Órla Bates (b. Wexford, 1978) is a visual artist living and working in County Wexford. She graduated in 2000 from Limerick School of Art and Design with a BA in Printmaking. Órla’s current practice has a particular focus on using drawing as a means of thinking, seeing and inventing. Through the act of drawing the work pursues a reinvented place that moves between states of representation and abstraction. Recognisable remnants and an assortment of lines, spaces and abstract mark-making veer away from their referential functions and seek out another state.
Recent group exhibitions include:
- Cairde Visual, The Model, Sligo,
- Peripheries Open, Peripheries Space, Gorey, Co. Wexford,
- RHA Annual Exhibition, Royal Hibernian Academy, Dublin
- Impressions, Galway Arts Centre.
In 2016 and 2012 she was awarded the Artlinks Bursary Award.
In 2012 Bates received the Tyrone Guthrie Residency Award from Wexford County Council.
Other residencies include:
- Tyrone Guthrie Centre, Annaghmakerrig, Newbliss, Co. Monaghan,
- Living Arts Project, Wexford County Council, Wexford Arts Centre,
- Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Ballycastle, Co. Mayo