duality within all humans, the balance and conflict of joy and sorrow, contentment and discontentment, love
and hate, torture and peace, what often is the tragic genius of the tortured artist and the pain it sometimes is to be human.
Something that is personal to McFadden is the alchemy of the soul; to reach a higher and more enlightened state of
consciousness, the allegory of taking base materials and transforming them to something of a higher incarnation, which is part of
the reason why he is attracted to painting people of an artistic nature, in essence they used simple tools and basic elements and
fashioned something of wonder from them, this is his tribute to their pursuit of expressing themselves in the attempt to
enlighten us.
http://chisholmgallery.com/
McFadden is self-taught, and likes to read the authors’ work while creating the portraits. He uses a palette knife and layering technique to achieve his unique style. “The palette knife is like a little trowel used by builders,” he says. “Instead of building walls I use it to build impressions of people, layer upon layer.”
Conor Goodman, Irish Times
Showcasing their works will be Sergey Talichkin, Rocco Tullio, Liz Doyle, Denise Downey
Jackie Edwards, Ken Browne, Kevin McSherry, Marty Byrne Gascon, Patrick Walshe, Sean Hillen, Una Kavanagh,
Mark McFadden and Miriam Sweeney
For more information please email info@themarkmcfadden.com
Mark explores the duality within all humans, the balance and conflict of joy and sorrow, contentment and discontentment, love and hate, torture and peace, what often is the tragic genius of the tortured artist and the pain it sometimes is to be human.
He tries to capture the essence of his chosen subject, to give them depth and a presence on the canvas that portrays the intricacy of our human existence. He often feel as if he is sculpting on the canvas.
For more information please email info@themarkmcfadden.com
Figuring out where to put George Bernard Shaw a couple of days before my Dublin Exibition, an interesting point about him is that he is the only person to have been awarded both a Nobel Prize in Literature (1925) and an Academy Award (1938)
Marks Current Dublin Exhibition
Spiritual Warrior by Mark McFadden
Crying Child by Mark McFadden
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