Tattoos, Puns, and Pop Art: Tom Mathews Opens New Show at Town Hall Theatre

This June, leading Irish cartoonist, Tom Mathews, will unveil 18 new works, including the official poster image for this year’s Galway Cartoon Festival, at his new exhibition at the Town Hall Theatre in Galway City. Discover all about it below...

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‘Lydia and Other Tattooed Ladies’ opens at the Town Hall Theatre Galway Bar & Gallery on Saturday 20 June at 2.30pm. The title of the exhibition comes from the song of the same name featured in both the Marx Brothers film At the Circus and The Muppet Show.

These new works will be a “reverie of tattoos and their hostesses”, according to James Harrold, the former Galway City Arts Officer who will be the guest speaker at Saturday’s launch.

In ‘Lydia...’, the art of the tattoo will be reimagined in a sequence of pop art images that, as James Harrold describes, “feature the signature Mathews cocktail of visual and literary puns [and] colourful cultural references that whirl across the life, loves and puzzles of the artist’s well-stocked imagination”.

Speaking ahead of the launch, Tom Mathews said he “made these images to amuse” exhibition goers: “I like Franz Hals ‘Laughing Cavalier’ more than Picasso’s ‘Weeping Woman’. Oscar Wilde said that art is the only serious thing in the world, and the artist is the only one who is never serious. Amen to that.”

above: Tom Mathews and Galway Cartoon Festival's Margaret Nolan

Among the works on display will be the official poster image for the 2026 Galway Cartoon Festival, which was created by Tom Mathews, a longtime friend of the event.

Galway Cartoon Festival 2026 will run from 1st - 6th October, and this year celebrates its 10th anniversary. To mark this milestone, there will be a retrospective exhibition and a display of works by leading Belgian cartoonists. There will be an art trail, the return of the Freedom Wall, and talks and exhibitions by Irish, British, French, and US cartoonists.

Admission to ‘Lydia and Other Tattooed Ladies’ is free. The exhibition will run for four weeks.

All photos courtesy Galway Cartoon Festival