The road less travelled leads back to where it all began Photo: Michael Hussey

Ever since she can remember Martha Cashman has been tinkering with bits of wood and metal in her father’s shed. With hindsight, Martha realises ‘it was no wonder, as my Uncle Mick Carey, the last blacksmith in Youghal, a gentle giant, spent long hours working there himself, shoeing the local horses’.

Art took precedence at secondary school, Loreto Convent, Youghal after which Martha made an unusual career choice, much to the chagrin of her art teacher and the nuns at the time! Straight out of school she walked on to a building site in Youghal, Co Cork to start a Decorating apprenticeship. The nuns derided it as ‘a man’s job’, in the hope that Martha would ‘come to her senses’. But as she says now ‘I think part of my drive throughout that phase of my career was to prove to everyone that I had made the right decision’. So, even at this stage Martha was showing great determination and single-mindedness – qualities which have been invaluable in her subsequent creative endeavours!

Apprenticeship completed, she moved to Boston where she set up and successfully ran her own all-women decorating company – ‘Irish Ladies in Painting’. Over seven years later, following the death of her father Kevin, she came home for what was to be a break that turned into a major career change. Martha stumbled upon Cloáiste Stiofáin Naofa, Tramore Rd, Cork, where she took a PLC course and then a ceramic course with accomplished ceramic artist and film maker Stephanie Dinklebach. She then went on to Crawford College of Art and Design in Cork where she graduated with an Honours degree in ceramic design and picked up two prestigious prizes; the Scarva Award and the UCC Purchase Prize.

In college and subsequently in her work, Martha discovered, or possibly rediscovered, sculpture as her first love and took to ceramics in a very immediate way. She feels it is the right medium for conveying her story, ‘porcelain in its pure form, mixed with contrasting media such as carved ash or birch and dark twisted wire work well together’. Martha describes her current body of work as ‘contemporary precious objects’. The work comprises mainly of spoons and other reworked kitchen utensils. Whilst not actually ‘useful’ in the strict sense, Martha finds they ‘are fantastic conversation pieces’ no matter what the setting. Why utensils and spoons in particular? Martha finds that she is undoubtedly influenced by her rural background and close familial associations with food production, the soil and the seasons. Her father was an adventurous market gardener who grew every kind of vegetable imaginable, introducing new and interesting foods to the family as well as to the tables of neighbours near and far. The simple yet elegant pieces, hung in framed groups from ancient rusty horseshoe nails, also ‘pay homage to my elders the teachers of my past, and take influence from the land we took from daily, to lost traditions and to the community spirit of my rural East Cork home place’.

Nora Hickey, Curator of Education and Collections, Lewis Glucksman Gallery, UCC suggests that ‘while the self-assured simplicity of Martha’s design emphasises the intrinsic beauty of the materials and their form, it is more so their inherent personal symbolism that preoccupies the artist, a piece of her work such as Shanakiel held at UCC Art Archive exude a strength and timeless quality that also nostalgically evoke another era’.

2008 was a busy year for Martha; she had several solo shows, Milano in Cork city, Café Organico in Bantry in conjunction with the Launch of the Slow Food Festival, Listoonvarna’s Slow Food Festival, The Snug, Mountshannon and at The City Gaol in Cork as part of the Taste of Cork weekend festival. She has also participated in several group shows including Ladyfest Cork, an International ‘Emerging Irish Artists’ exhibition in the Medici City Museum, in the medieval city of San Leo, Italy, Bloom, Phoenix Park, Dublin, Kinsale Arts Week, and several Christmas Group shows.

2009 starts out no different she is launching a new range of work and unique porcelain jewellery at SHOWCASE 09 held in the RDS Dublin on Jan 18th to the 21st one of the biggest gift trade fairs held in Ireland.

In addition to personal projects Martha also takes commissions from both private clients and interior designers.

Her work is available at The Kenny Gallery, Galway, Lavit Gallery, Cork, Ardmore Pottery, Co Waterford and Keane On Ceramics, Kinsale, Maison and Chateau Glanworth mills, Fermoy, Co Cork.

For more information contact:
Martha Cashman, Email: cashmanmartha@gmail.com, www.marthacashman.com Tel: 087 2606999