Visual Artists' News Sheet - 2013 November December

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet issue 6 November – December 2013 Published byVisual Artists Ireland Ealaíontóirí Radharcacha Éire

Artists should be Paid PAyment Guidelines for ProfessionAl VisuAl Artists for or the first time in ireland, venues and artists can now calculate equitable levels of payments, as well as properly budget for their programmes and for the variety of work that professional artists undertake in not-for-profit spaces.

Visual Artists ireland has collaborated with artists, organisations and our international partners to create the Payment Guidelines for Professional Visual Artists based upon international best practice, and are scalable for different sizes of organisations as well as the experience/ reputation of artists. they also take into consideration the different work undertaken by artists within the context of exhibitions and supporting services.

26 Oct – 15 Jan 2014 KDW@21C CONFERENCE Sat 26th Oct, 10.00 am – 5.30 pm Exploring the legacy of the Kilkenny Design Workshops, Parade Tower, Kilkenny.

the Payment Guidelines for Professional Visual Artists are available at www.visualartists.ie

REMEMBERING KDW Sun 27th Oct, 2.00 pm – 4.00 pm Reminiscing event at Butler House, Kilkenny – all welcome.

INVITATION

Late Date – Friday 29th June

Check our website for booking details, at 6.30pm.

Join us for a glass of wine and an informal tour of plus info on all our other seasonal the exhibition. activities and tours.

Between Art and Industry offers an opportunity to explore the shifting relationships between craft and industry and in doing so, to understand the wider contexts of our past and present and make plans for our future.

With the advent of globalisation, methods of manufacturing have shifted dramatically. Outsourcing of labour to other countries has resulted in the decline of industrial

manufacturing in Ireland and the UK. Utilising an evocative mix of installation, film, photography and objects, this exhibition reflects on the consequences and costs of shifting patterns of production, and on the potential for more sustainable new models. Between Art and Industry features work by Neil Brownsword, Róisín de Buitléar and Molloy and Sons.

Arts Council of Northern Ireland, MacNeice House, 77 Malone Road, Belfast BT9 6AQ. T: +44 (28) 9038 5200. W: www.artscouncil-ni.org. E: info@artscouncil-ni.org

Image: Brendan Jamison, Green JCB bucket with holes. Arts Council Collection

Arts Council of Northern Ireland Developing the arts in Northern Ireland

FIND US Castle Yard, Kilkenny City Ireland +353 (0)56 7796147 info@nationalcraftgallery.ie www.nationalcraftgallery.ie

EXHIBITION / LOCIS ONE-DAY SEMINAR Exhibition:

Thurs 14 Nov, 6pm

Seminar:

Fri 15 Nov, 10.30am - 5pm Leitrim Sculpture Centre, Manorhamilton, Co. Leitrim There is no fee to attend the Locis seminar but advance booking is essential.

For booking and further information go to www.locis.eu or contact Christine at Leitrim Arts Office 071 96 21694 arts@leitrimcoco.ie With the support of the Culture Programme of the European Union

www.locis.eu

LOCIS is collaboration between Leitrim County Council Arts Office; the Centre of Contemporary Art in Torun, Poland; and Residence Botkyrka, Sweden who have devised a two-year, three-country, artist-in-residence programme where each partner sends and receives a leading artist to the other two countries to work with groups of artists from the three regions.

The 2013 edition is based on space and new models for spatial/ urban/environmental transformation. The work of all the 2013 lead artists transcends disciplinary boundaries between art, design, architecture or urban planning and channels ideas in a direction which looks for new models of living in symbiosis with our natural surroundings.

The seminar features the artists and curators involved along with invited guests and the exhibition features work by the Irish residency group along with documentation of the other two.

Presenting at the seminar are:

Jarosław Kozakiewicz (Poland)

Leading the residency at Leitrim Sculpture Centre, Ireland

Irish group: Ulrika Larsson (SE), Natalia Wisniewska (PO), Niall Walsh (IE), Kathy O’Leary (IE) Jonas Nobel (Sweden)

Leading the residency at the Centre of Contemporary Art in Torun, Poland

Polish group: Cathal Roche (IE), Maja Hammarén (SE), Arek Pasożyt (PO), Patrycja Orzechowska (PO) Dominic Stevens (Ireland)

Leading the residency at Botkyrka Konsthall, Sweden

Sweden group: Elaine Reynolds (IE), Ewa Axelrad (PO), Jorun Kugelberg (SE)

4

The Visual Artists’News Sheet

Editorial Welcome to the November / December edition of the Visual Artists' News Sheet. In early September, Visual Artists Ireland announced Payment Guidelines for Visual Artists, the outcome a year-long research and consultation process. The official launch event took place in the context of TBG&S’s ‘Workers Café’ project on 17 October.

This issue also profiles other recent VAI activities. Richard Forrest reports on his experience of the VAI Show & Tell session recently held at 126 Gallery, Galway. Features on VAI’s help-desk, advocacy and professional development programmes offer essential guidance and advice. And VAI’s project management work is spotlighted in an interview with Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo about the Luas Docklands Public Art commission.

There’s spiky commentary and opinion from our columnists. Mark Fisher laments how the modern obsession with productivity is inimical to sustained thought and creativity. Chris Clarke similarly ponders whether the hyper competitive babble of the art world just adds up to a hollow scrabbling for attention. Jason Oakley salutes the efforts of initiatives such as The Mothership Project in tackling the alarming persistence of shallow presumptions about the incompatibility of parenthood with pursuing a dynamic art career.

Conference and seminar coverage includes Sven Anderson and Fergus Kelly’s reports on sound art events, both of which fuse discourse and performance, and were held in Brussels and Dun Laoghaire respectively. Joanne Laws reports on ‘Partition’, which addressed the issues raised by Derry’s year as UK City of Culture, 2013. Jonathan Cummins discusses his series of film installations and public discussions, based on interviews with Irish political prisoners, which has been presented in Dublin, Derry, Paris and Marseille.

Reviewed in this edition’s Critique are: ‘Sculpture in Context’, Botanic Gardens, Dublin; ‘False Memory’, TBG&S; Cora Cummins, Visual, Carlow; LCAG’s 'Labour & Lockout'; ‘The Alphabet Series’, WCAC’; and ‘Death Drive’, Galway Arts Centre.

