What can you do with a trench coat apart from wearing it? Inhabit it? Decorate it? Destroy it? We gave a €36 white cotton trench coat from Penneys to three artists and asked them to treat it whatever way they chose. These are the results, as described to Deirdre McQuillan.
Mark O'Kelly, Artist and lecturer
"I started making drawings on the coat in black ink, and they had a semiotic look, like signs which reminded me of Paris. In my work I have been influenced by writers such as Roland Barthes and his idea that fashion and clothing are connected with anthropology and sociology. The images were of Freud and Michel Foucault, with echoes of the Left Bank in Paris.
"It's a play on the idea of the look of French fashion with radical French philosophers, so a lot of signs and symbols can be interpreted in a Freudian way, such as the womb-like igloos, the cellular structures and the image of dinosaurs. I wanted the references to be cultural. My last show used fashion as a metaphor to discuss how ideas get mediated. Fashion is a language and is pejoratively treated, intellectually. I think there is a connection between economics and aesthetics.
"Scale was a big issue. I wanted the coat to be wearable, and I left empty space at the front and worked from the inside out, condensing the work around the centre so it looks more flattering."
•O'Kelly is a fine arts graduate of NCAD and the Slade School of Art and Design in London. He taught in Seattle in the US, and is now lecturing in Limerick School of Art & Design. He had his first solo show in Ireland in 1997 and exhibits at the Kevin Kavanagh Gallery in Dublin. His last major show, entitled In Fashion, was staged in Limerick City Gallery in 2005
Aideen Barry, Film and performance artist
"I wanted to do something cheeky and fun with the coat and bastardise the object. I wanted to suggest that the trench coat could make you do things you never thought you would do - so it took on a life of its own. As a result I created three performances around it. For the first, I spoke to Tanya McRory, a dancer-in-residence in Galway, about synchronised movement. Could we get women to synchronise flashing in a trench coat, an act usually associated with men? I spoke to David Delaney of Penneys in Galway and he gave me coats for 20 women. We organised them outside Naughton's in Shop Street and they flashed three times and were photographed by Clare Lymer.
"For the second, called Shop Lefting, I wanted to play with the idea of an object being suspicious and in disguise, and the idea of being a shoplifter, but leaving cheap objects behind rather than taking expensive objects away. This was photographed by Anita Murphy and Rosie Lynch in Brown Thomas. The third film was about how the trench coat could make you do extraordinary things, such as levitate."
•Barry studied sculpture at Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology, and graduated in 2002. She is currently completing an MA in visual art in DúLaoghaire College of Art and Design. She won the Claremorris Open Award 2004 and is creator of a number of DVD films and performances. She will be presenting her MA show in Studio 6 in Temple Bar Gallery & Studios, Dublin 2, from July 27th to 29th. She will also be doing an installation for Project '06 in Galway, as part of a group exhibition called 12 Degrees, and is exhibiting in Thomastown, Co Kilkenny, as part of Kilkenny Arts Festival, from August 11th to 20th
Geraldine Fox, Overall winner of the 2005 RDS National Crafts Competition
"I had the idea in my head before I actually got the coat. I wanted to take the theme of the summer jacket, which had come into fashion for the first time in a long time, but I wanted something light to wear with jeans or a skirt.
"I didn't want a coat, which is why I shortened the length and the sleeves to make it light and summery. I dyed it blue with Dylon, then cut out the shape and started the embroidery. I found the devoré fabric in Murphy Sheehy in Castle Market, Dublin 2, and that started off a new idea in my mind. I love silk and velvet, and in my work I like putting very luxurious textiles against very ordinary fashion pieces. I used the circular theme from the fabric throughout the jacket.
"The brass buttons are 18th century, and came from Camden Market, even though I didn't intend to go military. To be honest, I never plan. I sit down and start embroidering and then let it flow. As the jacket progressed, I could see the military theme emerging, so I just went with that. The belt is made from a sea-green shot silk taffeta from Murphy Sheehy, and I found the buckle in a Paris market. It took me three days to make. The embroidery took the longest. It always does."
•Fox is a textiles graduate of Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology. She is currently working as an accessories designer in Brandwell in Dublin. Her embroidered belts and brooches can be found in Jewel, beside the Design Centre, in the Powerscourt Centre, Dublin 2