Sheer determination got Niamh Barry to where she is today …
Image; Niamh Barry wears cobalt blue Jiggly knit top by Pleats Please Issey Miyake. Grey and black glass bangles by Arc Objects. “Vertical Stacked” bronze light sculpture and “Top Top” bronze console table both by Niamh Barry. Photographed at Killian McNulty Gallery, Dublin 8.
Determination defines artist and lighting designer Niamh Barry’s career. “I could always see in my mind’s eye I would be making work that would be shown and sold out in the world. That was my goal, my vision for what I wanted to do. I’ve always been extremely determined and when I decide I want something, nothing can get in my way,” she laughs.
“After college [at NCAD] I set up on my own in a 20-foot shipping container in a yard in Rush, Co Dublin, making light sculptures from bronze and hoping that the world would want them – and thankfully they did.”
Since then, Niamh’s exquisite bronze sculptural lighting and furniture has been commissioned for public and private collections all over the world. In her studio, nine craft speople are focused predominantly on site-specific commissioned pieces – each largescale piece can take up to 1,200 hours to produce.
Niamh allows herself one “passion project” per year, something over which she can have full creative freedom. Last year, she presented her latest design at Salon Art & Design in New York: “The piece is a very strong, sculptural form. It’s got real power, but it’s also quite soft and feminine. Even though it’s completely abstract, a lot of my work is about the human form.”
Niamh also displayed a new collection of large-scale paintings on canvas in her husband Killian McNulty’s antiques gallery and store. “I made a decision last summer to work as much as I possibly could on pure creativity, setting aside the day-to-day business side of what I do. I’ve been really enjoying this because, unlike my bronze pieces, it’s something that I can do completely on my own. I lock myself away in a room in the studio and work away on those. I’m very lucky to be able to do what I do.”
SEE MORE: At Close Range – Irish Contemporary Artist John Redmond
