Shelagh completed an MA in Renaissance Literature and Culture in 2006.  She taught English up until 2013 and now concentrates on her art.

‘My paintings and drawings are primarily an emotional response to a subject rather than what I see. When I paint, I become absorbed in memories, colours and favourite motifs such as birds, chairs, lamps, ceramics, flowers, hares, the moon, snow and rain – all things deep in my sub-conscious, sown in my Irish childhood. These are frequently otherworldly, as I feel enveloped in another world when I work, just as I do when I read poetry and novels. Favourite writers include Seamus Heaney, Michael Longley, Mary Oliver, Thomas Hardy, George Eliot, Gaston Bachelard and Niall Williams. More recently books that evoke the poetry of landscape – Robert Macfarlane.

These paintings emerged as I worked in sketchbooks over the summer, trying to get to the heart of what interested me and to access that inner place where the dreams are. I wrote and painted and made little books, immersing myself in the processes without looking for specific outcomes. The contrasts between prevailing deep, dark colours overlaid with little blazes of colour was something I was keen to develop – probably as a result of looking at 16th century paintings in The National Gallery in London. The pages of the books I made represented small, sequestered, private universes where the mood was saturated with peace and transcendence – ordinary places affording extraordinary moments. These sketchbook and handmade book explorations then lead to the making of these paintings.’