Niamh O’Dobhain

Niamh’s work explores the complexities of the ‘self’, with a focus on self-invention and expression as she is fascinated with the plasticity of the self. Her work is inspired by actresses of the Hollywood Golden Age, which led to an interest in the concept and issues of beauty and ageing.

Niamh creates imagined faces which are influenced by her years of exposure to photos of Hollywood ‘glamour-shots’, stills, posters and media photos, and has developed a digital collection which is constantly expanding. She also uses makeup as a medium and turns the camera on herself, with photography being the undercurrent of her work, using it as self-reflection and an exercise in self-invention. Her work explores hiding, revealing and the performativity of our identities, featuring masks and evolving faces; distorted, fragmented, decaying, breaking apart, and piecing together, using layering techniques. Niamh’s work is her finding what faces ‘fit’, represent, and reflect an inner and possible future self.