O
Geraldine O'BRIEN
A pupil of the FORBES SCHOOL in 1939.
Maggie O'BRIEN
Maggie O'Brien moved to Cornwall from London in 2006, after completing her art studies begun at St Martin's School of Art & Design, continued at Camberwell School of Art, and completed at Wimbledon School of Art.
A well-established exhibiting artist whose work has been shown at the Rainyday Gallery in Penzance, O'Brien currently maintains a studio at Trewidden Gardens. Here she creates atmospheric landscape paintings and drawings and builds installations related to the landscape around her, and found objects.
Maggie teaches the two-day course in Watercolour at the Newlyn School of Art on Chywoone Hill, Newlyn.
Breon O'CASEY
Born in London, the son of the Irish playwright Sean O'Casey, Breon has become one of the most versatile and highly regarded artists in West Cornwall, and in the St Ives School. He served an apprenticeship to Barbara HEPWORTH as did a number of the sculptors and artists important after WWII, but with a twist of the Celtic spirit of adventure has entered a wide range of arts including painting, printmaking, sculpture, weaving and jewellery, making him the doyen of artist craftsmen working in the area.
In 2008 in Falmouth, the Great Atlantic Arwenack St Gallery showed 14 of his abstract designs in collage, watercolour, gouache and oils, in their memorable show 'the golden age of cornish art'. He has exhibited at Rainyday Gallery, Penzance, and his work can also be seen on a regular basis at the Stoneman Gallery, Chapel Street, Penzance.
John O'CONNOR
Engraver associated with Falmouth, Cornwall
Michael O'DONNELL
O'Donnell was born in Penzance just after WWII, and studied art at the Bath Academy of Art at Corsham in the sixties. After completing his course there in 1967, he taught for two years in Sussex then worked in London on design projects.
Michael has worked in various Art Schools including the Falmouth College of Arts and was involved with the development of a number of Arts organisations and initiatives, including The Tate ( St. Ives,) - Leach Restoration Project - South West Arts in Exeter (as outlined below). He was closely associated with the original Trewarveneth Studio in Newlyn for over 30 years, while also maintaining his own studio focused entirely on his drawings and paintings. For the past ten years he has worked solely and full-time on his own artwork. Throughout his long career he has exhibited widely in every part of the United Kingdom. Two of his paintings are held in public collections in Japan, and many in private collections world-wide.
1985-7 - South West Arts, Bradninch Place, Gandy Street, Exeter. [Various Arts Panels,Awards Panels, Management Boards, Exhibition Selection and Hanging Committees, Arts Forum and planning meetings etc..
1987-1988: Elected Member, South West Arts Council of Management working in an advisory capacity to the Executive Board.
1988-1989: Appointed to the Executive Board as a non-executive Director for the Visual Arts and Crafts. Working with Sir Anthony Wilson (Chairman) in setting up the new Regional Arts Board. Member of the South West Arts Appointments Panel.
1989-1992: Member Regional Arts Executive Board, South West Arts.
1992-1994: Appointed Vice-Chairman, Executive Hon Officer to the South West Arts Regional Arts Board in Exeter with responsibilities across all Art Forms on all Executive Matters, throughout the Region. Liaison on National Issues,and planning.
1993-2009: Appointed to the Tate (St. Ives) Advisory Council.
2003-2008: Advocate / Founder member Leach Pottery Restoration Project.
Sheelagh O'DONNELL
Included in the main history of the Newlyn Art Gallery edited by Hardie in 1995, to celebrate the centennial of the institution presented to the artists in 1895 by John Passmore-Edward, are extracts and photographs provided by Sheelagh O'Donnell from her MA thesis at Falmouth College of Art (pp 26-7). This was a valuable addition to the research necessary to bring together a well-rounded history of this long-standing public art gallery.
Always a stalwart supporter of NAG and the NSA, Sheelagh was awarded a solo exhibition of her work in the summer of 1981. Then in 1988 she became the organiser for 'Craft Work', a show at NAG to highlight the wide ranging talented craftsmen and women living and working in the south-west of Britain.
Sheelagh was married to the painter Michael O'DONNELL, but the two parted, and for some years Sheelagh lived and worked in Bath, Somerset where she also ran an art gallery. She has now returned to West Cornwall and lives near Ludgvan.
Bart O'FARRELL
Bart admits to a thoroughly Celtic-fringe personality, born in Wales of Irish stock, but living in Cornwall, and continues to frequent all three countries in his search for roots and subjects. His interest is in the figurative representation of people, their activities and animals, throughout the cycle of the seasonal year.
Trained as an illustrator at Cardiff College of Art (1959-62) and further at the Polytechnic of Wales, Barry (1974-8), his careers have included work in advertising, and teaching, both of which he has given up in order to continue his painting. He works from St Keverne on the Lizard.
Jane O'MALLEY
Canadian painter, born in Montreal, who met and married Irish artist Tony O'MALLEY after meeting him in St Ives in 1969. Jane had attended art school in Canada, and after a bout of travelling, had come to St Ives to attend the School of Art (Leonard John FULLER Principal). They were both popular in St Ives and West Cornwall, and were also members of NSA and exhibitors at NAG and Penwith Galleries.
Now his widow, Jane lives in the home they built together in Ireland. Her close friends are Breon O'CASEY, Jane SCOTT and many others who travel to Ireland to paint with her. She continues to paint from her home studio and elsewhere, while exhibiting her work widely and at the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, including regularly in West Cornwall at private and public galleries.
In later years she has purchased the childhood home of Tony, and developed this into a well-conceived residential studio for visiting and student artists. On this project she is working with the National Gallery of Ireland who hold a permanent collection of her late husband's work.
Jane returns to Cornwall frequently where she has many friends and colleagues. Her work is exhibited locally at the Yew Tree Gallery near Morvah, and regularly with other Cornish and Irish artists by the Stour Gallery in Warwickshire.
Tony O'MALLEY
Irish-born artist (Callan, County Kilkenny) who initially worked in a bank before military service, and created his first oil painting in 1945 (Tate). He came to Cornwall on a painting holiday in 1955 and stayed, living in various places between St Ives and Penzance. Altogether he worked in Cornwall in the Land's End district for more than 30 years.
Latterly (1990) he and his wife Jane O'MALLEY(nee Harris), were drawn home to Ireland though maintaining their friends and memberships in Cornwall, where Tony has been greatly honoured and celebrated as a 'national treasure'. He was especially honoured in 1993 when the President of the Irish Republic, Mary Robinson, made him a Saoi (Aosdana title) presented to only 'Five Living Artists' at any one time. Together Jane and Tony created a rural idyll of a home in extensive laid-out gardens in which their studios and storerooms were contructed. Many Penwith friends, visited them and continue now to make the trip to Kilkenny to pay homage to the memory of a great friend and artist, who had spent the majority of his artistic life in Cornwall.
