Trish Morrissey - www.trishmorrissey.com
Artist's Statement
Trish Morrissey’s practice can be described broadly by the term “documentary aesthetic”. This is becoming a genre of photography that courts the real by staging pictures. The theorising inevitably gets tangled up in photography’s historical relationship with “truth” and its postmodernist critique. With Morrissey, however, staging is more than an arch gloss on the impossibility of representation; it is a door left open to let us view her in the act of constructing photographic meaning—imagining, remembering, planning, staging, acting, looking, deciding. It is her way into the heart of such issues as family experiences and national identities, feminine and masculine roles, and relationships between strangers. Her work does not so much define these subjects but uses photography to probe their boundaries, often left intact in everyday life.
©Alison Green from the book Vitamin Ph, published by Phaidon September 2006
CV
Born in 1967, Dublin, Ireland. Lives and works in London.
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2009
Front, Impressions Gallery, Centenary Square, Bradford, UK
Centre for Contemporary Photography, 404 George Street, Fitzroy, Melbourne, Victoria 3065, Australia
2007
Front (part I), Elaine Lévy Project, Bruxelles, Belgium
2005
Seven Years, Yossi Milo Gallery, New York, NY
New Works, Gallery of Photography, Dublin
New Works, The Pump House, London
2004
New Works, Impressions Gallery, York
New Works, Gardner Arts Centre, University of Sussex
2003
Trace Gallery, Weymouth, Dorset, UK
2000
WWM at Tom Blau Gallery, London
1999
WWM at Viewpoint Gallery, Salford, UK
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2007
Alone Together - Kunsthalle Palazzo, Liestal
F/Stop 1. Internationales Fotografiefestival Leipzig
2006
Family Photos Two person show with Richard Billingham. Galerie Photo du Pole Image Haute-Normandie, Rouen, France
EuropART, contemporary art from Europe, Billboard project, Vienna and Salzburg, curated by Walter Seidl and Ursula Maria Probst
Alone Together Galerie Nouvelles Images, Den Haag, Netherlands
2005
ev + a Limerick City Gallery of Art, Ireland
2004
EAST International, Norwich Gallery, Norwich
2003
Boundless at Fotofest, Naarden, The Netherlands
Schweppes Portrait Award, National Portrait Gallery, London
2002
Critical Dictionary, Mirror Gallery, London
John Kobal, 10 Years, National Portrait Gallery, London
2001
MAP, Art Pavillion, London
Fe/male, Installation, Braunchweiggasse Station, Vienna, Austria
Exquisite Corpse, Carlton Arts, San Paulo, Brazil
Elect at the London Institute Gallery, London
EDUCATION
2000-2001
MA in Photography, University for the Arts, London
GRANTS AND AWARDS
2007/08
The Media Museum Bursary
2007
Artist in Residence, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
2006
Prospective Sites, European Union Public Art Commission, Billboard Project, Austria
2005
Research Grant, Southampton Institute Centre for Advanced Scholarship in Art and Design
2004
Research and Development Grant, Arts Council of England
Research Grant, Southampton Institute Centre for Advanced Scholarship in Art and Design
1999
Finalist, John Kobal Portrait Award, National Portrait Gallery, London
1998
Portrait Award Winner, Elle/Photo98, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Runner-up, John Kobal Portrait Award, National Portrait Gallery, London
COLLECTIONS
Museum of Fine Art, Houston, TX
Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Vienna Museum of Applied and Contemporary Art
PUBLICATIONS
2009
Uncanny Likeness - The Contemporary Self Portrait (working title)
Thames and Hudson, to be published Autumn 2009
2006
Vitamin Ph , Survey of International Contemporary Photography, Phaidon Press
2005
EV+A, (Catalogue), Limerick City Art Gallery and Gandon Editions, Cork
2004
Cotton, Charlotte. The Photograph as Contemporary Art. Thamesand Hudson: 2004.
Seven Years. Impressions Gallery, 2004.
2003
Schweppes Portrait Award catalogue, 2003, National Portrait Gallery, London
Masquerade, ed. Kate Newton and Christine Rolph, Ffotogallery, Cardiff, 2003
2002
John Kobal Award catalogue, 2002, 1999, 1998, 1994, National Portrait Gallery, London
1999
Visionaire 29. New York, Visionaire: 1999.
1996
Double Vie, Double Vue. Paris, Foundation Cartier Pour l’Art Contemporain: 1996.
