Holly Lyons has an interest in the city and how it affects those who encounter it. The Japanese concept of ‘the floating world’ – a city of play, entertainment and hedonism – is an underlying source of research in her work. Drawing on this concept, she focuses on the crowds of people who interact with the city for survival purposes, but also for pleasure and entertainment. This need for individuals to release the stresses and burdens of the everyday is expressed in the works, through the morphing of the figures into their surroundings. The vibrantly coloured backgrounds of her paintings emphasise how the urban environment absorbs and influences those who encounter it. However, this spectacle that is the city, often disguises the horrific social issues which are present, and forces us to ignore the horrors of the floating world that exist there. Each of the works display theatre-like stages, which play with ideas of utopia and dystopia in the city.
Trinity Comprehensive, Ballymun, Co. Dublin. Donabate Community College, Donabate, Co. Dublin. Skerries Community College, Skerries, Co. Dublin.
1 - Inequalities under the Winter Sun
2 - Transient Interactions
3 - Trade and Commerce Flourished
4 - Utopian Metropolis
5 - Trade and Commerce Flourished
6 - The Desire to be Entertained
7 - A Pleasure Seeker’s Paradise
8 - Dystopian
9 - Spectacle of the City
10 - Suburbia