What’s On | Visual Arts Events in July
This July, escape the heat with these cool visual arts events taking place across the country!
Exhibitions:
Sliabh na mBan [Scorched Grass/Structured Gress/Keep Yourself Nice] | Mollie Anna King
South Tipperary Arts Centre
2nd July – 24th August
For this exhibition, King has chosen to engage with the physical and historical elements of Sliabh na mBan and the surrounding rural area, drawn from androcentric folklore and the Cairn located at its peak.
By exploring the use of ritual and routine as a means of embedding ones self in a place, Mollie Anna King engages with the physical, material and historical elements of her immediate surrounds to create architectural forms. These question our unconscious responses to both built and natural environments through the use of routes and well-worn paths within domestic, display and rural spaces.
Interlinking personal rituals with those of others (namely Winnie from Beckett’s Happy Days), the artist constructs an elevated floor plan which can be seen as a set, a table, a cyclical act and a support structure. The current work engages with notions of idealised interiors and exteriors in the age of Wellness and the Environmental/Housing Crises.
The Horizon is Never Still | Jane Rainey
The Molesworth Gallery
3rd – 21st July
Drawing inspiration from Romanticism and traditional Japanese landscape painting, Jane Rainey’s work is never a facsimile of the world around us, but instead expresses our longing for an escape into nature, tapping into a sense of magic and the inner self.
Following a visit to the Chester Beatty museum in Dublin, Rainey was enthralled by its collection of Japanese artworks, in particular the Nara Ebon painted manuscripts. Essentially a device to tell mythical or religious stories, the Nara Ebon manuscripts are imaginative in composition; worlds float and fold in on one another, while clouds of gold frame the images and waves move in and out of the landscapes.
Between Worlds: The Door to the Stolen Days | Rosie McGurran
ArtisAnn Gallery
4th July – 31st August
Rosie’s work sits between the two worlds of Belfast and Roundstone: often the backdrop of urban houses meets the clear blue Connemara sea. Elements of life and loss appear with re-birth emerging victorious. Veils are made from fishing nets, wild flowers sit surrounded by votive candles and offerings from nature, holy wells are adorned with ribbons, houses burst open their walls to reveal snapshot moments of past lives – a door to the stolen days.
Light Keepers | Geraldine O’Sullivan
Custom House Studios Gallery
4th – 28th July
Light Keepers is a collection of 25 artworks capturing the unique world of Irish lighthouses.
“My paintings not only show the physical structures and the scapes but also capture the echo of the lives lived by the keepers and their families. I have tried to do this in my Lifescapes using old family photographs and memorabilia given to me by the families. Where possible the stories are retold here by the keepers and their families. It was the stories that governed my choice of locations to paint.”
I Remember Nothing, I Remember This | Peter Nash
Garter Lane Arts Centre
4th – 17th July
Composed of animation, sculpture and prints, the exhibition is an exploration of how remembered stories and imagery are eroded by the passing of time. These memories are evolved by experience and accumulation of knowledge, to become new, relevant entities to be passed on to the next generation.
Drawing on influences including the films of Peter Firmin & Oliver Postgate, illustrations of Gustave Doré and 16th century automata, the exhibition is a continuation of Nash’s ongoing research into pre-internet sources of knowledge and methods of communication.
Quare Taken | Larry Dunne
The Presentation Centre
6th July – 19th August
In Quare Taken, Dunne reflects on the homophobia he experienced while growing up in rural Ireland. The surreal and vibrant nature of his illustrations juxtaposed with the relentless prejudice that Dunne experienced in his native Enniscorthy combine into a fascinating response to the past, and provides an insight into the enduring effects that such an environment can have on mental health.
Recurrence | Olivia O’Dwyer
The Creative Hub
6th – 20th July
Recurrence is a new body of work focusing on rhythm, pattern and repetition of compositional motifs in painting. Predominantly monochromatic in nature, the paintings come into being through a process of addition and erasure until a balance is achieved. Periodically, subtle touches of colour find their way into the painting but the primary objective is to allow the painting to develop through a process of accident and discovery.
