Paddy Critchley is a painter from Portlaoise, County Laois. He works in Wickham St. Studios Limerick and his Father’s paint shed in Portlaoise. He is a painter, with a keen interest in the theatre of the absurd. Also a painter and decorator, he incorporates elements of this trade into his work. Installation plays an integral part to his practise, as seen in his exhibition ‘Waiting’ where he held an exhibition-play on the theatre stage of the Dunamase Arts Centre. Paddy takes great inspiration from artists and writers such as Joseph Beuys, Brendan Behan and Robert Tressell. Tressell’s book ‘The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists’ has influenced Paddy’s newest work greatly. Ideas of socialism, working class struggles and livelihood, the people in close proximity to him, and the trade of painting and decorating are subjects explored within his work.
The motif of the ladder is used to encapsulate these principles. This object is reoccurring in his paintings, and is shown alongside his work, along with other tools and trade items. Paddy wishes to explore the relationship between his life in the studio making paintings, and his life painting houses. He believes that his work is a form of social sculpture, responding to his life and environment, and how the differences between a painter and decorator and a fine art painter are minimal.
