Page 13 - The Iveagh Trust AR 2023

Annual Report 2023 11
being a single parent, but Evin changed my life.
I knew if I was going to support him, I needed
to make this art business work. The experience
I had gained during my five years in NY really helped. Following in my mother’s footsteps, I too started hanging my art around Merrion Square. Before I left the US, I had a show at the Whistler House Museum in Boston. I had created a series of massive paintings, some of which I brought home. Those were the days when there were no luggage limits on planes. I rolled the paintings
up like a roll of carpet and hung them proudly on the Square. The star of the show was a 10ft x 10ft cow painting! That day was life-changing. People honked their horns as they drove by. By 5 pm I was so tired, but I had a line of people wanting
to buy my work. I sold everything and soon had a deposit for my first apartment in Cherrywood. Looking back, it’s so funny that I live so close to there again now. I am back where I started.
The birth of my son strongly influenced me. I know it sounds silly, but I watched an Oprah show that interviewed millionaires, and all of them had one thing in common: they all loved what they did. The one thing I really loved was making art.
I always taught and waitressed in between. My experience in NY taught me that I was still young in the art game, but I still had to be active as an artist. After I hung my massive paintings, galleries started looking for my work, and I was busy.
I went on the back-to-work scheme, and I was able to slowly get back into earning. My mom has also been a big influence. I believe she is one of the best artists in Ireland. She wants to leave us all her art. She talks about death a lot, which I find quite amusing – when you lead a creative life, you have a big list of stuff you want to do before you depart! She has taught me this.
Take two well-intentioned, hard-working self- employed people, a worldwide recession, and a vulture fund, and you get the perfect recipe for homelessness in Ireland. My former partner and I were with the wrong bank, and we couldn’t save our mortgage no matter how hard we tried. We moved nine times in six years and ultimately ended up separating.
The private rental market is tough, especially
as a single parent, older, and a freelance artist. The last rental was a reno-viction – this time, I found myself unable to afford another rental. My children were scattered among family, and I was either sleeping in my van or on friends’ couches. This felt like rock bottom to me. The biggest loss was missing mothering my children.
I had been on the housing list for several years since losing my family home to the vulture fund, but I had always managed to earn or borrow enough for rent. Now, rents had become so high, and there were so few rental properties that I just could not find something affordable that would allow me to keep my children in their school in the Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown area. I wanted to die so many times, and I honestly don’t know where my strength came from. My friends and children held me close. My art saved my life too
– it kept me distracted and, most importantly, earning.
I have always been a problem-solver, and I love my art business. I create children’s art books too, which brings me great joy. But I could not solve my housing situation – it was too hard. Without a rental I could afford, I eventually surrendered and started to dream really small.
I imagined what type of keyring I would have for my new home. Miraculously, that was when the Iveagh Trust called.
I remember bursting into tears. The type of strength it takes to hold it all together for my kids and family was already starting to crumble. I cried for myself. I grieved the fake person I was trying to be in order to hide my despair, and I still cry today. It’s a feeling of being held and being seen finally. A home is the cure.
A home cures everything.
It is a wonderful feeling to have a home. The best thing is being able to cook. We cook every day! My daughter loves baking too. Also, to have an address! We are sleeping so well too. When I first lost my home, I was so disoriented – I would get up in the middle of the night and still think I was in my old house. We moved so many times,