Alan Graham was born in 1939 in Dublin. He commenced his artistic career in Belfast in the late fifties as an apprentice linen designer in John Shaw Brown (1955-58). After three years he returned to Dublin and worked in a leading advertising company as a commercial artist for many years. During his time in Dublin he attended the College of Art (1958-61).

He was influenced by mountaineering and took off on many expeditions to the Arctic. His experience of the outdoors had an influence on his paintings.

"I have tried to express myself in abstract form as feelings when I travel through desert regions, such as the Artic and Namib desert. My thoughts are for the small detail of landscape which is presented in plant and rock formations and the effect of weather on these areas. The feelings of being in these environments, you become part of the big silence, and its being part of this great silence your senses become more acute, there is a powerful feeling of emptiness, that you become aware of any little form or plant that you see no matter how small it becomes significant and hugely important, as it has a greater meaning than the larger landscape that confronts you. The difference between a warm desert and cold desert, brings different images, but never the less, being part of the big silence dominates."

"The philosophy of my work, how I interpret the images that confronts me and their affect on my subconscious has produced works that invoke abstract meaning of silence."

As far as the subjects of his paintings go, they are one moment of time involving particular images in relationship to each other and to him, after that moment has past all the problems are pictorial paintings have become more elaborate, because he wants them to contain more of the subject and rhythm of the environment.

Alan Graham has exhibited in various group shows in Dublin and solo exhibitions with the Hylands Gallery and James Wray & Co. in Belfast. He lives and works for part of the year in Provence in the South of France.