Fine Arts

Meet the Artist: Mark Swords

The award-winning Irish artist sees each artwork as a small motion toward an unknowable destination

Mark Swords: ‘A place that means a lot to me? Sicily. I feel like all Italians are cool. Even the old guy who is selling you prickly pears from his van is cool’

Mark Swords studied fine art painting at the National College of Art and Design and graduated with a Master’s degree in 2004. In 2010 he was awarded the AIB Art Prize.

Swords has exhibited his work widely, both nationally and internationally and is represented in numerous collections. Recent exhibitions include Tribuna, 2022 at the Royal Hibernian Academy of Arts, Dublin; Portico, 2021, with Tanad Aaron at the Complex, Dublin and Tauchgang, 2019, a group exhibition ...