Collection: Sam McCready

Sam McCready studied painting at Stranmillis College and the Belfast College of Art, where his tutors were Kenneth Webb and Romeo Toogood. His professional work in theatre, in which he had an international reputation as actor, director and playwright, and his teaching commitments, allowed him little time to pursue his painting until he retired as Professor of Theatre at the University of Maryland in the US.  Since then he had also studied calligraphy and brush painting with Chinese masters.

He had exhibited a number of times at the ArtisAnn Gallery and had mounted a number of sold-out solo shows in the US, most notably in Baltimore and the Heartland Gallery in Urbana, Illinois. His work is in private collections in Ireland, the US and the Far East.

As an artist, he was absorbed with nature in its many moods, with the patterns and rhythms of line, texture and space. For subject, he returned to his native Ireland, intent on evoking not merely the topography of the landscape but the feelings and moods he associated with it. He worked principally from memory, creating with rich colours and textures, images of mountain, lakes, tree, bog, and sky.

His later artworks reflected his study with Chinese masters, focused on black and white, and turning for inspiration to the environment close to his home in the US. 

Sam died at his home in America in 2019 at the age of 82. 

He is deeply missed by those who knew him around the world.