Champions Avenue emerged from a two-year artist’s residency at Larkin Community College, Dublin 1. The school is situated in the heart of Dublin’s inner city and is attended by a diverse student population of over 400 pupils. LCC is a DEIS school (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools), part of a government Action Plan for Educational Inclusion. The residency (supported by Young People, Children and Education grants from the Arts Council) was part of a wider long-term study of school and education, that posed questions about equality of opportunity and the support systems in place to nurture children and young people. 
Diane was one of the sixth year pupils at the school and had a particularly strong and enigmatic presence. Aidan Dunne (Irish Times, Aug 2018), describes Diane as having ‘an unmistakable attitude’ of meeting ‘the viewers gaze with cool assurance and, looking to art history, something of the bearing of a renaissance prince’. This image was winner of the Zurich Portrait Prize 2018 at the National Gallery of Ireland.