Solomon Fine Art is delighted to present TRIBE, a new exhibition by Helen O’Sullivan-Tyrrell.  This is her first solo show with Solomon Fine Art since joining the Gallery in 2014.  Born in London in 1968, O’Sullivan-Tyrrell grew up in Bray, Co. Wicklow but is now based in Brussels. While mainly a figurative painter, her subjects range from portraiture, still life and landscape and she is currently examining the theme of tribal identities; particularly how the imagery associated with Catholicism is intertwined with what is viewed as ‘Irishness’.

TRIBE revisits childhood and religious rites of passage in Catholic Ireland and with these atmospheric, evocative images she recognises and captures happiness and sadness, ease and anxiety, moments from a past that is itself never past. The exhibition not only references historical events, memories or feelings from a time gone by. Portraits and intimate glimpses of contemporary life intertwine themselves; provoking questions about today’s world and the one gone by.

Helen O’Sullivan-Tyrrell has been exhibiting her work in Belgium for a number of years and has been a finalist in both ‘De Canvascollectie’ (2012) and the Belfius Art Prize (2014). In 2014 her painting ‘The Convalescent’ was selected as one of the 12 finalists in the prestigious inaugural 2014 Hennessy Portrait Prize and subsequently exhibited at the National Gallery of Ireland.  In April 2015 the same picture was selected as one of the 55 finalists in the UK’s most esteemed art prize – the BP Portrait Awards – which sees the painting on tour to the National Portrait Gallery in London,  the Scottish National Portrait Gallery and the Ulster Museum until the Spring of 2016.  The OPW purchased one of Helen’s paintings for the State Art Collection last November and soon after she made the finals of the 2015 Hennessey Portrait Awards for a second time with a beautiful portrait of her son Fiacra, which is currently on display at the National Gallery of Ireland.