Oisín Kelly was born, Austin Ernest Kelly, into a protestant family on May 17th, 1915. His father, William Kelly, was a school teacher and the family lived on James Street in the heart of working class Dublin on the south side of the River Liffey.
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Kelly completed a degree at Trinity College in French and Irish. He also studied at the Metropolitan School of Art and during his Trinity years he pursued his interest in art while on an exchange program at the University of Frankfurt.
After college, Kelly followed a career path in both teaching and art with school stints in Monaghan, Galway and Waterford before returning to Dublin where he taught at St Columba's College from 1946 to 1964. During this period, he studied with Henry Moore at the Chelsea Polytechnic for two semesters.
In addition to Moore, Kelly was influenced by Picasso and Brancussi along with archaic Irish art forms which he successfully fused with the modernest tradition. Kelly worked across multiple mediums including, bronze, wood and earthenware. He is likely best known for his 1964 monumental Children of Lir in the Garden of Remembrance and the 1977 James Larkin on O'Connell Street in Dublin. The latter work base on a 1923 Joseph Cashman photograph which captured the labor leader in full oratorical flow on O'Connell Street.
Following his teaching career, Kelly was established in a residency at the Kilkenny Design Workshop and it was in the associated city that he passed away suddenly on October 12th, 1981 at the age of 66. He is burried with his wife Olive Ruth Gwynn Kelly at St. Maelruain's Churchyard in Tallaght.
