John Devlin was born in Dublin in 1950 and studied at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin. Initially working as a graphic designer for the Abbey Theatre and as an illustrator in America, he began exhibiting his paintings in 1970. While the majority of his time is currently spent completing private commissions, John Devlin’s personal work on paper and canvas is also remarkable for its realism and attention to detail which, while minutely accurate, does not become laboured. Instead there is a relaxed fluidity to Devlin’s style that perfectly compliments the (dark) humour of his genre and still life works and creates an interesting tension between his subjects and his concern with formal composition and perspective.
John Devlin received the Carroll Award at the 1971 Irish Exhibition of Living Art and the following year won the Alice Berger Hammerschlag Trust Award bursary. He has exhibited regularly with the IELA and the Independent Artists shows, and also at the Oireachtas and RHA Annual Exhibitions. Devlin has had solo exhibitions at the Hendricks Gallery, Dublin and a two-person show with Martin Gale at the Davis Gallery, Dublin. Recent commissions include a memorial portrait of Mr. Cholmeley-Harrison of Emo Court, Co. Laois for the OPW and an oil on linen portrait of Robert Erskine Childers for the Reception Room of Leinster House as part of the State Art Collection. John Devlin’s work is included in public and private collections across Ireland.
Exhibitions with Taylor Galleries:2003 Paintings