Cavan is the regional focus in this issue. The contributors are: Cavan Arts Office; Yvonne Cullivan; transart; John Byrne and Michelle Boyle. Visual arts activity in East Belfast is explored in profiles of the Household Festival and Art in the Eastside – an artists' billboard project. We also profile Belfast based PS2's Galway project ‘5 ways to say your prayers’. Feargal O’Malley, VAI’s NI Manager, devotes his column to the PRIME collective’s contribution to this year’s East Belfast Festival. The festival context is also explored in an interview with UK artist Bob and Roberta Smith, about his exhibition and projects for this year’s Kilkenny Arts Festival.

Louise Manifold profiles a cross-disciplinary collaboration with author Kevin Barry. Marie Farrell, Pat Murphy and Alice Maher discuss Mayo Collaborative, which instigated a multi-venue exhibition of work by Niamh O’Malley across the Mayo. Other profiles include, focuses on the Luan Gallery, Athlone and The Craft & Design Collective; alongside a feature on the Leopold Bloom Award, a Hungarian art prize sponsored by Irish company Maurice Ward & Co. Ella De Burca’s ‘Career Development’ article includes accounts of her residency experiences in Banff, Miami, Antwerp and Brussels. Closer to home, Anna Marie Savage describes her residency at Cló Ceardlann na gCnoc, Donegal. Aideen Barry’s West of Ireland column focuses on Clare’s Outrider Artists group, which has organised a number of international exchanges.

As ever, there’s roundups of recent exhibitions and public projects, details of all the latest opportunities, news from the visual arts sector and Pablo Helguera’s Artoons.

Join

Visual Artists Ireland

November – December 2013

Contents

Cover: Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo. Luas Docklands Public Art Commission. Installed August 2013.

Commissioned by the RPA, and managed by Visual Artists Ireland.

5. Roundup. Recent exhibitions and projects of note.

5. Column. Column. Mark Fisher Space to Think.

6. Column. Jason Oakley Even in Sweden.

7. Column. Chris Clarke Status Update.

8. News. The latest developments in the Visual Arts Sector.

9. Regional Focus. Resources and activity accross Cavan.

12. Project Profile. New Others New Difficulties. Jonathan Cummins discusses ‘When I Leave These Landings’, an evolving film-installation project based on conversations with political prisoners.

13. Festival. Questions & Change. Bob and Roberta Smith talks about tparticipation, art and democracy.

14. International. Hungarian Connection. John Ward Director of Maurice Ward & Co, and Petra Csizek of ACAX / the Leopold Museum, Budapest, discuss the Leopold Bloom award.

15. Seminar. Resonant Chamber. Joanne Laws reports on 'Partition' a seminar held at The City Factory Gallery, Void, Derry (16 –17 July 2013).

16. Residency. Relocations. Anna Marie Savage describes her residency at Cló Ceardlann na gCnoc.

17. How is it Made? Chance is the Objective. Louise Manifold outlines the development of a work created in collaboration with the author Kevin Barry.

18. Project profile. Connecting Domestic Hubs. Alissa Kliest profiles the Household Festival.

19. Critique. Cora Cummins, Visual; Sculpture in Context; ‘False Memory’ TBG&S; 'Labour & Loclout; LCAG; ‘The Alphabet Series’ WCAC; ‘Death Drive’ Galway Arts Centre.

23. Career Development. Considered, Stuttering Progress. Ella De Burca considers the guiding principles of her practice.

24. VAI Activity: Show & Tell: Galway. Richard Forrest reports on the VAI Show & Tell session held at 126 Gallery, Galway.

24. VAI Professional Development. Develop Yourself!Artists share their views on the role of training and development in their practices.

25. VAI Help Desk. Reasonable Expectations. What artists should expect from exhibition agreements.

25. VAI Advocacy. Café Culture. VAI's Common Room Café in Limerick.

26. Organisation Profile. Championing Innovation. A profile of the Luan Gallery, Athlone.

26. Organisation Profile. Food for the Soul. A profile of the Craft and Design Collective, Belfast.

27. Project Profile. The Mayo Collaborative. Marie Farrell, Pat Murphy and Alice Maher discuss Niamh O'Malley's multi-venue exhibition (31 AUG – 30 Sept), that inaugurated the Mayo Collaborative, a new venture supported by Mayo County Council and the county’s visual arts venues.

28. VAI Consultancy. Street Life. Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo discuss their Luas Docklands commission.

29. VAI West of Ireland. Clare's Cultural Climate. Aideen Barry, takes a reading from her cultural thermometer in County Clare.

29. VAI Northern Ireland. Making a Splash. Feargal O’Malley reports on promising new cultural developments in East Belfast, including the Prime Collective.

30. Conference. Listening in Brussells. Sven Anderson assesses ‘Tuned City: Brussels’ 30. Conference. Bandwith & Fidelity. Fergus Kelly reports on the Irish Sound Science & Technology Association's third annual convocation.

31. Project Profile: Relics, Scenarios & Props. A profile of Belfast based PS2's Galway showing ‘5 ways to say your prayers’.

32. Project Profile. Art For the People. A profile of 'Art in the Eastside' East Belfast's art billboard project.

33. Art in Public Roundup. Public art commissions, site-specific works, socially engaged practice and other forms of art outside the gallery.

34. Opportunities. All the latest grants, awards, exhibition calls and commissions.

35. VAI Professional Development. VAI's upcoming professional development programme events.

36. Artoons. Pablo Helguera. Artoons. The foibles and ironies of the art world.

Production: Publications Manager: Jason Oakley. Assistant Editor: Lily Power. News & Opportunities: Niamh Looney. Invoicing: Bernadette Beecher.

Visual Artists Ireland provides practical support, services, information & resources for professional visual artists throughout their careers.

