Street artist satirises Irish banking crisis
“Pricks & Mortar”, which runs at the South Studios Gallery in Dublin for three days starting today, has been created by Irish street artist ADW.
After his first successful solo show Stensual in 2010, his new exhibit also features 3D pieces and installations which, the promoters say, “sums up the post-Celtic Tiger hangover”.
Among the other pieces is a picture of Steve Martin’s character in the film The Jerk. The image has been altered to have the character dressed as a leprechaun, complete with beard, green top hat and garb, and a child’s bat and ball embossed with a Celtic harp.
Under the image are the words, The Jerk: A Rags to Riches to Rags Story.
Another image entitled Dumb Beetle shows the Naas Ball being rolled away by a dung beetle while, on a rather more serious note, there is one picture entitled Riot Police, indicating the potential uprising which might follow the collapse of the economy.
ADW studied animation at college in Dublin before moving to Britain to work for a computer games company.
According to a spokes- man for the exhibition, within a few years he became “bored and disillusioned with the corporate grind of turning art into industry”.
“ADW felt as though he was pawning his creativity to manufacture a vision that was not his own,” said the spokesman.
“Inspired by the freedom and deviance of the street art he saw every day on his way into the city, he began experimenting with stencils and spray paint — sometimes to express his frustrations, sometimes just for his own amusement.
“Soon afterwards, in 2008, the recession hit and almost destroyed the country. For ADW, who found himself out of work, the downturn brought liberation — it killed his livelihood, but breathed life into his art.
“He began creating street art full-time.”
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