Can there be a detached touch?

touch technologies

as more than human assemblages

could be remaking what touching means.

María Puig de la Bellacasa, Matters of Care: Speculative Ethics in More Than Human Worlds, 2017, p99 (first line), p104

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shane finan

BA in Fine Art from IT Sligo 2008

MSc in Interactive Digital Media from Trinity College Dublin 2013

Certificate in High Impact Leadership, Irish Management Institute 2018

Certificate in Irish language, bonnleibhéal, TEG, University of Maynooth

Interactive digital media artist and project manager based in Ireland.

Project management experience include: European Manager, Gstaadfilm International Festival for Short Art Films (Switzerland, including tours to Ireland, UK, Uruguay, Brazil and Germany; 2014-date), Project Manager Projects: Slándáil (European Union FP7), FÍOSÍN (Enterprise Ireland Commercialisation Fund) and Éadáil (Atlantic Bridge Proof of Principle Fund), Trinity College Dublin (Ireland, 2014-19).

Artworks explore contemporary theory on technology, place and more-than-human relationships.

Proud to be a member of Visual Artists Ireland, the representative body for artists in Ireland, and a constant source of support and information.

visual artists ireland membership badge

Supporter of federated, free and open source software:

logo of peertube, open source video sharing platform

Other social media:

Signatory of Culture Declares Emergency:

latest news

29th June 2021

New artwork documentation: The Power of Inconspicuous Things (2021)

A 2-minute video documenting the interactive artwork The Power of Inconspicuous Things, which debuted in April 2021 at VARC, UK, and will form part of the touring exhibition from the programme ENTWINED.Rural.Land.Lives.Art. in 2021 and 2022 in north England.

Artwork #3 from the project The Wood Wide Web (2020-)

22nd June 2021

Exhibition Residency: Leitrim Sculpture Centre

A 2-month residency working with more-than-human entanglements, technology, agriculture and forests began at the Leitrim Sculpture Centre on 22nd June 2021, and will conclude with a solo exhibition in August 2021.

A photograph of the outside of the exhibtion space for the Leitrim Sculpture Centre, a long white industrial space with light blue doors and window frames

4th June 2021

New Artwork: Macalla

A tryptich of web-art pieces about trees, tubes and humans presented online.

Available to view at at this link.

A screenshot of a web page with a series of circular photographs. The background is black, and each photograph is looking down into a green tube at a young tree growing. They overlap, and look a little like eyes or tadpoles all clustered together.

29th May 2021

Publication: The Wood Wide Web

The UK-based artist resource Curatorspace invited a write up about what it was like to spend a month making art with fledgling trees in Northumberland.

The relationships aren't simple, and human language is not well equipped to describe them. So I am gradually trying to strip away language and focus instead on visual and interactivity.

post citation, 2021

Available online at this link.

A photogaph of an interactive art installation usign lights, video and painting about tree planting, fungi and relationships between human and nonhuman actors

28th May 2021

Workshop documentation: Kielder School

VARC have shared some documentation from a workshop with Kielder school while resident in April 2021. Children were taught about trees and fungi, and then were invited to make small electronic hyphae using lights, Arduino boards and fibre optic cables.

A photogaph of five children working with an Arduno board and some electronics, wearing a red uniform

5th May 2021

Publication: The Master's Device

A publication in the Visual Artists Ireland News-sheet about open source media and the potential for technological critique by artists.

Artists … are known for challenging hegemonies, exploring environmental issues, … or voicing ethical concerns within their work. So, there is an unfortunate contradiction in using ethically, environmentally or socially unsound tools.

post citation, 2021

Available online from June 2021 at this link.

A photogaph of an article printed in Visual Artists Ireland News Sheet May 2021 names The Masters Device

24th April 2021

New installation: the power of inconspicuous things

New artwork presented at VARC, Highgreen, to an audience of over 70 people across a day. Full documentation coming soon.

This piece invited attendees to come together to make place with one another. It was influenced by the tree planting at Kielderhead Wildwood Project.

Part of the programme ENTWINED: Rural Land Lives Art.

A photograph of an art installation featuring lights in tubes and wires that are lit up under a false ground.

31st March 2021

Residency: The Wood Wide Web

A one-month residency working on a project about networks (forest, community, technology) is now underway.

In collaboration with Kielderhead Wildwood Project, Northumberland Wildlife Trust, UK, where they are planting 39,000 trees over five years in Kielder, England, near the Scottish border.

Project page.

This is part of the residency programme ENTWINED: Rural Land Lives Art.

31st March 2021

Video Essay: Never Just a Tree #6 - Necessity: Community

The sixth video essay for the The Wood Wide Web project is now available online.

Each video includes a long-form blog-post outlining the research toward this video:

Shane Finan: Repairing The Chain.

This is part of the residency programme ENTWINED: Rural Land Lives Art.

21st March 2021

New Project Page: ]EXPOSURE[[ENCLOSURE]

A new project page to host all of the different writing and work that I have made as part of the FIELD project.

New web-based artworks from this project to appear soon.

A pencil drawing of a farm gate.

1st March 2021

Article: Callous Caring: The myth of dichotomy in farming

A new blog post about the complex decisions that farmers make, as part of the FIELD project.

The article looks at the idea of dichotomy and how nuanced the relationship between farmer and animal is.