Contributors: Mark Fisher, Jason Oakley, Chris Clarke, John Byrne, Michelle Boyle, Yvonne Cullivan, Jonathan Cummins, Bob and Roberta Smith, John Ward, Petra Csizek, Joanne Laws, Anna Marie Savage, Louise Manifold, Alissa Kliest, Ella De Burca, Richard Forrest, Monica Flynn, Niamh Lonney, Alex Davis, Marie Farrell, Pat Murphy, Alice Maher, Mick Kelly & Istvan Laszlo, Sven Anderson, Fergus Kelly, Aideen Barry, Feargal O’Malley, Pablo Helguera, Sarah Lincoln, John Graham, Sara Baume, Anne Mullee, Catriona O’Reilly, Trans-art, Michaële Cutaya, Jan Irwin,Emilia Krysztofiak, Deidre Robb, Peter Mutschler and Ruth Morrow, Monica Flynn, Vera McEvoy, Monica De Bath, Colin Martin.

Contact: Visual Artists Ireland, Ground Floor, Central Hotel Chambers, 7–9 Dame Court, Dublin 2 T: 353(0)1 672 9488 F: 00353(0) 1 672 9482 E: info@visualartists.ie www.visualartists.ie Board of Directors: Liam Sharkey (Chair), Maoiliosa Reynolds, Roger Bennett, Susan MacWilliam, Linda

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The Visual Artists’News Sheet

November – December 2013

Column

Mark Fisher

5

Roundup

On Leaving

her recent series of work were developed

The Earth Rings in Your Ears

David Monaghan’s solo exhibition ‘On

during residencies at The Arthouse,

Leaving’ ran at Siamsa Tire, Tralee, Kerry

Stradbally and the Ballinglen Arts

(10 Sept – 19 Oct). “Each background”,

Foundation, Co Mayo.

Space to Think This summer I found myself unable to write or think. My brain felt as empty as a kettle that has boiled dry; its thoughts stale and repetitious. I was lethargic and found it difficult to muster much enthusiasm; my mind wouldn’t focus on anything except television. There was a bitter irony about this. After years of being a precarious worker, I finally got a permanent contract at the beginning of the year. So I had promised myself that the summer would be the time when I would – at last – be able to devote myself properly to my own writing and creative projects, instead of being endlessly distracted by the freelance work which I previously needed to take on in order to pay the rent.

It’s tempting to give a Lacanian explanation of this collapse: free time was only alluring when I couldn’t get it. When I was actually faced with the prospect of attaining what I said I wanted, I fell into a melancholic stupor. The catatonic disengagement lasted just long enough to ensure that I would get nothing done before the urgencies and busyness of the next academic year snatched time away again, and returned me to the familiar – and comfortable? – state of being permanently harassed and deflected.

No doubt there’s some truth in this. We’ve all faced the terror of the blank page; procrastination is an occupational hazard of the cultural worker. Yet in this case I think there was more to it than that. The analogy of the kettle boiled dry was probably close to the truth: I was running on empty, my brain exhausted. A certain bipolarity is no doubt a given with creative work – who is the writer, musician, artist who can reliably produce work of high quality indefinitely? Similarly, capitalism has always forced people to do work that is depressingly pointless. But, in the age of what David Graeber recently called ‘bullshit jobs’, the pressure to engage in pointless work has reached a new intensity, with the result that the time and space in which creativity can develop has been crushed to an unprecedented degree.

I gained an insight into this when – the last person on earth to do so – I started watching Mad Men during my summer collapse. Two scenes from the first season stood out, illustrating the difference between a form of capitalism which merely parasited and exploited creativity – the capitalism of the early 1960s – and a form of capitalism which makes creativity almost impossible – the neoliberal (or nihilberal) capitalism which now dominates. In the first, we see Cooper, the boss of the agency, go into the office of the agency’s leading ‘creative’, Don Draper. Cooper says that he finds it difficult to adjust to the fact that he never seems to see Draper doing very much. And that’s correct: there are many scenes in which we see Draper reclining in his chair, staring blankly, apparently doing nothing. The contemporary viewer is liable to relate to Cooper’s bafflement – what this same viewer will find surprising is the fact that Cooper makes no further comment, turns on his heel, and leaves the office.

Imagine how that scene would play out in a contemporary workplace. Instead of trusting that Draper’s methods are effective, and leaving him to it, as Cooper does, a modern boss would foist a whole series of pointless tasks on Draper to ensure that there wasn’t a moment when he wasn’t seen to be working. For this is what so much of the frenzied inertia of contemporary work in the West amounts to – a simulation of productivity. One of the reasons that the concept of ‘cognitive work’ is so unsatisfactory is that thinking is the last thing one is permitted to do at work now.

Work only counts as work if you can be seen doing it, and if it is quantifiable: so answering emails feels like real work whereas ‘just’ thinking doesn’t. It’s worse even that one of the most obvious ways to be seen working is to make work for others: to send out surveys, quality documents, self-surveillance log-books, etc. And so the spiral of pointlessness gets vicious.

In the other scene from Mad Men that struck me, Draper is advising his secretary, Peggy, who is aspiring to be a copywriter. Peggy is stuck on some copy, and Draper tells her to think very deeply about the subject, then forget about it – the solution will come to her. Today, this possibility of ‘forgetting about it’, of allowing the unconscious to process a problem while we are doing other things, is as rare as the opportunity to just sit in a room thinking. Brains are not allowed to idle any more than they are allowed to be absorbed very deeply in something. Instead, the brain is bombarded by an unrelenting blitz of stimuli.

If it isn’t our employers forcing us to multi-task, it is our own addiction to social media which constantly overloads our brain and nervous system. (I say ‘our own’, but this addiction is not a moral failing on our parts; it has been deliberately cultivated by those forces which want to deny us agency and the capacity to reflect.)

The conditions that allowed the Don Drapers of the world to just sit in an office thinking involved massive exploitation. Part of this, of course, was the exploitation of women such as Peggy, or Draper’s wife, Betty, consigned to the home while Draper stays late at work and has multiple affairs.

But neoliberal capitalism’s version of equality, which has had the effect not of giving everyone a chance to be a Don but making us all like Peggy, is in the early part of the first season – we are forced to spend most of the day doing administration, and to squeeze time for our creativity and our thinking in the hours after the official working day has finished. Surely this can’t be right – and surely it’s time we started fighting for spaces to think again?

the press release detailed, “has a

www.karenhendyartist.com

particular significance for the subject, and the idea is to make a heroic shot

Seven

which celebrates the person”.

