Emily Mc Gardle

The Pox, 2023

Coloured pencil and pen on paper 

"This is a portrait of someone who was very excited to go to her first post-pandemic gig and was very nervous about catching COVID but ended up getting chickenpox instead. Was seeing one of her favourite bands in the whole wide world worth being covered scalp to shin in blisters? At the time, no. But in hindsight, maybe." - Emily Mc Gardle

Emily Mc Gardle is a printmaker from Co. Monaghan. Her practice consists primarily of screen printing and drawing. Using hand-drawn artwork, she creates multilayered screenprints that combine humour, satire and parody. She graduated from Dublin Institute of Technology in 2016 with a First-Class Honours degree in Fine Art and received an MA in Print from the Royal College of Art, London in 2020. She was shortlisted for the 2022 Zurich Portrait Prize, the 2023 and 2024 Trinity Buoy Wharf Working Drawing Award and the 2024 Derwent Art Prize. She is a member of Black Church Print Studio, Dublin. 

Go back to the shortlisted works