Artist–Maker Kirsty O’Connor was born in the Channel Islands and now lives on a small island in the Outer Hebrides. She initially trained in textiles and later, psychotherapy and has been making art in a wide range of media for much of her life. 

She worked with The Research Society for Process Oriented Psychology for several years, as artist-in-residence drawing at public, NHS and training seminars, creating publications and researching body-symptoms and drawing. In Edinburgh her practise was primarily in ceramics –making smoke-fired voluptuous vessels– and creating handmade books. In recent years she has created several installations including the autobiographical Tender Burns Unit and –inspired by the sea– bodytides and Soul Vessels. In 2019 she completed a BA in Fine Art with the University of the Highlands and Islands. Threshold –celebrating womanhood in ceramic sculpture and installation– is her degree show.

Her practice is largely concerned with exploring female embodiment and sexuality; the honouring of birth and death; and the sea. She is inspired and informed, amongst many other things, by pre-historic artifacts, the myth of the goddess, pioneering women artists, movement work, motherhood, and living in a place of stark beauty, yards from the sea. She also writes poetry and memoir, which forms the basis of some of her artworks. She has exhibited widely over the last thirty years and has work in numerous private collections.