‘Seven’, a solo exhibition by Robert

www.siamsetire.com

Ballagh, ran at Crawford Art Gallery, Cork (14 Sept – 26 Oct). The press release noted, “Seven self-portraits and seven

Excursion

portraits of political and cultural leaders have been assembled to mark the seventh decade in the life of an artist

'The Earth Rings in Your Ears', Eight Gallery

whose career began in the 1960s and

The group exhibition, ‘The Earth Rings

who over the years has not wavered

in Your Ears’ ran at Eight Gallery, Dublin

from advocating his ideas and ideals,

(4 – 10 Sept) and featured work by Ruth

however controversial, through both

Le Gear, Kevin Gaffney and Sally Anne

art and political activism”.

Kelly, and Ruth Clinton and Niamh

www.crawfordgallery.ie

Moriarty. The press release stated, “Although we are tiny we feel the Universe. We see and hear the crash of a wave on the shore being pulled by our moon. Various waves come to touch our skin from all corners of the cosmos and our eyes extend infinitely. We feel the enormous size of things”. www.eight-gallery.com

Pat Byrne,Idle, 2013, acrylic on canvas

False Memory Syndrome

Pat Byrne’s solo show ‘Excursion’ ran at Arthouse Gallery, Stradbally, Laois (5 Sept – 4 Oct). The artist wrote, “The core theme of my painting is playing with scale. This is achieved by placing locations, landscapes and scenes in, on or around oversized everyday objects creating juxtapositions that give my

Back Alleys Amanda Jane Graham’s exhibition ‘Back

work a surrealist nature”. www.laois.ie

Alleys’ ran at Custom House Studios, Westport, Mayo (5 – 29 Sept). The press release described how the work “revolves

Michael Boran,Far and Away, 2013

Temple Bar Gallery & Studios, Dublin held ‘False Memory Syndrome’ (4 – 26 Sept), a group show featuring work by

Overland, The Ongoing

Michael Boran, Sabina Mac Mahon,

the

Alan Phelan and Sarah Pierce. The

documentation of emotive and dramatic

exhibition celebrated the gallery’s 30th

visions that are accurate recollections of

anniversary, and the artists were chosen

private worlds, which are challenging,

because of their various associations

funny, intriguing and disturbing at the

with the institution. Each artist, the

around

urban

space

and

press release stated, made “art works

same time”. www.customhousestudios.ie

Sin Corner

Tim Acheson,Caravan and Winnie Pun,Space Mountain

that respond to the gathered research,

126 Gallery, Galway held ‘Overland, The

and to their experiences of the building

Ongoing’, by Tim Acheson and Winnie

and its inhabitants”.

Pun (7 – 28 Sept). Acheson’s work, the

www.templebargallery.com

press release stated, “deals with the duality of a sense of perspective…

Star-Gazing Lazer Cats

[looking] at the simultaneous nature of

Nicky Teegan’s show ‘Star Gazing Lazer

seeing and memory, perspective and

Cats’ ran at Lewisham Arthouse, London

location”. Pun’s work “encourages active

(12 – 22 Sept), following a six-month

looking. Seeing is always in motion

residency at the studio / gallery space.

within each image, and each image

Teegan’s work, the press release stated,

Triskel Christchurch, Cork hosted Ben

portrays a mechanism of seeing that can

“deals with the fanatical collecting of

Reilly’s exhibition ‘Sin Corner’ (5 – 29

be continued in other work, and in

things. It specifically focuses on the

Sept). Reilly, the press release noted,

other mediums”.

fetishisation

Ben Reilly, 'Sin Corner'

“populates the calm neo-classical

www.126.ie

interior of Triskel’s Christchurch with its flipside – a collection of darkly decorous

rationality

of

everyday

objects,

oddities and their subversion into devotional objects”.

Ruminant Ground

surreal objects that thumb their noses at the

of

outmoded technologies and found

www.lewishamarthouse.org.uk

the

architecture”.

AAA Catalyst Arts and Bbeyond, Belfast

www.triskelartscentre.ie

presented a series of performances by The Birth Exchange Project

artists Alastair McLennan, Andre Sitt

The Birth Exchange Project took place

and Adrian Hall, collectively called

at the Damer House Gallery, Roscrea,

'AAA', from 16 – 20 Sept.

Tipperary (7 – 20 Sept). The press release described the project as comprising “…a diverse collection of original prints in various media by American, European and Africa women artists. Each print represents a personal perspective of each artist who shares her story and thoughts on child- birth”. www.damerhousegallery.ie

Temporary Measures Karen Hendy, 'Ruminant Ground'

Karen

Hendy’s

solo

exhibition,

‘Ruminant Ground’, ran at Dunamaise Arts Centre (3 Oct – 9 Nov). Hendy’s abstract expressionist paintings and drawings, the press release noted, “are grounded in the philosophical theories of change and permanence, evident in continuous layering of paint. Most of

'TemporaryMeasures'

6

The Visual Artists’News Sheet

COLUMN

November – December 2013

Roundup

Chris Clarke

‘Temporary

group

‘Earthworks’, an exhibition of drawings

exhibition by the artists Deirdre

Measures’,

a

and photographs by Gypsy Ray, ran at

Status Update

Glenfield, Jessica Conway, Joanne Reid

the Watergarden Gallery, Kilkenny (9 –

and Julianne Knowles, ran from 23 – 25

18 Aug) as part of the Kilkenny Arts

It feels strange to look back at New Labour as anything but the preamble to war,

Aug at 33 Mill St, Dublin. “Words,

Festival. The artist was inspired, the

deceit, and widespread disillusionment with liberal idealism. Instead, it was once

sculpture, sound and light”, the press

press release noted “by memories of a

associated with notions of ‘Cool Britannia’, the YBAs, Britpop, and an arts policy

release noted, “temporarily occupied

childhood in rural Illinois and by past

that, in comparison to the current UK coalition government’s ideologically-driven

and traced the physical and historical

and ongoing experiences of the rural

austerity measures, appears in retrospect quite progressive. Yet, at the time, their

space of 33 Mill Street”.

landscape

of

North

Solo el Cielo

Kilkenny”,

support for the arts seemed all too conditional, tempered by a focus on ‘creative

continuing, “These works, created in

industries’ that saw the art school as a potential testing ground for ideas better

pencil with inks and dry pigments on

Brenda Higgins

paper, are not representational but are

Brenda Higgins’s show ‘Solo el Cielo’

applied to business. This was the future back then: sell yourself through your open-

The Celtic Surrealist

mindedness, your network of like-minded colleagues and contacts, your unerring

best described as abstract translations of

knack for lateral thinking. For a nation that had lost interest in fusty areas of

the familiar”.

