About

Betty-Brown-Through-the-Looking-Glass0867-72dpi-1

2021 ACNI CIRP Individual Artist Award Award (project ongoing until end of March 22)
2010 Ards Borough Council Tyrone Guthrie Bursary Award
2007 ACNI Individual Artist Award
2006 ACNI CYP Artist in the Community
2005 Ards Borough Council Sister City Bursary to Peoria, Phoenix, Arizona, USA
2005 ACNI Travel Award
2005 RUA Gold Medal Award
1999 Fellowship Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Mayo
1994 Ards Borough Council “Lord Dunleath Bursary” Tyrone Guthrie Centre
1986 Elected Member of the Royal Ulster Academy.

I have been a practicing visual artist since 1976, beginning as a painter followed by a significant change in direction to making large sculpture works in the mid 1980s

I became a member of the Royal Ulster Academy in 1986 and was President in 2018-2021. When the pandemic hit at the beginning of 2020 and we all went into lockdown, I found myself working full-time as the Director of the RUA keeping it relevant through a time of unprecedented change.

I have now returned to the creative side of my career and have been making a new installation artwork that tells the story of that experience. It was already “Wonderland” becoming curator of the RUA Annual Exhibition at the Ulster Museum for three years. Lockdown brought suspension of the 2020 exhibition and uncertainty of purpose and a fall down the rabbit hole certainly resonated.

Under the project title “Afternoon Tea”, I have been constructing an installation based on the “Tea Party” which features the Hatter and the March Hare prior to the arrival of Alice. Research into the story included a recent visit to London in October to visit Curiouser and Curiouser at the V&A museum. I was also invited to visit the RA Annual Exhibition to choose a student prize as a current trustee on the board of the British Institution Fund which is based at the Royal Academy.