This 1970s Galway semi-d has been refreshed and revived
This 1970s Galway semi-d has been refreshed and revived

Nathalie Marquez Courtney

Material Intelligence: Meet the emerging designers from Ireland’s leading fashion colleges
Material Intelligence: Meet the emerging designers from Ireland’s leading fashion colleges

Ruth O'Connor

A red carpet first-timer brings us behind the scenes at Cannes Film Festival
A red carpet first-timer brings us behind the scenes at Cannes Film Festival

Kara O'Sullivan

Garden designer Peter Dowdall on the best places to find unique pieces for your garden
Garden designer Peter Dowdall on the best places to find unique pieces for your garden

Megan Burns

Key trends and challenges shaping the job market in 2025
Key trends and challenges shaping the job market in 2025

Leonie Corcoran

Inside this five-bedroom Edwardian Terenure home
Inside this five-bedroom Edwardian Terenure home

IMAGE

In The Meadows 2025 review: A festival for the fans
In The Meadows 2025 review: A festival for the fans

Sarah Gill

Sole Steps: Join us for a run and a coffee in Phoenix Park
Sole Steps: Join us for a run and a coffee in Phoenix Park

Edaein OConnell

We’re taking notes on the rich, tactile details of this Belfast café for our own homes
We’re taking notes on the rich, tactile details of this Belfast café for our own...

Megan Burns

Cathy White talks honestly about taking to the road as a new mum, without her baby
Cathy White talks honestly about taking to the road as a new mum, without her...

Fiona Alston

Image / Editorial

Pigsy: Nostalgia’s Not What It Was


By Fiona McCarthy
04th Oct 2017
Pigsy: Nostalgia’s Not What It Was

Pigsy, who also goes by the name of Ciaran McCoy at the award-winning ODKM?architects, is opening up his second solo exhibition this week.
We caught up with the artist/architect to hear more…


How do you feel about heading in to your second solo exhibition?
It feels good. I suppose the last one was a really big learning curve for me, but?great fun. I really enjoyed the’six weeks. I get quite bored and restless, so I?used the gallery space to paint a canvas on the floor and I would just paint away. People would come in and see me paint and I’d have a chat with them. It’s more interactive, so it’s breaking down that hierarchy between art and public.

What should we expect to see in ?Nostalgia’s Not What It Was??
The title was actually less positive until I changed it, it was originally ‘No Space for Nostalgia’. I fixated on this notion of nostalgia holding you back from what you want to do, before realising that some nostalgia is good. If you can’t pick out the positive things from your past and what it made you,?nostalgic thoughts can prevent you from being positive in the future. ‘Nostalgia’s Not What It Was’ ?is about moving forward.?

How did you come up with the alternative name of Pigsy?
It’s simple, it’s my nickname from when I was a kid. It was a character from Monkey Magic, a japanese programme about demons. One of the demons was kind of an anti-hero. My mates thought I looked like him, so they called me Pigsy. The reason why I use it in my painting, is because Ciaran McCoy is quite formal, like my architectural world. With painting, I want to be informal.

What do you do differently with your art as your alter ego, Pigsy, as opposed to architect, Ciaran McCoy?
There is no third-party influence like in architecture. With art, all you have is a blank canvas. The only real restriction is yourself and your own creative inabilities that can restrict your process. The only thing that confines you is the edges of a canvas.

What is your favourite medium to work with at the moment?
In my new stuff what I have been doing is, I pour really high gloss, like household paint, and then I sand it out, so it gets a big, lovely texture. When you spray any materials on it, it grabs it. I have a couple of friends in art who work with stencils. They give me their leftover spray cans, and tops. I don’t clean the tops, and the ones that spray wrong are the ones I want, the ones that bubble. It gives me texture and it’s more interesting. I like the imperfection of it all, there is more opportunity in it.

As an artist, how do you find working in this specific creative field in Ireland?
Ireland has a small art market as well as an?architectural market, so it’s a bit more difficult. I am not sure how many artists are carving out a living. They just do it for the love of it, that’s just what they are. I paint because I have to, more than I want to. The guys in Ireland are mostly really positive, people like Emma Sheridan, ADW, Noel Dempsey or Steve Kemp. I just love talking to them, they just look at life differently. It inspires me.

Steve Kemp is curating your show again, what does he represent that appeals to you as an artist?
I love Steve as a person and an artist. He’s a cool guy. We’re very similarly minded, but so different. We have a good laugh but we’re fairly honest with one another. He’s brutally honest, which I need.?

What artists appeal to you in the industry?
Jean-Michel Basquiat’does appeal to me. Funnily enough Le Corbusier’s work appeals to me usually. His work is all based on the golden ratio. If I’m struggling at the start to get an idea, I use a mathematical equation, that goes back to my architecture.?In art you hear that staring at a blank canvas is the most unfriendly thing in the world. I love blank canvases, I just see huge opportunity.?I also like the guys that are more expressive with their art, like Jackson Pollock’s kind of stuff.

What’s next as Pigsy?
Next year, I plan to do a show in London. The year after I am going to hit the states, so either New York or LA, that is the aim. This show is a stepping stone. The documentary maker Mike Andrews contacted me a while ago. He liked my story and wanted to do a piece on me, and we’re going to try and get that into a few festivals.?Either way, my plan is to keep painting. I have lots of ideas that are just stacking up in my head, that I just want to paint.

Nostalgia’s Not What It Was?runs from October 5-8 at the?Fumbally Exchange, Dublin 2.