Oct –) and comprised 30 oil paintings

manufacturing, agriculture or industry, the studio looked like a natural precursor to

www.gypsyraywordpress.com

the open-plan office.

In many ways, this neo-Thatcherite logic has stuck. The artist or arts professional

‘Anamorph’, an exhibition of work by

cultivating their resumé through the right projects, in the right places and with the

Olivia Hassett, ran at Garter Lane

right collaborators. Based in Berlin and London, Copenhagen / Beijing / New York,

Gallery, Waterford (28 Jul – 18 Sept). It

they must remain so in demand, so relentlessly mobile, that any thought of

explored, the press release noted, “the

permanence or stability can only imply irrelevance. Like the CEO or politician who,

continually morphing form of the abject

with feigned modesty, talks of getting up at 5am to check emails while exercising on

body”. Continung, “Many of the works

their treadmill, and coaching their child's football team in their ‘spare time’, the

draw from her interest in how the

contemporary art worker must stay relentlessly active, always ‘on’ (as in a neatly

medical world examines and depicts the

postmodern updating of the myth of the singular, solitary artistic visionary, wholly

female body. This fragile body very

dedicated only to their work).

often engenders feelings of anxiety and

As a way of life, it’s straight out of the business manuals and technological

disgust. Yet it is this potential to be

utopianism of the corporate world. In place of outdated notions of artistic autonomy,

grotesque and also its capability to be

one is expected to be a multi-tasker, a jet-setter, or in their terminology, a freelance

sublime that informs the work in this

consultant. It might explain the prevalence of artists and institutions couched in the

exhibition”.

The Bruce High Quality Foundation, and Ultimate Holding Company; one emulates the model of capitalism, not strictly as a parody but in pragmatic acceptance that these are the terms of contemporary society. Is there an admission of defeat here? Is art essentially there just to be co-opted by the marketplace, resigned to its commoditisation as a product that trades on the consistency, reputation and visibility of its maker(s)? Instead of critique, is there simply competition, a scrabbling for attention?

Jonathan Crary, in his recent book 24/7: Late Capitalism and the Ends of Sleep, addresses the prevailing sensibility and what it might mean: “Everyone, we are told – not just businesses and institutions, needs an ‘online presence’, needs 24/7 exposure, to avoid social irrelevance or professional failure. But the promotion of these alleged benefits is a cover for the transfer of most social relations into monetized and quantifiable forms.”

It’s interesting that Crary here pinpoints the Internet amongst the many examples in which individuals aspire to visibility. The social network is the space where one increasingly advertises their individuality – through a curated selection of preferred films and novels (it was with a twinge of guilt that I posted Crary’s book as a favourite read on my Facebook profile), places they’ve been, photos of their

the Internet is a site of cultural and reputational capital. The promise of technological emancipation remains set within the regulations – and agenda – of the service providers.

Crary observes, “If one’s goal is radical social transformation, electronic media in their current forms of mass availability are not useless – but only when they are subordinate to struggles and encounters taking place elsewhere. If networks are not in the service of already existing relationships forged out of shared experience and proximity, they will always reproduce and reinforce the separations, the opacity, the dissimulations, and the self-interestedness inherent in their use.”

This self-interestedness represents the continuation of the New Labour project in the current coalition policy, a transition that has strong affinities with the Irish government’s own shift from the Celtic Tiger’s encouragement of consumerism to present-day austerity. The compulsion to define and disseminate one’s individuality

retrospective in Ireland of the work of

continual insistence to keep (net)working and to willingly monetise oneself in

‘Still, We Work’, was an exhibition presented by the National Women’s Council of Ireland (NWCI) at the Gallery of Photography, Dublin (19 – 26 Oct). It featured work by artists Sarah Browne, Vagabond Reviews, Miriam O’Connor and Anne Tallentire. The exhibition was devised as part of NWCI’s Legacy Project developed by project curator Valerie Connor for NWCI to mark their 40th anniversary year and was funded by the Atlantic Philanthropies. “The artists stated,

“on

contemporary

representations of women’s work in the David Begley

context of the centenary of the 1913

Surrealist painter Leonora Carrington,

Dublin Lockout. They have responded

opened at IMMA, Dublin on 18 Sept

by making new works addressing

(until 26 Jan 2014). The press release

women’s experience of precarious

stated, “Carrington is known for her

contemporary working conditions and

figurative dreamscapes filled with

the invisibility of much of ‘women’s

extraordinary and complex narratives

work’”.

informed by her rich interest in

www.galleryofphotography.ie

mythology, alchemy, fairy tales and the Vertical Instincts & Process

occult. This exhibition of some 30 paintings, six sculptures, four tapestries and 30 works on paper from the 1940s

David Begley,Pursuit of Adoration

onwards, holds a particular focus on the

A solo show of drawings and paintings

imagery that enchanted her as a child

by David Begley ran at the Presentation

and on the cultural influences of

Centre, Enniscorthy, Wexford (11 – 28

Mexico”.

Oct). The press release noted, “David www.imma.ie

will exhibit three large charcoal drawings in the Chapel of the

In Isolation

Presentation Centre. The drawings were

‘In Isolation’ ran at Broadstone Studios,

made while on a residency at The

Dublin (13 – 21 Sept) and featured the

Tyrone Guthrie Centre in 2013, awarded

work of three emerging artists – Paul

to the artist by Wexford County Council.

