Biography
Cliona Doyle (born 1968) is an Irish printmaker whose career-long subject has been the botanical world of Ireland — flowering trees, fruit, garden specimens, and the wild flora of hedgerow and meadow — rendered through the disciplined intaglio techniques of copper-sulphate etching, aquatint, and carborundum. She is one of the most distinctive botanical print artists working in contemporary Europe and a long-standing member of Graphic Studio Dublin.
She trained at the National College of Art and Design (NCAD) in Dublin, completing an Honours BA in Fine Art Printmaking in 1991 (1987–1991). She joined Graphic Studio Dublin shortly after graduation and served on the studio's Board of Directors from 2005 to 2009. She is also represented in London by Long & Ryle and exhibits regularly through SO Fine Art Editions in Dublin.
Doyle's signature contribution to contemporary printmaking is her sustained use of copper sulphate (blue stone) as an environmentally non-toxic mordant in place of nitric or ferric acid. Working en plein air, she carries her copper plates and copper sulphate into the field and etches directly from the subject in situ — a working method she has pioneered as part of the broader move within European printmaking towards eco-friendly intaglio. She supplements this technique with carborundum (silicon carbide grit applied as a resist) for tonal modelling, and with aquatint for the half-tone passages of her larger plates.
Her subjects span the year-round botanical calendar of Ireland: flowering fruit trees (Apple Tree, Pear Tree, Pear 'Louise Bonne', Quince, Persimmons, Pomegranate Tree, Magnolia Soulangeana, Magnolia Nigra, Black Magnolia, Apple Blossom, Pear Blossom, Last of the Apple Blossom), garden iris and peony cultivars (Iris 'Brise de Mer,' Iris 'Peach Melba,' Iris Marechal Ney, Paeonia 'Fair Rosamund,' Bearded Iris, Phalaenopsis Hybrid), and the wild flora of Irish hedgerow and meadow (Hawthorn, Blackthorn, Bluebells and Ramsons, Spindle, Rowan, Mountain Avens and Speckled Wood, Wild Rose and Honeysuckle, Queen Anne's Lace). Her larger plates measure 100 × 121 cm and are issued in editions of fifty at the Graphic Studio Gallery.
Doyle has exhibited at the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane, the Chester Beatty Library, the Royal Hibernian Academy (RHA), the Botanic Gardens Glasnevin, and the Office of Public Works' Farmleigh House programme. She teaches etching classes and drawing workshops at Graphic Studio Dublin and serves as one of the studio's most consistently productive working members. Her print catalogue at Graphic Studio Gallery currently exceeds eighty plates spanning two decades.
Within the small but internationally-respected community of European botanical printmakers, Doyle is among the most distinctive — not only for the breadth of Irish flora she has documented, but for her commitment to copper-sulphate etching as an environmentally responsible alternative to traditional intaglio acid baths. Her practice represents one of the strongest sustained intersections in contemporary printmaking between scientific botanical illustration, en-plein-air drawing, and large-format intaglio.
Key Facts
- Active Period
- 1968
- Nationality
- 🇮🇪Ireland
- Movement
- Contemporary Mokuhanga
- Works Indexed
- 25
Frequently Asked Questions
Cliona Doyle (born 1968) is an Irish printmaker whose career-long subject has been the botanical world of Ireland — flowering trees, fruit, garden specimens, and the wild flora of hedgerow and meadow — rendered through the disciplined intaglio techniques of copper-sulphate etching, aquatint, and carborundum. She is one of the most distinctive botanical print artists working in contemporary Europe and a long-standing member of Graphic Studio Dublin.
Cliona Doyle was active born in 1968. They were associated with the Contemporary Mokuhanga movement.
Cliona Doyle's work was shaped by the Contemporary Mokuhanga tradition in Japanese woodblock printmaking. Contemporary Mokuhanga: Contemporary mokuhanga (literally "wood-block print") encompasses artists working from approximately 1970 to the present who continue or reinvent traditional Japanese woodblock printing techniques.