About Olivia Hassett
Biography
Olivia Hassett is a Dublin-based artist who creates live art works and regularly collaborates with other performance artists and across disciplines. In 2012 she graduated with a fine art masters of sculpture from the National College of Art and Design, Dublin.
From a young age her fascination with science and more specifically human biology was fostered by her mother who was a biology teacher. Working as an artist in residence in Tallaght University Hospital and collaborating with scientists in Trinity College Dublin over the past number of years has created a vibrant and exciting framework for her exploration of notions relating to the politics and physiology of the human body.
Over the past year Hassetts practice has shifted to include a prolonged and deep exploration of how her body relates and responds to specific ancient Irish sites. Currently Hassett is developing a series of solo performances and a short performative video work in response to a Neolithic site in the Dublin Mountains and one in the Kerry Mountains.
Highlights from the past year:
In April Hassett performed ‘Lamella’ a series of four performances as part of Supermarket, Stockholm, curated by Alannah Hopkin of Interface Gallery. Recent solo performances include Creation Myths, Curated by Livestock in September.
Alongside ‘Synaptic Space’, a collaboration with fellow performance artist Rachel Macmanus, and ‘Cerberus’, with Deej Fabyc and Rachel Macmanus, Hassett regularly performs with Bbeyond Belfast and recently performed with Bbeyond Berlin in March. Collaborative group performances and workshops of note undertaken this year include Be-coming Tree in February and the La Pocha Nostra Alumni Summit with Vest&Page in July, both took place in Live Art Ireland. Hassett will travel to London for a week in April 2025 to take part in ‘Arcane Portals’, an intense co-creation workshop with Vest&Page, where she will also perform collaboratively during the ‘Ceremony’ public program.
Olivia Hassett is currently in the process of creating a large-scale artwork, which was developed over the past two years, and inspired by her research and conversations with Dermatology consultants in Tallaght University Hospital, Dublin. In the past she was awarded two Community Health Initiative Scheme awards for work with The Alzheimer Society of Ireland. Hassett was also part of an interdisciplinary collaborative team that was funded by TCD to research and develop two high profile projects and exhibitions inspired by a selection of trees on their campus
Artists Statement
An in-depth exploration of colour and materials are core elements of my process. Like a scientist, I will experiment with the physicality of each material and object that I am drawn to. I will return again and again to explore its strengths, limitations and how it might transform in relation to its environment, my performing body, or other materials. Using brightly coloured man-made materials, and sometimes alongside reappropriated medical elements, I explore the complex relationships we have with our visceral body.
Over the years I have engaged and reengaged with the notion of human skin as a porous boundary. Recently this interest in liminal boundaries has extended to include prolonged and deep explorations of the relationship between my body and a selection of important ancient Irish sites.
My practice explores the inter-relationships between my body, the sculptural elements I create, and the unique ‘fabric’ and boundaries of the spaces I respond to and perform in. These artworks aim to create a site of contestation while also offering a space for dialogue. While my practice seeks to push and pull across and along these shifting boundaries it also seeks to explore, reconnect, and build a new provisional whole, one that recognises the landscape of struggle and joy in our lived bodily experience, past, present and future.