Cabena, Gavin Porter and Mathew

In the foyer and other spaces of the

Tucker – and was curated by Marta

Centre David will show a selection of

Slawinska. It was noted in the press

recent paintings. www.davidbegley.com

exhibition come from three separate Adiaphora

identity, the self and consumption from

Kevin

the individual perspective of each artist

presented ‘Adiaphora’ a show of new

and with different focuses”.

work by Conor Mary Foy (30 October –

Gallery,

Dublin

2November), featuring video, sculpture, photography, live art and sculpture.

Earthworks

The press release noted that “the sequential

accordance with a credo of rampant individualism. For the arts worker, whose

purposefulness

of

the

narrative in these works progresses in

background might make them particularly adept at self-promotion but who, at the

tandem alongside the gearing of

same time, is subject to a policy-driven scrutiny over their financial viability, the

Adiaphora’s fundamental implications;

necessity of remaining ‘present’ is an ongoing source of anxiety and concern. It

an impending, indifferent possibility of

invades and diminishes any distinction between labour and leisure time,

things. The cultish direction of Foy’s

transforming previous notions of sociality, whether virtual or real, into opportunities

video works strive towards the sense of

to network, to hustle and promote. The warning is implicit: to lapse into invisibility

a greater indifference”.

is to infer inactivity.

www.kevinkavanagh.ie

Chris Clarke Gypsy Ray,Machine

selected recent graduates from NCAD, IADT, DIT and LIT, which ran 19 – 22

series examining aspects of space,

Kavanagh

Caroline Le Méhauté, photo by Tadhg Nathan

‘Process’ was an exhibition of work by

release, “The artworks selected for this

sits neatly alongside the demonisation of those who refuse to do so, who expect oldfashioned ideas of community and society to act as a failsafe. Instead, there is a

www.garterlane.ie

‘The Celtic Surrealist’, the first major

Still, We Work

were asked to reflect”, the press release

Leanora Carrington,The Giantess, c1950

experiences, who they know. For all its rhetoric as a site of destabilising traditional hierarchies and power structures, of parceling out democracy through Twitter feeds,

that explore colour in nature.

Anamorph

– like any other individual now – is an ongoing project, a one-person business,

language of bureaucracy, with collectives entitled AGM, Agency, MadeIn Company,

ran at Málaga-Costa del Sol Airport (13

Sept at Block T, Dublin. The press release noted, “Process is a potent entity found in each of the works in the exhibition…

The potentialities of material, play and interventon collaborate to bring what stemmed froma thought or idea to a palpable form”.

‘Vertical Instincts’ by Caroline Le Méhauté Exhibition ran at Block T, Dublin (10 –23 Oct). Le Méhauté was selected for Block T’s inaugural international residency award. The press release described how the artist created “a new body of work, responding to the natural environment of the Irish countryside”. Continuing, “Le Méhauté’s work is concerned with the visceral and

The Visual Artists’News Sheet

November – December 2013

7 Roundup

COLUMN

Jason Oakley

organic qualities of the landscape.

Working with materials such as peat,

‘Mandrake’ by Frances Upritchard, ran

Even in Sweden

rock, and wood, she creates large-scale

at the Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin (20

“Women in the art world have had enough”.

sculptures that depend on carful

Nov – 6 Nov). The press release stated,

engineering and delicate balance”.

“Francis Upritchard, born in New

Jennifer Thatcher,The Mother of All Battles, Art Monthly, June 2013

Dig, undig, redig

Mandrake

Zealand and now resident in London,

www.blockt.ie

“… and this is Sweden, the land of legislated gender equality and paid parental leave for both fathers and mothers. If things are so bad there, they can only be worse elsewhere.” A Portrait of a Car Jennifer Allen,The Parent Trap, Frieze,March 2012

Serious attention has recently been focussed on how the artworld can harbour some pretty retrograde attitudes and practices in relation to women artists and artworkers in relation to motherhood. The UK publications Art Monthly and Frieze have explored the subject in articles respectively titled The Mother of All Battles and The Parent Trap.

The reported issues include attitude shifts that occur when women artists and artworkers reveal that they’re planning or raising a family – the presumption is that they’re no longer serious about thier art careers. In the broader context of the 'precarity' of cultural workers, questions arise as to how financially pressed artists can balance – or even justify – childcare costs against the time and monies devoted their practices. It seems that women still find themselves in the situation of having to choose between having an art career or children – it's shocking that this dilema hasn't been consigned to the refuse bin of history.

At a more structural level, attention has been drawn to the lack of even the most basic childcare facilities in art venues, studios and academic institutions. Seen as equally problematic is the lack of alternative opportunities for networking, other than the child-un-friendly evening-time exhibition openings, talks and events.

Critical mass around these issues has also been growing in Ireland. Sheena Barrett, Curator of The Lab, Dublin has paved the way with the ‘Baby on Board’ series of parent and child meetings for art workers. This initiative has been allied to artist and academic Michelle Browne’s ongoing research project ‘Mothers and the City’. In Belfast, PS2 has ran an experimental childcare facility. In addition Visual Artists Ireland have also explored the topic with a profile of UK activist group Enemies of Good Art in the Visual Artists’ News Sheet and presentation by the founder, Martina Mullally, at the Get Together 2013.

Founded in April, The Mothership Project, a new Irish networking group, has been going from strength to strength. They've been profiled on RTE radio and in the Irish Times; and operate an informative website. The groups genesis was sparked by artist Seoidin O’ Sullivan’s email exchanges of ideas, views and links with over 20 female art workers. The group has so far conducted three public sessions, addressing the logistics, economics and status associated with being an artist / parent. Upcoming meetings will consider alternative childcare models and support networks.

A recent Mothership Project session, entitled ‘Perception: How Does Having a Child Affect the Artist Within a Reputational Economy?’ was hosted at the VAI offices at the beginning of September. Sixteen parents, 3 toddlers and 2 babies were in attendance. Artist Naomi Sex (PhD Gradcam) outlined the socioeconomic history of the concept fo the 'reputational economy' – including its migration from the realms of business-speak and the lexicon of the social sciences . Alternatively dubbed ‘the attention seeking economy’, the concept is now in vogue as a means to understand the power-dynamics between artists, curators, collectors, critics and institutions.

Where’s the anger? Why so polite? Aren’t the problems facing artist mothers absolutely horrendous? This was the sharp end of the spectrum of viewpoints aired.

