I inspired by Liam, the owner of Dernagun Bog, Ballycumber, Co. Offaly, who told many different stories about the generations of his family working on the bog.  In this project, I worked to encompass the human interaction and the turf cutter's personal connection to the land and turbary rights. The Dernagun bog has been passed down through generations of Liam’s family, so I decided to photograph and paint the three generations, Liam, his son, Sean and his grandson, Sean Og, to document the different generations of interaction, history and turf cutting on the land.

 

I worked with the bog and the landscape within the portraiture through the use of bog material in my painting. The browns used in the painting come from the peat of the bog to document the relationship between man with the land. Materials used include peat, chalk, turf sut and charcoal.