Elaine Beverley Tyrrell

"The Peoples' Art Exhibition" 1999

"The Village Inn", Dublin 2000

ELAINE BEVERLEY TYRRELL’S WORK AND HER BACKGROUND


ELAINE BEVERLEY TYRRELL’S PAINTINGS:

Elaine Beverley draws her abstract designs freehand using the inspiration of the moment in a

spontaneous fashion. She then gets her brushes and fills in the colours one by one. She enjoys listening

to the reaction of different people who view her finished work. Her work explores a particular theme in

a consistent fashion. No two people interpret each painting in the same manner. Different individuals

perceive different things in her work.

Elaine has exhibited her work at the Peoples’ Art Exhibition, Dublin during the years 1999 and 2002.

She has also held her own one-woman exhibition in 2001 in Crumlin, Dublin, Ireland, which is the

locality where she is based.


ELAINE B. TYRRELL’S BACKGROUND

Elaine was born in Dublin on 20/06/1958 of Dublin parents. She was a globetrotter as a young child because her father Ivan was a “deep sea captain” in the Irish Merchant Marine. Her mother Hazel, her younger brother and Elaine Beverley herself travelled world-wide with Ivan during various periods of Elaine Beverley’s early childhood. During her second year in secondary school a psychologist consulted by Elaine Beverley’s parents tested her Intelligence Quotient (I.Q.) and assessed her as having the I.Q. level of someone from the top One Per Cent of the population. Elaine Beverley won several scholarships, prizes for being first and second in her class, the German government Book Prize and a prize in a European wide competition for an essay on the Lome Convention. As part of her cultural development she studied Piano and Music Appreciation, Drama and Elocution. She also played Tennis, Badminton Netball and Hockey in her spare time at school. Elaine Beverley was also an artistic student at her secondary school Alexandra College. At age 13 having submitted the entry of an Anti-Litter Poster to the Irish nation-wide Texaco Children’s Art Competition she won the award of the distinction of “Highly Commended” in the Texaco Children’s Art Competition. She clearly remembers that when she got the written notification of her success her mother Hazel told her delightedly that she “saw stars lighting” in Elaine Beverley’s eyes! The then Lord Mayor of Dublin, Ireland presented her with her prize at a function in the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery, Dublin. At the age of 16 she performed very well academically in a then Irish nation-wide examination called the Intermediate Certificate getting a number of top grades out of the 12 subjects she studied. Because she wanted to go to university, Elaine Beverley Tyrrell then decided to concentrate on her more academic school subjects such as History, Latin and French to mention a few of the 8 subjects she studied for the national “Leaving Certificate”. Ultimately, she did an Honours Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics, Politics and Psychology in University College Dublin. Her extra-curricular achievements while studying for her B.A. included learning Swedish and Norwegian, a basic course in Legal Science, Business Computers, Hill-walking and briefly Judo. Her activities also included being part of a tripartite film importing agency and Treasurer for the UCD Film Society, participating in a “Rag Week Yard of Ale Competition” , helping with the work of the Students’ Bar, reading tarot cards to raise money for charity, going on several demonstration marches and attending meetings of the UCD Women’s Group. She also attended many controversial debates of chiefly the UCD Law Society and the Literary and Historical Society, invited notable speakers to a debate she initiated on the relationship between Socialism and Film and won “First Prize” in an undergraduate debating competition run by the Commerce and Economics Society.

She took various temporary jobs while an undergraduate with which she financed her university fees and her foreign travels. She worked at sea in 1976 on the ferry the “Saint Patrick” first as a waitress during which period she fought a one woman campaign against the Seamans’ Union for being a closed shop and discriminating against temporary employees. During Autumn 1977 she worked as a barmaid in Wandsworth and Soho in London, England. She found memorising large customer orders and totalling up different drink prices in her head was good mental exercise! During her second period of employment at sea in 1978 she was a stewardess who worked twelve-hour shifts for periods of 10 days in a row at a time before getting a few days leave. During her scarce free time she steered the ferry the “Saint Patrick” under supervision using a Gyrocompass and other maritime technical aids for which she obtained a “Steering Certificate”. In Summer 1977 at the age of 19 she travelled on her own on a round trip of the United States taking in New York, Seattle, Portland (Oregon), Houston (Texas), Los Angeles, Pebble Beach (California), New Orleans, Las Vegas, Washington City, Miami and Tampa (Florida). In 1979 she packed a small ridge tent, a Camping Gas cooker and a rucksack and travelled to a small village some few kilometres away from Haarlem in the Netherlands where she set up camp on a tiny patch of ground in a Dutch campsite. She went knocking on doors locally until she found a Dutch family prepared to sell her a second-hand bicycle at a reasonable price. She used the bicycle to travel to and from her work in various flower bulb-packing assembly firms. She left her work in Holland in September 1979 and travelled to a central train station in Paris, where she joined up with two fellow female undergraduates from University College Dublin called “Bairbre”(the Irish for “Barbara”) and “Irene”. The three young women each had bought special student “Inter-Rail” tickets which permitted them the privilege of travelling almost anywhere in Continental Europe for a month. Their travels during this period took them to France, Germany, Austria, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Monaco, Luxembourg, Greece and Yugoslavia. The trio shared adventures, fun and sleeping on trains in between stays in youth hostels! During 1980/1981Elaine Beverley took a job as a lounge-girl a pub in Mount Merrion, Dublin, Ireland called “The Sportsman’s Inn”. Despite having obtained previous experience in 1977 as a barmaid in London, Union politics prevented her from getting the better paid job of being a barmaid there because the union refused to let women serve drink from behind the bar counter. (What old-fashioned sexual discrimination such a restrictive practice seems!)

