About

Emma Berkery’s painting practice is rooted in, and frequently references, the art historical movements of Colour-Field and Abstract Expressionism. The

combined influence of these two movements results in a unique style of abstraction, which the artist uses as the vehicle to process, repackage and reflect

back to the viewer a shared experience of the world. Resisting singular interpretation, the paintings act as conversations and explorations of the materiality of

paint with powerfully evocative colour combinations. For the viewer, they both depict and create experiences. Berkery paints with a process lead methodology,

incorporating a symbolic palette with fluid organic forms, collocated with conscious and subconscious structure and gesture. Her work frequently references

the work of great modernist painters such as Helen Frankenthaler, Mark Rothko, Cy Twombly, Joan Mitchell and Lee Krasner.

Based in Belfast since 2004, Berkery completed her MFA in painting in 2006 with Ulster University. Since then she has been immersed in the arts sector in

Northern Ireland working as a practicing artist, creative consultant, evaluator, and educator. Berkery currently holds a long-term associate artist residency with

Cultúrlann McAdam Ó Fiaich, an arts centre in West Belfast, and is represented by The Nicholas Gallery in Belfast and SO Fine Art Gallery in Dublin. She

exhibits regularly throughout Ireland with recent solo exhibitions in 2022 and 2021 in Belfast, and 2024 in Dublin, and is the recipient of several Arts Council of

Northern Ireland Funding Awards.

Speaking about her work Emma has said, ‘Painting is for me a mirroring back to the world, my experience of it. It is how I process life. I swirl and bleed and

drip and dribble and pour and stain and spatter. The process informs the visual language.’

Viewing Berkery’s artworks brings to mind the words of Mark Rothko – ‘A painting is not a picture of an experience, it is the experience’.

www.emmaberkery.com 2024