I am a contemporary artist whose work is rooted in lived experience and a lifelong resistance to conformity. Raised in Bray, County Wicklow, in a chaotic yet creatively rich home, I turned to art and writing early on to express ideas beyond the limitations of language. Disillusioned with rigid authority, I existed on the margins of society through addiction, homelessness, and incarceration, where art became a source of liberation. Working in graphite, my practice captures the tension between past and present, collapse and renewal. Marked by profound loss, I chose recovery and life, rebuilding through awareness, responsibility, and hope. Through surrealist symbolism and metaphor, I explore power, greed, social control, and inequality, giving voice to the marginalised and alienated. My work challenges imposed narratives, portraying the world as I see it while calling for it to be reimagined, affirming individuality, agency, and the possibility of collective change.

Thomas Hendy is an award-winning, self-taught artist based in Kells, County Meath, originally from Bray. Working primarily in graphite, his practice is shaped by lived experience, drawing on a past marked by addiction, homelessness, and incarceration to explore themes of control, stigma, and survival on the margins of society. His highly detailed works challenge stereotypes surrounding addiction, mental health, and economic struggle, offering an unfiltered perspective that amplifies voices often unheard. Thomas’s journey from chaos to creative purpose has been featured in newspaper articles and radio interviews, where he spoke openly about the turbulent life that led him to art, a story often described as reading like a movie script. Today, his work stands as a testament to rebuilding and resilience, using personal history to invite deeper reflection on the shared human condition.