Words are not my first language!
Listening to President Michael D Higgins inspirational speech last evening at the official announcement of his return to office for a further term, there could be no doubt about his suitability to the role. He is a wonderful orator and using words with great effect he delivered his speech with the surety of a swordsman, he left no doubt in the mind of his voters that they had done the right thing and in the minds of his most staunch critics, that the pen is mightier than the sword. Yeats himself would have been proud!
I, on the other hand, have decided that words are not my first language. What I have to say – is best said visually through my art. At last, art has given me a means of expression that I have always known was there but couldn’t access. It has opened up conversations within myself and exposed the self-limiting barriers of concepts, thoughts and language, which has in turn lead others to deeper conversations and greater awareness and hopefully personal growth and development.
The value of Visual Art as a language has yet to be fully acknowledged, as it was with our Celtic fore bearers. In the meantime, in this patriarchal system of spin and hashtags, we are content to celebrate those who can engage a nation with the gift of words. Go neirí an bothair leat tUachtarain ÓhUigínn
