Jaki Irvine

Irvine's career is marked by her work with video installation, photography, music composition, and writing.

Biography of Jaki Irvine

Jaki Irvine, born in 1966 in Dublin, is an artist who currently divides her time between Ireland and Mexico. She pursued a BA in Fine Art Sculpture from the National College of Art & Design in Dublin from 1984 to 1989, followed by an MA in Visual Arts at Goldsmiths College, London, from 1992 to 1994.

In addition to her practice, she serves as a regular artist advisor at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam.

Her solo and two-person exhibitions include "Jaki Irvine & Locky Morris, Re_sett_ing_s" at Void in Derry (2023), "Re_sett_ing_s" (two-person exhibition with Locky Morris) at The Complex in Dublin (2022), "Ack Ro’" at Frith Street in London (2021), "Ro’ Ro’" at The Bower Gallery in London (2021), "Ack Ro’" at Kerlin Gallery in Dublin (2020), among others.

Additionally, Jaki Irvine's works have been featured in numerous group exhibitions, including "The Narrow Gate of the Here-and-Now" at Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin (2021), "Summer Breeze" at Frith Street Gallery in London (2017), "A Room of one’s own" at Laboratorio Arte Alameda in Mexico City (2015), "Silver" at Frith Street Gallery in London (2014), and many more. 

Jaki Irvine's Art Style

Jaki Irvine's art is characterized by immersive video and sound installations that tell fragmented, elliptical, and open-ended narratives. Her work is grounded in rigorous research, often focusing on evocative details from landscapes and cityscapes, particularly in Dublin and Mexico City. Irvine's pieces explore contested histories, sonic bricolage, and the built environment, incorporating the customs and communities of urban residents.

Irvine frequently centers her work on the peripheral or undervalued aspects of history, often highlighting overlooked female figures or presenting alternative perspectives on the present.

In her imaginative worldview, humans and nature are deeply intertwined, with plants, birds, and other creatures permeating her practice. This approach blurs the boundaries between the real and the imagined, contributing to a sense of the unknown and unknowable in her work.