Claire Mc Dermott London, United Kingdom

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As a naturalist, Mc Dermott's research-based practice observes plant morphology to understand their design, function and mechanism, and how they interact with our atmosphere. Her transdisciplinary expressions explore art, science, and the humanities through social and environmental issues, while her multidisciplinary skills create sculpture, macro photography, drawing, print, and poems.

Claire Mc Dermott is a multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary working-class artisan of Irish descent who is passionate about research and how it is communicated. Mc Dermott has exhibited at Tate Exchange, Watford Museum, Cooke Latham Gallery, Beaconsfield Gallery, South Park Gallery and Tension. Her exploration of spent flowers created a transdisciplinary path that started to open when she turned to biophysics during her Master of Arts in Art and Science at Central Saint Martins after a college trip to CERN. This led her to answer the physical aspects of a flower that she questioned during her field observations, giving an understanding of their function and mechanism that never ceases to amaze her. She continued her studies with a Master of Research at the Royal College of Art (RCA) in 2022/3 and wrote her thesis titled, Happenings, Sightings and a Plumed Seed where she explored Allan Kaprow's development of art happenings and made comparisons with her field observations (which she renamed as ‘sightings’), as both phenomena could provide moments of enlightenment capable of transforming one’s perspective of the world. As an artist she enjoys creating a wide range of artworks, that explore spent plants and social and environmental concerns. Thinking as a sculptor Mc Dermott creates concepts in her mind that move between disciplines and develops plans of construction, a storyboard of experiments that build around the initial intention. Her notebook drawings and prints are her methods to formulate the data of her thinking that capture fleeting moments of inspiration to work out how an idea can be explored. She uses macro photography to capture the essence of nature and is looking to enter the world of the flower, a mural of colour, with fascinating abstract structures. Mc Dermott writes poetry to describe her research and to break down concepts from combined subjects of art, science and humanity. The field observations of phenomena that she witnessed in nature are detailed in two of her published poems while her collection of poems are based on real conversations, memories or events, capturing fleeting moments to create a dialogue with the reader. She writes about nature, social and environmental issues, together with bereavement and an acknowledgment of the peace process. Mc Dermott writes from a London Irish perspective, from a neutral point of view with the hope that peace prevails above all. She was awarded residencies with SLoAS, AA2A, Sculpture Symposium 2016 and from Cill Rialaig, Ireland. She was featured in Axis, Phi Magazine, The Pluralist’s, RCA college magazine and the Earthwise book. She has received in-kind support from the Port of London Authority, Central Saint Martins, UAL and grants from the Gane Trust, UAL Student Union, and the Arts Council, England. Her botanical illustrations are held at Cill Rialaig Arts Centre, Ireland, and her public sculpture ‘The Meeting Tree’ is installed at Newton Farm Ecology Park, London.