Elaine Beverley Tyrrell’s first “permanent job” started in 1982 when she worked as an Executive Officer in the Irish Revenue where she started to study taxation. In 1983 she got a pay-rise when she obtained a special transfer to the Inspectorate of the Irish Revenue. She then in 1984 freelanced as a tax consultant specialising in giving advice on personal taxation, personal investments and social security while also studying in the evenings for the qualification “Associate of the Institute of Taxation in Ireland”. Elaine Beverley Tyrrell then developed further an interest in computers which dates as far back as 1976/1977. During 1983/1985 she taught herself enough of the computer language BASIC to write short computer programs calculating Personal Income Tax liabilities. She joined the technologically advanced professional body the “Unix Users Group” in 1984 in order to accelerate her technological education. During 1984/1985 she participated in an Enterprise Development course run by the Management Consultants “Francis P. Coyne And Associates”, Dublin, Ireland. In 1985 in order to get a deeper understanding of the evolving field of Computer Science in 1985 she moved to the rural town of Bray, County Wicklow, Ireland. There she enrolled to become a mature student on a full-time course in Computer Applications at a training centre, which was at the time known as the Nixdorf Centre for Advanced Technology Training. During the years 1987/988 she studied by day on a full-time courses in Computer Programming, which included a work placement researching an artificial intelligence project on behalf of a senior Irish lawyer. In 1987she also started studying part-time for an evening course in Marketing under the auspices of the professional body known as “The Marketing Institute of Ireland”. She pursued this course for several years. In 1989 she spent a brief period as a franchise agent selling laptop and desktop computers. In 1990 she returned to the Education field to fulfil a freelance contract teaching a European Social Funded pilot distance-education course to a client group of the National Rehabilitation Board, a semi-state body then in existence. Her pupils were severely physically disabled adults, which included paraplegics amongst their number. Her work involved some career guidance and tutoring of her students for a Dublin City University licensed course called “The Business Applications of Microcomputers”. During the period 1990-1992 she developed further her expertise in the speciality of teaching mature adult beginners how to use computers while she was working in Dundrum, Dublin, and Ireland for the Vocational Education Committee. During 1991 she started her own fledgling business as a freelance teacher of Computer Applications. She used to be a member of the former Irish Society of Technical Communicators. In 1993 she also tutored mature first and second year students studying for their Bachelorhoods in Computer Science. During the period 1996/1999 she studied for a Dublin City University postgraduate qualification. This course was called “The Graduate Certificate in Information Technology and Accounting”. This course taught Computer Consultancy to a group of mature students who were mainly qualified accountants. During the period 1997/2001 Elaine Beverley Tyrrell was a distributor marketing a national magazine to businesses and private individuals. For a brief period during the 1990’s she also had network marketing agencies in the car leasing business called “Autonet” as well as in the international telecommunications industry. In 1999/2000 she again took time out to pursue a full-time computer course in Web Design which discipline let her combine her artistic and Computer Science background together. In the late 1990’s she started to do voluntary work as an activist in mental health which has involved her in groups such as the Irish Council For Civil Liberties, Mental Health Matters, the Irish Advocacy Network, The Wheel and GROW. She has campaigned hard for improved legislation on and improved practice of mental health in Ireland. She currently divides her time between running her home alone, helping look after the welfare of her elderly mother and managing her resources . Her leisure pursuits are varied and include walking around Dublin, Ireland to keep fit, radio broadcasting, writing, listening to and making music, going to cultural events and spending time on her computer. She also enjoys socialising on the telephone, in person and by letter or email with a large network of personal friends, business friends and acquaintances as well as spending a lot of time enjoying the solitude of her own space. She has a hobby of researching mental and physical health and its relationship with clinical nutrition using the Internet, books and magazines/newspapers etc. as her source materials and she would rather read a medical textbook than a novel! Since 1999 the wheel has turned full circle and she has come back to her early teenage love of drawing and painting colourful abstractions! She has participated in four art exhibitions including one solo exhibition since then. She is about to hold another solo exhibition in the suburb of Dundrum.

I specialise in ABSTRACT WORKS OF ART USING THE MEDIUM OF ACRYLIC AND THE COLOUR RANGE OF THE RAINBOW. These WORKS OF ART explore a particular CELTIC THEME OF MINE THROUGH MULTIFARIOUS PERMUTATIONS! I draw the outline of my images freehand and spontaneously by letting my INNER MUSE express itself through my subconscious. I then infill the colours of the designs using my acrylic paints. I enjoy observing and hearing how different people interpret my work in an individually different manner. One person will perceive one image a certain way while another will perceive the same image as something totally different!

Texaco Art Competition: "Highly Commended"