A photograph of two cows behind a barbed wire fence on a sunny day. One cow's head is raised, looking at the viewer. It has a white head with reddish-brown coat. The other, a block cow, has its head lowered, eating grass.

19th February 2021

Article: The artist who stares at sheep

A new blog post documenting my first encounters with sheep suffering from lameness as part of the FIELD project.

The article documents how I began to underatand the vulnerability of sheep suffering from lameness, and what the sheep are now teaching me about being human.

A close-up photograph of the brown and white, furry snout of a sheep with the hand of the photographer reaching out to it from the camera. The sheep is smelling the hand as it touches gently the face of the sheep.

16th February 2021

Public talk: art-talks, University of Lincoln

A public talk organised by the MFA programme at the University of Lincoln, partners on the FIELD project

The talk will discuss my artistic practice and background, and the current ongoing projects about farms and fungi. Click the image for more information.

a poster with an art installation image on a garish pink and blue background, with some information about the artist shane finan

3rd February 2021

Online exhibition in progress

Working on new collaborative material with Michele Allen and Mark Jones for the FIELD project for an online exhibition, 2021-22.

Works are focussed on animal disease including lameness and BVD.

an animated gif of an animal shape walking unsteadily, its head bobbing with the limp an animated gif of an animal shape walking steadily with a straight spine

latest exhibitions

open studio

april 2021 VARC, Highgreen, Northumberland UK

VARC artists in residence Catriona Gallagher and Shane Finan showing work from the adventurous three-year programme ENTWINED. Rural. Land. Lives. Art. Shane will stage a new interactive performative installation.

a photograph of an interactive artwork. The artwork is in the form of a large box, like a table. This close-up shot only shows some of the left side and the top of the box, and also an opening into the underneath/inside where the side facing us should be. The left side is an abstract painting with mostly dark colours. The top has two tubes placed in it. The underneath shows a series of bluish pipes of light that seem to emanate from the tubes above.

as tree

october 2020 online (due to take place in St. George's Hall, Tubbercurry, Sligo)

Curated online exhibition (postponed offline exhibition) as tree, due to take place in Tubbercurry in 2021

an image of interactive installation with strings of lights attached to wooden structures

over nature vi

september 26th-november 21st 2020 Luan Gallery, Athlone, Co. Westmeath (IE) - unfortunately closed early due to covid-19 lockdown restrictions

The sixth and final stage of the ongoing group exhibition Over Nature curated by Valeria Ceregini. Image of gallery courtesy of Wikimedia.

Wikimedia image of the Luan Gallery, Athlone

over nature v

august 7th-september 5th 2020 Courthouse Gallery, Ennistymon, Co. Clare (IE)

Part of the ongoing group exhibition Over Nature curated by Valeria Ceregini.

Photograph below credit: Mary O'Connor, artist.

Photograph of the front door of the Courthouse Gallery, Ennistymon, during the exhibition Over Nature

in áit

june 24th-26th 2020, Lockstown, Wicklow (IE)

An exhibition of restricted paintings presented to neighbours and friends living in a close locale to celebrate the end of the COVID-19 restrictions

Paintings installed for the in ait exhibition in Valleymount, Wicklow, 2020

COVID-19 update

Postponements/cancellations

Exhibitions and events up to August 2020 are currently postponed or cancelled in response to the COVID-19 crisis. Any update will be posted here. Please stay home, stay safe.

over nature iv

february 6th-march 7th 2020 Regional Cultural Centre, Letterkenny (IE)

Part of the ongoing group exhibition Over Nature curated by Valeria Ceregini.

Image below courtesy of Sammon chartered surveyors.

Photograph of the Regional Cultural Centre, Letterkenny

over nature iii

november 14th-December 21st 2019 Rathfarnham Castle, Dublin (IE)

Part of the ongoing group exhibition Over Nature curated by Valeria Ceregini.

the dining room of rathfarnham castle, site of shane finan's artwork in the dublin leg of this exhibition

over nature ii

october 2019 Sample-Studios, Cork (IE)

Part of the ongoing group exhibition Over Nature curated by Valeria Ceregini.

shane finan at the opening for over nature in cork, standing with one of his paintings

over nature i

september 2019 Roe Valley Arts & Cultural Centre, Limavady (UK)

Part of the ongoing group exhibition Over Nature curated by Valeria Ceregini.

shane finan at the opening for over nature in cork, standing with one of his paintings

over nature touring exhibition

september 2019-june 2020; multiple venues

over nature lead image

In 2019/2020, I will be one of the exhibiting artists in an upcoming exhibition about contemporary thoughts on nature and landscape, Over Nature, curated by Valeria Ceregini. The works that will feature in the exhibition will include interactive digital works and paintings on landscape and place. The exhibition will tour to five venues in the Republic of Ireland.

The venues that will be exhibiting the works are as follows:

the repeated refrains of nature

june 25th-august 31st 2019; zoological museum, trinity college dublin

A new interactive video based artwork, the repeated refrains of nature, was exhibied in the Zoological Museum, Trinity College Dublin (June 26th-August 31st 2019). Based on nature writing including that of Rachel Carson and Robert MacFarlane, the piece is a response to the decline in bird species populations currently being observed internationally. The artwork is exhibited in the Auk Room, beside an exhibiton of extinct birds and animals that once called Ireland home.

This artwork is part of the series solastalgia.

More information