Lisa O'Sullivan

Artist Bio

Lisa O’Sullivan is a visual artist and musician based in Cork city. She is a recent graduate of MTU Crawford College of Art and Design with a First Class Honours in Fine Art. (2024) She works across a variety of media including Printmaking, Drawing, Sound, Video and Photography.

Lisa was awarded a Crawford College of Art and Design Graduate Residency award in Drawing for 2024/2025. Other awards include Cork Printmakers Bursary Award for 2024/2025 Sample studios & Backwater graduate membership awards & MTU exhibition award. She was also longlisted for the RDS Visual Arts Graduate award.

Her work explores the interconnectedness between humans and nature through a lens of folklore & ritual. Her background as a musician is central to this investigation and she is interested in the potential outcomes of incorporating both elements into her practice.

Artist Statement

Using elements of print, drawing, photography, sound, video & performance, my work draws inspiration from folklore and ritual. I am interested in mapping a territory where landscape, ceremonial acts and the marking of time meet, finding new resonances in old practices as a way to navigate the current climate and ecological crises.

My work looks at folklore & myth as a lens for exploring the metaphysical space between nature and humans. It considers how environmental and ecological collapse require urgent re-engagement with old forms of knowledge and wisdom in an effort to reimagine better ways of co-existence with nature. I examine how ritual and reconnection to the natural world during an unprecedented time of failing systems and global uncertainty, might act as tools of transformation. Central to the work is an investigation- questioning if re-enchantment with nature through folklore could be a potent agent for resistance, change and renewal

Membership: Backwater Artists Network