Ronan McCrea studied at the National College of Art & Design, Dublin, holds a PhD from University of Ulster and is currently Lecturer in Fine Art at Dublin Institute of Technology (D.I.T.) He is represented by Green on Red Gallery, Dublin.
In his installations and exhibitions Ronan McCrea stages encounters between the rhetoric of the photographic image and various historical resonances, symbolic social spaces, and institutional formations. This is elaborated across contexts such as pedagogy in MATERIAL(s) (2016), School Play (2008) and Autodidact (2011); corporate space in Medium (Corporate Entities) (2008/15); the novel in Medium (Upsidedown) (2007); civic space and architecture in New Town Centre Project 2009; autobiography in Sequences, Scenarios & Locations (2003/05); historical memory in Projection (Baton Charge) (2013): and even the institution of photography itself in Venn (Fragments after a lecture on the history or photography, in two parts) (2012). 1
Bio & Career
Dr. Ronan McCrea is an artist working with photography, moving image, architecture and social space. He has been making exhibitions and projects in galleries, museums and public contexts for over twenty years.
McCrea teaches Fine Art at the Dublin School of Creative Arts, DIT Grangegorman. He has previously taught at Northumbria University, Newcastle (2013-15) as well as part-time roles at DIT and Limerick School of Art & Design and as a visiting lecturer throughout Ireland and Europe. In 2010 he gained a practice-based PhD entitled Celluloid Materiality: Experimental Film, Photography & Contemporary Art under the supervision of Prof. Willie Dohertyat University of Ulster.
Selected exhibitions and projects include MATERIAL(s) Green on Red, Gallery, Dublin 2016-17; We Are Center, Centre for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York, 2016; Medium (Corporate Entities) 2008/15 in Fragments, Irish Museum of Modern Art (2015); Venn/Chroma Enclave Gallery, London (2014); Exiles, Lab Gallery Dublin (2013); solo exhibitions at Green on Red Gallery (2013 and 2011); Autodidact screenings at Cologne Kunstverein and Cobra Museum, Netherlands (2011); School Play a public art commission for a CETNS school in Dublin (2009); We are Grammar, Pratt Manhatten Gallery, New York, (2011); School Days, Glucksman Gallery, Cork (2010-11); Third Sinop Biennial, Turkey (2010); Coalcese: Happenstance, Smart Project Space, Amsterdam (2009); Nameless Science, Apexart, New York (2008); Ireland at the Venice, 52nd Venice Biennale, (2005) general-specific Project Arts Centre (2003), Seminal Glassbox Paris (2002). His work is represented in the collections of the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Arts Council of Ireland, UCD, OPW, as well as private collections. 2
Exhibitions
Solo exhibitions
- 2019 Efference Copy Mechanism, Temple Bar Gallery + Studios, Dublin
- 2016 MATERIAL(s) Green on Red Gallery, Dublin
- 2014 Chroma/Venn Enclave Gallery, Deptford, London
- 2011 AUTODIDACT Green on Red Gallery, Dublin
- 2008/09 School Play Castleknock Educate Together National School, Dublin
- 2009 New Town Centre Project (Extract #1) Draiocht Arts Centre, Blanchardstown, Dublin
- 2008 Medium (Corporate Entities) Project for Irish Museum of Modern Art
- 2007 Medium (Upsidedown) & Medium (The End) Gallery for One & Goethe–Institut, Dublin
- 2006 The Twentieth Century, Dublin City Council public Art Commission
- 2004 Sequences, Scenarios & Locations, Galway Arts Centre
- 2003 general – specific Project Arts Centre, Dublin
- 2002 Seminal, Glassbox, Paris
- 2000 Das Ist Echt! (performance) Expo 2000, Hannover
- 2000 Das Ist Echt! (exhibition) Golden Pudel Klub, Hamburg
- 2000 In between, Ronan McCrea and Paul O’Neill Temple Bar Gallery, Dublin
- 1999 View Off-site Project Arts Centre
- 1998 – 2000 Out of It Pier 4A Heathrow Airport / Public Art Development Trust
- 1998 “…all the time.” Context Gallery, Derry
- 1994 Projective Techniques Pearse Museum, Dublin
Group exhibitions
- 2020 Waste to Energy/Energy to Waste, slide-dissolve installation and photographic works, The Green on Red Gallery at Art Brussels
- 2018, MAC International 2018, MAC Gallery, Belfast
- 2018, An Act of Hospitality can only be Poetic, Highlanes Gallery, Drogheda, Ireland
- 2016, We Are (Epi)center P! Gallery, New York
- 2016, We Are Center, Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York
- 2015, Fragments, Irish Museum of Modern Art
- 2015, To Pay Respect to the Generosity of the Three-Minute Punk-Rock Song Pt. 2: re-edit, BEEF, Bristol
- 2013, Catalyst Arts: Collective Histories of Northern Irish Art X Golden Thread Gallery, Belfast
- 2013, Exiles, Lab Gallery, Dublin
- 2012, Last Day, Cartel, Old Police Station Deptford, London
- 2011-12, Cross Currents, Green on Red Gallery, Dublin
- 2011, Screening Room: Dublin, Kölnischer Kunstverein, Germany Nov 2011
- 2011, Moving Buildings, Cobra Museum, Amstelveen, Netherlands Netherlands
- 2011, To Pay Respect to the Generosity of the Three-Minute Punk-Rock Song, Crate Project Space, Margate, UK
- 2011, Gracelands: Substance Abuse, Gracelands, Dromahair, Co. Leitrim
- 2011, We Are Grammar, Pratt Manhatten Gallery, New York
- 201o, School Days: The Look of Learning, Glucksman Gallery, Cork
- 2010, Sinopale 3, Sinop, Turkey
- 2010, Between Sight and Sound, Green on Red Gallery, Dublin
- 2009, Art in Public Places: The Archive of PADT, Henry Moore Institute, Leeds
- 2009, Coaleasce: Happenstance, Smart Space, Amsterdam
- 2008, Nameless Science, Apexart, New York
- 2005, Ireland at Venice (National Represenation)51st Venice Biennale
- 2005, Red White Blue, Spenser Brownstone Gallery, New York
- 2005, La La Land, Project Arts Centre, Dublin
- 2004, No one makes me feel the colours that you do. Temple Bar Gallery, Dublin
- 2004, No Respect, Tangier Lane & Neary’s Bar, Dublin
- 2004, Tonight, Studio Voltaire, London
- 2003, Permaculture, Project Arts Centre, Dublin
- 2002/03, Greyscale/CMYK, Tramway, Glasgow & R.H.A., Dublin (NIFCA)
- 2003, Affinity Archive, Sarah Pierce Studio, Broadstone Studios, Dublin
- 2003, Vacationland, Arthouse Dublin & Westbourne Studios, London
- 2001, A Timely Place, Or Getting Back to Somewhere, London Print Studio Gallery, London
- 2000, EV+A, Limerick
- 2000, In Consistency II, Arthouse, Dublin
- 2000, Multiples x3, Temple Bar Gallery, Dublin
- 1999, In Consistency, Arthur R Rose Gallery, London
- 1999, Utopias, Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin
- 1998, Waterfront, Catalyst Arts, Waterfront Hall, Belfast
- 1997, Passport Exchange (ex)Change, Temple Bar Gallery, Dublin & Zachenta Gallery of Art, Warsaw
- 1996, Summer Show, Kerlin Gallery, Dublin
- 1995, Summer Show, Kerlin Gallery, Dublin
