Maeve Coughlin: Someone Who Isn鈥檛 Me
Who is Maeve Coughlin? The name Maeve originates in the Gaelic word Medb, pronounced 鈥渕ead鈥� literally meaning 鈥渕ead-woman, she who rules, intoxicating.鈥� The surname Coughlin is the Anglicized form of Gaelic 鈥淢ac Cochl谩in鈥� or 鈥溍� Cochl谩in鈥� meaning descendant of the one with the cloak. Maeve Coughlin is the mead-woman descended from the cloaked one.
All names are words first. Searching for herself on the Internet as one searches for a word in the dictionary, Maeve Coughlin was confronted by Maeve Coughlins. She kept tabs on the other Maeves. She indulged in the voyeurism that is the Internet鈥檚 flagship offering. She used images from the social media accounts of the other Maeves to produce a body of sculptures.
Just as a word fails to encompass the object to which it refers, a name fails to encompass the person to whom it was given. But all things which are called by a shared word have something in common beyond the word that refers to them. One sculpture is likely to be dramatically different from another object called a sculpture. Yet they have something else in common and that shared aspect is referred to as sculpture. At one time Coughlin saw in the Maeves what she could have been. In them her other lives were lived. Perhaps every Maeve Coughlin has something in common besides the fact of their shared name鈥攂esides the fact that they all began as the mead-woman daughter of the hooded one.
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Who is Maeve Coughlin? The name Maeve originates in the Gaelic word Medb, pronounced 鈥渕ead鈥� literally meaning 鈥渕ead-woman, she who rules, intoxicating.鈥� The surname Coughlin is the Anglicized form of Gaelic 鈥淢ac Cochl谩in鈥� or 鈥溍� Cochl谩in鈥� meaning descendant of the one with the cloak. Maeve Coughlin is the mead-woman descended from the cloaked one.
All names are words first. Searching for herself on the Internet as one searches for a word in the dictionary, Maeve Coughlin was confronted by Maeve Coughlins. She kept tabs on the other Maeves. She indulged in the voyeurism that is the Internet鈥檚 flagship offering. She used images from the social media accounts of the other Maeves to produce a body of sculptures.
Just as a word fails to encompass the object to which it refers, a name fails to encompass the person to whom it was given. But all things which are called by a shared word have something in common beyond the word that refers to them. One sculpture is likely to be dramatically different from another object called a sculpture. Yet they have something else in common and that shared aspect is referred to as sculpture. At one time Coughlin saw in the Maeves what she could have been. In them her other lives were lived. Perhaps every Maeve Coughlin has something in common besides the fact of their shared name鈥攂esides the fact that they all began as the mead-woman daughter of the hooded one.
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