Willie Doherty (b. 1959)

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GENERAL DESCRIPTION
Willie Doherty (Irish, b. 1959) studied at Ulster Polytechnic in Belfast. For three decades, his films and photographs have explored aspects of landscape, trauma, and political turmoil in his native city of Derry, Northern Ireland. His work was included in the Carnegie International, Pittsburgh (1999); the Bienal de São Paulo (2002); the 52nd Venice Biennale (2007); and Documenta 13, Kassel (2012). Doherty has also had solo exhibitions at art institutions worldwide, including the Dallas Museum of Art; the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; the Renaissance Society, Chicago; Museum of Modern Art, Oxford; and Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. He was nominated for Tate’s Turner Prize in 1994 and 2003.

Dr. Anna Katherine Brodbeck, The Nancy and Tim Hanley Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art, 2017.
NOTES
Previous general description: (current one written by curator)

Born in 1959 in Derry, Northern Ireland, Willie Doherty spent his formative years amid the escalating sectarian and political violence known as the Troubles, which began in the late 1960s as civil rights demonstrations set off a succession of attacks and counterattacks between what became the entrenched positions of Unionist Protestants versus Nationalist Catholics. Doherty studied sculpture at Ulster Polytechnic in Belfast between 1978 and 1981. There he found it impossible to ignore the violence raging outside the institution, and his relationship to the history of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland has served as one of the main backgrounds for his art. Returning to Derry in 1984, he searched for a way in which to address the ubiquitous conflict. His early black-and-white photographs of landscape overlaid with text were first exhibited in the 1980s. His first media work, Same Difference, a slide piece, was produced in 1990 and exhibited at Matt's Gallery in London, England, that same year. His first foray into video, The Only Good One is a Dead One (1993), was also exhibited at Matt's Gallery.

Since then, Doherty's photographic and media work has been displayed in numerous one-person exhibitions at institutions worldwide. He was short-listed for the Turner Prize in 1994 and 2003; and in 2007 he was chosen to represent Northern Ireland at the Venice Biennale. 

Adapted from
Erin K. Murphy, "Willie Doherty-A Biography,"  in Willie Doherty: Requisite Distance, ed. Frances Bowles (Dallas: Dallas Museum of Art; New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009), 93.

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General Description
Willie Doherty (Irish, b. 1959) studied at Ulster Polytechnic in Belfast. For three decades, his films and photographs have explored aspects of landscape, trauma, and political turmoil in his native city of Derry, Northern Ireland. His work was included in the Carnegie International, Pittsburgh (1999); the Bienal de São Paulo (2002); the 52nd Venice Biennale (2007); and Documenta 13, Kassel (2012). Doherty has also had solo exhibitions at art institutions worldwide, including the Dallas Museum of Art; the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; the Renaissance Society, Chicago; Museum of Modern Art, Oxford; and Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. He was nominated for Tate’s Turner Prize in 1994 and 2003.

Dr. Anna Katherine Brodbeck, The Nancy and Tim Hanley Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art, 2017.
Fun Facts
 
Archival Resources
(digitized/non-digitized)
Web Resources
 
Notes
Previous general description: (current one written by curator)

Born in 1959 in Derry, Northern Ireland, Willie Doherty spent his formative years amid the escalating sectarian and political violence known as the Troubles, which began in the late 1960s as civil rights demonstrations set off a succession of attacks and counterattacks between what became the entrenched positions of Unionist Protestants versus Nationalist Catholics. Doherty studied sculpture at Ulster Polytechnic in Belfast between 1978 and 1981. There he found it impossible to ignore the violence raging outside the institution, and his relationship to the history of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland has served as one of the main backgrounds for his art. Returning to Derry in 1984, he searched for a way in which to address the ubiquitous conflict. His early black-and-white photographs of landscape overlaid with text were first exhibited in the 1980s. His first media work, Same Difference, a slide piece, was produced in 1990 and exhibited at Matt's Gallery in London, England, that same year. His first foray into video, The Only Good One is a Dead One (1993), was also exhibited at Matt's Gallery.

Since then, Doherty's photographic and media work has been displayed in numerous one-person exhibitions at institutions worldwide. He was short-listed for the Turner Prize in 1994 and 2003; and in 2007 he was chosen to represent Northern Ireland at the Venice Biennale. 

Adapted from
Erin K. Murphy, "Willie Doherty-A Biography,"  in Willie Doherty: Requisite Distance, ed. Frances Bowles (Dallas: Dallas Museum of Art; New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009), 93.

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*Contemporary Art
landscapes (representations): AAT: 300015636
Ireland (nation): TGN: 1000078
politics: AAT: 300055537
filmmaking: AAT: 300263841
film (performing arts): AAT: 300054141
Doherty_Willie: ULAN: 500116194
Derry: TGN: 7012110
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artists_and_designers-0217.xml.nores