Artist-mothers felt ‘invisible’ in professional terms, perceived to have “fallen off the face of the world”. There was agreement that informal networking situations – openings, talks, conferences, residencies, performances and events – were hard to access. This added up to an exclusion from the everyday peer exchanges that organically generate inspiration, affirmation and opportunities for artists. Some lamentable attitudes in the commercial art world were reported: collectors seeing female artists who had started families as a bad ‘investment’, presuming a lack of future productivity and commitment to their art careers.

Others expressed more hopeful views – having children had been empowering and had sharpened their sense of what was really important in life. The situation was just a challenge. Wasn’t there everything to play for in countering shallow art-world attitudes and very visibly overcoming the difficulties and misconceptions? In this regard, the Mothership Project was recognized as a valuable tactical and strategic resource in itself, bolstering the reputational ‘capital’ of art-worker mothers and providing an alternative networking space.

The Mothership Project and the other endeavours mentioned here all welcome and encourage the participation of men. But, undeniably the issues at stake are glaringly feminist. Jennifer Thatcher, writing in Art Monthly, noted a reluctance in male artists to define themselves as parents, and highlighted double standards: men garner praise and attention when they involve themselves in childcare; women are patronizingly pre-judged as being unavailable to work out-of-hours. 1 Frieze’s Parent Trap article cites Swedish statistics attesting to how women still make the biggest time-commitment to childcare, even in the ‘progressive’ art world – yes, even in the Swedish art world2.

Expect to hear more from the Mothership Project, they have more work to do.

Notes & Further Reading 1. Jennifer Thatcher,The Mother of All Battles, Art Monthly, June 2013 2. Jennifer Allen,The Parent Trap, Frieze,March 2012 www.themothershipproject.wordpress.com www.enemiesofgoodart.org www.mythologicalquarter.net

makes figurative sculpture that treads a line between realism and fantasy; while

Irina Kuksova’s solo exhibition, ‘A

in

Portrait of a Car’, was held at the Signal

theatrical, it is also keenly observant of

Arts Centre, Bray (8 – 20 Oct). The artist

human nature. Made from polymer clay,

wrote, “There are two things I am inspired by: travelling and art. In my artwork I celebrate the former through the latter. I paint highly detailed classic automotive oils on canvas… In the days of mass culture there is more joy than ever in the genuine uniqueness of classic cars. I hope to share this joy through my artwork”. www.signalartscentre.ie

some

respects

flamboyantly

painted, and clad in colourful textiles,

Joanna Kidney, 'Dig,Undig, Redig'

Joanna Kidney’s exhibition ‘Dig, Undig, Redig’ ran at the RHA, Dublin (5 Sept – 24 Nov). The press release stated, “Drawing plays a central role in Joanna Kidney’s practice. It is drawing’s inherent characteristics: immediacy,

the figures are displayed on elaborate bases; they seem, very often, to be taking part in a pageant or masquerade, for their expressions and gestures appear to be orchestrated and conceived in unison”.

www.douglashyde.ie

open endedness, spontaneity, technical diversity and rawness, that pull Kidney back again and again to make drawing

A Feather in the Sky

based work. ‘Dig, undig, redig’ focuses

Polar Forces

on the expansion of drawing in a space”. www.rhagallery.ie

Line: An Ambiguous Journey ‘Line: An Ambiguous Journey’ ran at the Drawing Project, Dun Laoghaire (16 – 30 Oct). It was co-curated by Joanne Proctor and Anna Marie Savage, featuring work by Craig Donald, Doris Rohr, Joanne Proctor and Anna Marie Savage. The exhibition explored, the Ruth Le Gear, fromLSC residency

press release noted, “the practice of

An exhibition by Ruth Le Gear, ‘Polar

drawing on and beyond the paper source

Forces: the universe of an iceberg’, ran at

via the work of four practitioners

Leitrim Sculpture Centre (11 – 29 Oct).

currently working in the North of

The press release stated, “This emerging

Ireland”.

Eve ParnellAngel in the Glory above the Chair of St. Peter

body of work stems from a residency Le Gear undertook in the Arctic waters of Svalbard

in

2012

where

she

Cunningham

contemplated the micro and macro forces of ice in the retreating ice flows.

For the LSC residency, Le Gear further explores the potentiality of ice in terms of ‘water remedies’ resulting from fieldwork investigations of the north Leitrim landscape. The contradiction of a remedy made from water and diluted with itself presents interesting questions around the uses and permutations of a landscape whose energy-fields mediate and co-exist with the human body”. www.leitrimsculpturecentre.ie

Installation of work at Cunningham Building

Void, Derry presented Ackroyd and Harvey’s ‘Cunningham’ (15 Sept – 16 Oct) at the Cunningham Building, Ebrington Barracks, as part of Artist’s

Eve Parnell’s exhibition ‘A Feather in the Sky’, a suite of eight new large-scale drawings, was recently presented at the The Pontifical Irish College in Rome (5 – 30 September 2013). The works in the show were inspired by Bernini’s (1598 -1680) sculptures in Rome. Anne Hodge, Curator of Prints and Drawings in the National Galllery of Ireland, writing in the exhibition catalogue noted that “… the snap-shot quality of the drawings allows us to imagine what an awe-struck pilgrim might have committed to memory having stood, mouth agape perhaps, gazing up at the incredibly lifelike sculptural figures which inhabit St Peter’s Basilica”.

Garden’s for Void Sites project, curated

Opening

by Greg Mc Cartney. The press release stated, “The Cunningham Building at Ebrington has been chosen as the site for a temporary art installation with the intention to plant and grow the facade with seedling grass. Nature and structure, control and randomness are juxtaposed in the artists work to reveal a time-based practice with intrinsic bias towards process and event… The artists take up their residency at the building for three weeks and become temporal

Tom Watt, 'Opening'

‘Opening’ by Tom Watt was held at 8 Seville Place, Dublin (10 – 19 Oct) and featured new work by the artist in a residential setting.

custodians

of

this

consequential

building. Aware of the contexts they are operating in, Ackroyd and Harvey offer an interstice inspired by aesthetics and poetics that becomes an abstract

www.tomdavidwatt.com

observation of what happens in space, through time and history”. www.derryvoid.com

Get into the Roundup ■■ Email text & images to

lily@visualartists.ie

■■ Details should include: venue

name, location, dates and a brief

description of the work / event.

