Designer Lainey Keogh for British Vogue

Oliver Stanley, 1990

My great friend Oliver Stanley, who died in 1995 from an AIDS-related illness. He was 41.

Lian Bell, 1988

Out-takes of my then ten-year-old sister Lian for the cover of the Hothouse Flowers’ ‘People’ album.

Enya, 1991

The singer in front of her castle in South County Dublin, taken for the Sunday Telegraph magazine.

Neil Duggan, 1989

Horslips

Polaroid from the early 2000s of the pioneering Irish rock band Horslips having tea at the Clarence Hotel / channelling their inner country priests.

Rolf Harris, 1987

“There is a Jekyll and Hyde nature to Rolf Harris and this dark side of Rolf Harris was obviously not apparent to all of the other people he met during the course of his work, and it was not apparent to those who may want to testify to his good character.” Sasha Wass QC, during the 2014 trail for indecent assault which led to his imprisonment. When I photographed him for the New Musical Express in the late 80’s all he wanted to give me was his standard cheeky chappy persona. After I asked him to take off his glasses I caught something of his dark side, just for a moment. I could feel there was something not at all nice about him, which is why this was the image I sent for publication.

Self-portrait in Tony Higgins Studio, 1983

Working late one evening. I’d just been given my dream job as Tony’s assistant, and didn’t have a clue what I was doing.

Ronan O'Leary, 1991

Film director and screenwriter Ronan O’Leary dropped in for a portrait. He asked me if he’d look better if he wet his hair a bit. I said well, you might, and he just kept going.

Karl Stephenson, 1986

Karl died in a hit and run accident on Christmas Eve 1988.

John Fiddler, 1979

This feels like one of the first real portraits I ever made. I’d run away from home aged 17, and was living in a squat in Earls Court. John was Irish, had mental health issues and had lived in the basement for years. I often wonder what became of him.

Mary Furlong, 1997

Mary assisted me for a while in the late 90’s before she became full-time photographer. She has more hair these days.

Marie Heaney, 1993

The author, editor and critic at home in Sandymount.

Brendan O'Hara, 1989

Brendan moved to the UK shortly after we did this portrait, and the last I heard he was working as an addiction counsellor.

Saffron Burrows, 2000

Part of a commission from Elle Magazine to photograph the actor in the West of Ireland, on the location of the film “The Seventh Stream”

Susan Howick, 1985

My son Sam’s mother. Taken in a cafe on her lunch break and later used for the cover of RANT magazine.

Gary Coyle, 1985

The artist as a young man. He’s always been a snappy dresser.

Rebecca Tallon, 1994

For the Sunday Tribune

Djinn and Gerry, 1986

From a series on couples.

Yvonne Connolly, 1995

An out-take from a Peter Mark shoot. It’s my hand.

Ronnie Drew, 1998

Out-take from a shoot for a solo album on Sony Music.

Ali Dunne, 1986

Ireland’s first supermodel, who had worldwide success throughout the 80s and 90s. Shot for the cover of RANT Magazine.

Lovers, 1996

Two friends, a couple, dropped in and asked me to take their picture. I turned away to load the camera and when I turned back they were naked. I hadn’t realised that was what we were doing.

Lisa Cummins, 1991

Lisa was my muse for many years. Here she models Jean-Paul Gaultier jewellery for the shop Kamouflage. The photographic technique is obviously a homage to / inspired by / stolen from Man Ray’s rayographs.