Leonard Sheil was born in Dublin in 1965. He received a degree in graphic design in 1984 at Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design. Awarded a scholarship in 1985 to study at the Beijing Language Institute, and the Central Academy of Fine Art,under Professor Li Hongeren, Dept. of Lithography. His initial career was as a graphic artist, working in Dublin and in London as a set painter, at the National Theatre Southbank. At ‘The Graphic Studio’ Dublin he worked as studio assistant,alongside many highly regarded Irish printmakers. In 2014 Leonard was elected the first Irish member of The Kunstverein Baden, established in 1924. Along with other new members, he exhibited a new series of works entitled ’Stories about Navigating’, based on the sea chart of Dublin Bay, and his many ’voyages’ around it.
In June he participated in exhibition entitled ’Dearth’ at Queen Street Studios Belfast. mo.ë in Vienna founded 2010 by graduates of Vienna’s Academy of Fine Arts invited him to show and talk about work made in Austria since 2007. The space intends to enable a wide range of art processes from production to exhibition, experiment to archive. His most recent show was ’Bay at the back of the Ocean’ at the Artspace Ebreichsdorf, Lower Austria.
He lives and works in Vienna Austria and Co.Wicklow Ireland.
Beyond Mimesis is a research and discourse platform investigating contemporary painting conditions curated by Christian Bazant-Hegemark.