My PhD research project, based within the School of Law at Queen’s University Belfast, is funded by the AHRC. The project examines how knowledge is being produced on a new investigative tool for law enforcement – known as Investigative Genetic Genealogy – and how use of this tool within criminal justice investigations adversely impacts on the right to privacy. Like a number of my peers, I’m also a parent. Recently I asked my youngest daughter, Zara, what she thought of my undertaking a PhD as a mature student. “It’s cool” she replied, a view echoed by her elder sister. “I’m proud of you” Zara added, smiling.

In that moment our roles as parent and child were reversed, a fact not lost on her. I reminded Zara she too is doing ‘cool’ things. Here’s the story of one of those things.

Zara’s experience of remote-learning during the COVID-19 pandemic was more protracted than most due to medical reasons. To pass the time I encouraged her to draw; previously drawing had helped her cope with the anxiety she felt in nursery and then later in school.

At first, she drew pencil portraits while I continued my PhD research. As her time at home dragged on, Zara asked whether she could use money she had saved for a set of oil paints and canvases and so we scoured the internet together. Her first oil painting in the summer of 2021 was a portrait of a bandmember of Måneskin; I thought it was incredible for anyone, not least a 13 year old. One of her schoolteachers shared a picture of the portrait on social media and the post went viral prompting newspaper reviews and radio interviews.

Since then Zara’s artwork has been exhibited, amongst other places, at the Royal Ulster Academy of Arts in Belfast as part of the Texaco Children’s Art Competition, while a portrait she painted of former US President Barack Obama for a Black History Month competition was displayed in the University of Ulster.

Most recently, a portrait she painted of me in oils was shortlisted for the Zurich Young Portrait Prize. It is first being exhibited in the National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin until 2^nd April and then travelling to the Regional Cultural Centre, Letterkenny, County Donegal from 3^rd June until 2^nd September 2023.

In late 2022 Zara and I travelled to Dublin for the awards ceremony. During the journey I asked what she was most looking forward to. “Seeing your portrait again and the Caravaggio painting” she replied. We did both. And as I looked at her taking in every inch of the paintings in the Gallery it struck me how far she had come and how proud of her I am.