Fidelma Massey

Fidelma Massey studied sculpture at the Dunlaoire School of Art, Dublin, and has exhibited many times in Ireland, the U.K., France, Italy and Germany.

Artist’s Statement

I like to invent images for invisible beings: plants, spirits, animal spirits, human spirits, and all the beings in between.

I draw very heavily on traditional church art.

I was reared a Catholic, surrounded by Madonnas, and I love all of the images of the Mother still, but have widened my viewpoint to incorporate images from many religions and cultures, from many places in the world.

I love Gothic art  particularly and you will find many references to church carvings in my work, like green men (and women), the Madonnas of course, and all the infinity of mythical beasts that inhabit Gothic cathedrals.

I love hybrids, beasts that are neither one thing nor the other, a man who is also a bird, a woman who is a tree, deliberately ambiguous images, hair that might be water, or branches, eggs that might hatch into birds or snakes, or anything else you can imagine……

I live sometimes in Ireland, and sometimes in England, in Skelmersdale with the Transcendental Meditation group there. I have practiced meditation (TM ) for 27 years, and could not live without its peace and deep nourishment, which feed directly into my work.