Art is the Place We Meet
Signal Arts Centre
8th – 27th July
The work presented in this exhibition is the result of the activities of the residents’ Art Group in Leopardstown Park Hospital. The provision of this service for residents stems from the strong belief in the power of art to connect people, to enable communication, to alleviate suffering and lessen the burden that illness brings.
Some of the artists involved in the project have never painted before, others are well experienced but for all of them to pick up the brush and step into the creative journey in health care settings was an act of courage and determination. We have been trying not to focus on the images around; but on those emanating from inside. Works in this exhibition are the images of emotions, ideas, sensations, struggles, memories transferred to the canvas, paper, bread boards and even table cloths; they are the proof of strength of human spirit and creativity.
How Long After Best Before | Liliane Puthod
Pallas Projects/Studios
11th – 27th July
How Long After Best Before by Dublin-based French artist Liliane Puthod brings together new and existing works in a large-scale installation. Considering the exhibition as a temporal dispositif, the gallery space will be transformed into an atmospheric and fully immersive installation for the audience to experience as if one was stepping into a concept store or an archaeological site; in other words a place yet to be discovered and apprehended.
Researching into and manipulating modes of display as well as language used by merchandising strategies, Liliane uses industrial as well as handmade materials to question the temporality of everyday life’s consumption, systems of production as well as the incessant proliferation of goods and their perceived value. Through exhibited sculptures, images and texts specifically made or chosen for the exhibition time frame, Puthod’s work creates new paradigms for the perception of artefacts working around merchandise as an archaeological resource.
Transmission | Tom Climent
GOMA
11th July – 24th August
This new series of paintings is focused around spatial constructs and how they might provide a structured space in our environment. Referencing landscape, various types of structures and natural phenomena, the compositions range from the visually complex to simple basic structures. By the manipulation of the materials, scale and weight of these structures, Climent tries to obscure their basic properties and any identifiable purpose. It suggests a narrative but never actually reveals what that might be. The paintings also investigate materiality and aesthetics. The layers and the mobility of the paint and textures become a witness to the thought process of their making.
Festivals:
Clonmel Junction Arts Festival
1st – 7th July
Clonmel Junction Arts Festival started almost 20 years ago as a celebration of touring theatre and live music. Over the years, it has grown into a week-long arts festival where national and international acts share a stage with some of the best local talent.
The 2019 edition will feature an exciting new cabaret venue, some pop-up art installations in the heart of Clonmel, a host of music and theatre shows, as well as lots of ways to get involved either as a spectator, or a performer!
Cairde Sligo Arts Festival
6th – 13th July
Highlights include Meascan a new cross-cultural collaborative work commissioned especially for the festival; a powerful literary strand, featuring the first ever Irish event with genre-busting Maggie Nelson; and the premiere of the darkly comic Uprooted by Brokentalkers.
Alongside events for young inquisitive minds, we also welcome our first ever Cairde Young Curators programme which presents a series of music, workshop and film carefully selected by our youth panel. At the heart of the programme lies a varied music strand featuring unique collaborations in special locations.
You can read our full programme announcement here.
Galway International Arts Festival
15th – 28th July
Galway International Arts Festival is the festival of extraordinary experiences, a creative collision of performance, music, visual art, theatre and spectacle. Whether turning a small Irish city on its head for two weeks, taking work on an international tour, or being a forceful year-round presence, every experience of the Galway International Arts Festival is an unforgettable encounter.
Other:
Site Specific Sculpture Trail in Sneem, Co. Kerry
17th – 22nd July
A temporary site-specific sculpture trail will be taking place in Sneem, Co Kerry. Approximately twenty participants, from Ireland and abroad, will each present an environmentally respectful sculpture as a response to the site along River Walk.
