Institute of Art Design + Technology Dún Laoghaire
Ireland’s campus for the Creative Industries

Iza Jane Geraghty 

BA [Hons] Art

Iza Jane Geraghty is a textiles artist based in Bettystown, Co. Meath. Throughout her four-year bachelor's degree, she has refined her skill and specialty toward themes of motherhood and nurture by exhibiting a keen interest in crochet practices and constructing elements of clothing into her work. Alongside her development as an artist, Geraghty has highlighted the importance of being environmentally conscious by solely utilizing secondhand fabrics and 100% organic yarns in her work. Geraghty aims to continue her practice in the realm of teaching.

Project Description

Finders Keepers is an ode to the unnamed peasant woman who found a significant historical artifact on Bettystown beach, my hometown, in 1850. It is an ode to the unnamed woman in everyday life, who shoulder unspoken responsibilities. For example, the role of a mother. A lot of things that a mother would do is just second nature to them and whether they realise what they are doing is important or not, it is important. And what the peasant woman found was important, whether she realised what it was or not. Someone else could have found it years down the line but the point is, she is the one that found it and she is the one that made it come into light and it is what we know it now as the “Tara Brooch”.


Thesis Title

My thesis explores key female, contemporary Irish artists in relation to space, examining how they shed light on issues of representation, power dynamics, and the redefinition of public and private spheres. As the new Ireland progresses, all sorts of added boundaries are added to the lot of the female artist. Being a woman of colour, or from a war-torn country, or from a socially disadvantaged background where the last thing on the household shopping list is a canvas and a paint brush - may present further obstacles to new Irish artists in terms of opportunities. Gender based conventions would potentially exist in the freest of vocations, the production of art. Art is ultimately a projection of the self. An artist is vulnerable in a way few other public service providers are. Gender based critique should be a non-existent concern for the artist, the art should stand for itself. The wonder is not whether the female artist is equal in brilliance to her male counterpart, but whether in fact she is so powerful that she has only begun to scrape the tip of the creative iceberg. Women give birth to the next generation and have done so since they were assigned that role by nature. The most powerful role in humanity may be symbolic of a more profound and weighty role in the arts.