Profile

Patricia Kelly

Patricia Kelly is successful textile artist who has encountered significant recognition for her work locally and internationally. Her works have been extensively exhibited across Ireland and abroad, are held in public collections including at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre, and have been acquired by private collectors from many countries.

Kelly creates abstract textile pieces using free motion embroidery techniques and old fabrics. Her inspiration and influence come from many sources including the landscape and skies in the west of Ireland, and the sense of belonging to a place, where family history is interwoven through present lives. Her work aims to convey the multi-layered nature of lives, linked and stitched together.

In her artist statement, the...

Patricia Kelly is successful textile artist who has encountered significant recognition for her work locally and internationally. Her works have been extensively exhibited across Ireland and abroad, are held in public collections including at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre, and have been acquired by private collectors from many countries.

Kelly creates abstract textile pieces using free motion embroidery techniques and old fabrics. Her inspiration and influence come from many sources including the landscape and skies in the west of Ireland, and the sense of belonging to a place, where family history is interwoven through present lives. Her work aims to convey the multi-layered nature of lives, linked and stitched together.

In her artist statement, the artist gives an insight into her work: ‘Using free motion embroidery techniques to create my works, which in recent times have become more abstract, there is a strong focus on the use of the stitched line. Inspiration and influence come from many sources including the Japanese concept of wabi-sabi, which is to see beauty in the imperfect; as well as from the rugged landscape and skies in the west of Ireland, where lines created by tangled hedgerows are silhouetted against coloured skies. The sense of belonging to a place, where family history is interwoven through present lives, greatly influences my works too. Incorporating recycled old textiles, often used by ancestors in quilt making, conveys something of the multi-layered nature of lives linked, stitched together – changing but staying the same, shifting, breathing, living.’

Bio

BASED in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland

EDUCATION

1986 Degree (BA Honours) in Fine Craft Design (Textile / Embroidery), University of Ulster, Belfast
1988 Diploma in Art Education, University of Ulster, Belfast

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2025 ‘Textile Exhibition’, SCD Studio, Perugia, Italy
2024 ‘Patricia Kelly Solo Exhibition’ (invited artist), Knitting and Stitching Show, Belfast, N. Ireland
2022 Strule Arts Centre, Omagh, Northern Ireland
2021 Ards Art Centre, Newtownards, N. Ireland
2017 Waterways Ireland, Enniskillen FLIVE, N. Ireland
2010, 2011 Inspire Gallery, Dublin, Ireland
2010 The Waterside Theatre, Derry, N. Ireland
2009 Iontas Theatre Gallery, Castleblaney, Ireland
2009 The Alley Theatre and Arts Centre, Strabane, N. Ireland
2009 The Grand Opera House, Belfast, N. Ireland
2009 Market House Gallery, Mullingar, Ireland
2009 The Higher Bridges Gallery, Enniskillen, N Ireland
2008 The Carlinn Gallery, Carlingford, Ireland
2007 The Hamilton Gallery, Sligo, Ireland

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2025, International Art Textile Biennale, touring exhibition throughout galleries in Australia
2025, ‘Capturing Nature / Dabas Notversana', International Drawing Box, Jelgava Latvia
2024, 'Art at the Modernist House', Gallery 545 at La Roche House, Belfast, N. Ireland
2024, 2023, 2022 ‘Gallery 545: Contemporary Art of Northern Ireland #3, #4’, #5, Gallery 545 at the Island Arts Centre, Lisburn, N. Ireland
2024 Museo del Ricamo e del Tessile (Embroidery and Textile Museum), Valtopina, Italy
2024, 2021 ‘Textile Art’, Gallery 57 Contemporary Art, West Sussex, England
2024, Drawing Box International, Leitrim Sculpture Centre
2023 'Pathways', Craft NI Gallery, Belfast, N. Ireland
2022 ‘Cloth and Clay’, Island Arts Centre, Lisburn, N. Ireland
2022 ‘Textile Art’, Amelie Maison d’Art, Paris, France
2021 ‘Fibre: Structure and Surface’, Gallery 57 Contemporary Art, West Sussex, England
2021 ‘Art in Mind’, Brick Lane Gallery, London
2020 ‘The Paper Bag Show’, Cross Gallery, Bundaberg, Australia
2020-2022 ‘The Drawing Box International Touring Exhibition’, UK
2019 ‘Nine Walls’, The Hyde Bridge Gallery, Sligo, Ireland
2017 ‘Facing West’, Boyle Arts Festival, Boyle, Ireland
1999, 2007, 2010 ‘RUA Annual Exhibition’, Ulster Museum, Belfast, N. Ireland
2010 ‘Sacred Project’, with selected works from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Enniskillen, N. Ireland

RESIDENCIES

2008, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2017, 2019 Residency, Tyrone Guthrie Centre, Co. Monaghan, Ireland
2008, 2009, 2011, 2013, 2017 Fermanagh District Council Residency Award, N. Ireland

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

NIVAL, National Irish Visual Arts Library, Dublin
HSE, Health Services Ireland
The New Acute Hospital, Enniskillen, N. Ireland
The Tyrone Guthrie Centre, Co. Monaghan, Ireland
Enniskillen Castle Museum, Enniskillen, N. Ireland

PUBLICATIONS

2023 ‘Friday Feature Artist Interview’, Fibre Arts Takes Two, Australia https://www.fibreartstaketwo.com/articles/kelly-2/
2023 Barbara Pavan, ‘Patricia Kelly’, Artemorbida Textile Art Magazine, 19 June, https://www.artemorbida.com/patricia-kelly/

MEMBERSHIP

The Drawing Box, international drawing group.

ART-RELATED WORK EXPERIENCE

1989-2021 Teacher of Art and Design (F/T)

OTHER

Awarded grants in support to the artist’s practice by
Fermanagh and Omagh District Council, N. Ireland
Arts Council of Northern Ireland