■■ Inclusion is not guaranteed,

but everyone has a fair chance

■■ Criteria: to ensure that the

roundup section has a good

regional spread and represents a

diversity of forms of practice, from

a range of artists at all stages in

their careers.

■■ Priority is given to events

taking place within Ireland,

but do let us know if you are

taking part in a significant

international event.

8

VAI News Artists Should be Paid!

After a year long research and consultation process Visual Artists Ireland, has launched The Payment Guidelines for Professional Visual Artists. For the first time in Ireland, venues and artists will be able to properly calculate equitable levels of payments, properly budget for their programmes and for the variety of work that professional artists undertake in not for profit spaces.

As a result of our 2012 / 13 research and consultation process, we realised that not only was there no consistency in the type of remuneration that institutions provided to artists but that in many cases no fee was paid to the artist for their participation at all. Case studies show that artists at the pinnacle of their career are expected to work at a level that no other profession would tolerate. Examples include those working for nothing or paying to have their work shown. The small minority who are being paid for their creative skills earn in the region of only €1200 Euro per annum. In any industry this is inequitable when taking into consideration the salary levels of other art professionals such as arts administrators, managers, curators and technicians who rely on visual artists for their jobs.

In follow up, VAI undertook a series of conversations with the sector to find the cause for the non-payments.

Along with reasons such as insufficient funding, one of the main reasons given for non-payment was that, unlike other professions, there was no national scale of payments available for reference.

Visual Artists Ireland has collaborated with artists, organisations and our international partners to create this set of guidelines. The guidelines are based upon international best practice, and are scalable for different sizes of organisations as well as the experience/ reputation of artists. They also take into consideration the different work undertaken by artists within the context of exhibitions and supporting services.

It is intended that the guidelines will become the national go-to resource for calculating artists’ payments and become the first step towards the development of a sustainable model for best practice between artists and the institutions that contract their labour.

In terms of take up – Visual Artists Ireland has received positive feedback from the publically funded venues sector in the Republic of Ireland and is looking forward to the widespread adoption of the guidelines. In Northern Ireland, Visual Artists Ireland has received equally positive indications and work is currently underway to create guidelines for the Northern Ireland context.

Visual Artists Ireland publically launched The Payment Guidelines for Professional Visual Artists on Thursday, 17 October at Temple Bar Gallery & Studios, Dublin.

The launch was part of The Workers Café project and included a presentation on Visual Artists Ireland

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

research on artists payments and how to use the now publically available Payment Guidelines. The presentation was followed by a drinks reception with music on the theme of work provided

by Jason Oakley. Members of VAI staff were available during the event to provide information and answers about our advocacy work; help desk and advice services; professional development programmes; and our arts news centre.

The guidelines are downloadable from www.visualartists.ie – follow the link from the home page.

Resale Right Campaign The Irish Visual Artists Rights Organisation (IVARO) is calling on artists and their supporters to sign a petition supporting the full implementation of the Artists Resale Right around the World. This important right ensures that creators of visual art can obtain a small percentage of the sale price when their works are resold by an auction house or gallery. Guaranteeing the artist’s share from the resale of their works is only fair. The increase in value of visual art is attributed to the growing reputation of the artist, and the right ensures that creators can benefit from the value of their works and, at the same time, provides incentives for more creative activity.

Resale rights are not new; they date back to the 1920, harmonized in Europe in 2001 and provided internationally under the Berne Convention. However, the right is not mandatory and is missing in many countries, including two of the world’s largest art markets: the US and China.

An online petition to raise awareness for the resale right and bring pressure for its universal adoption is available at www.resale-right.org and already has over 3800 signatories. Sign the petition online here: www.resaleright.org GRASSROOTS TO CELEBRITY What is art world celebrity? What lies behind the spectacle? Does art need an audience? Are there acknowledged paths from obscurity to celebrity? These issues are being addressed in the daylong event entitled 'From Grassroots to Celebrity', taking place on Saturday 9 November at the Golden Thread Gallery, Belfast.

Jointly hosted by The Turner Prize, Visual Artists Ireland and The Golden Thread Gallery the day features talks and tours, including Prizes! Prizes! Prizes! a panel discussion on the subject of arts awards, chaired by Jason Oakley and featuring Hugh Mullholland, Phillip Napier, Peter Richards and Brenda McParland.

'From Grassroots to Celebrity' has been devised to draw public attention to contemporary art and the ideas and themes relating to the Turner prize – namely the dynamic between emerging grassroots visual arts activity and the role of high profile events such as the Turner Prize in supporting and promoting contemporary visual art. A key theme running throughout the day is how artist attract notice and develop their profiles. www.turnerprize2013.org

Gatherings Visual Artists Ireland has been busy devising a range of membership events and other gatherings for artists across the country. Details of our first Common Room Café / Show & Tell event in Limerick – held at Ormston House can be found on page 24. Other recent events include a Film night held in VAI’s Dublin offices – a screening of the perennial favourite The Cabinet of Dr Calagari, (Robert Wiene, 1920) introduced by Deirdre Morrissey Director of The Market Studio. On 11 December Occupy space in Limerick host a VAI Common Room Cafe and Show and Tell Evening. Also we will soon be announcing details of an evening event for recent graduates – to be held in Dublin in January, in association with CREATE. In February another Show and Tell evening is scheduled for the VAI offices. Full details including call outs for participation will be circuled via the e-bulletin and on the VAI website.

RETURN is Live Has your artwork or photograph been featured in a book, magazine or periodical published in Ireland? If so you may claim a share of RETURN royalties. RETURN is an annual service run by the Irish Visual Artists Rights Organisation (IVARO) to distribute photocopying royalties to visual creators. Deadline for applications is Thursday 21 November. Don’t miss out!

Apply online today: www.ivaro.ie/ return

News

part of its new strategic direction, the Arts Office is moving away from a programmed response to need, and instead resourcing artists directly through awards and commissions.

For the New Strategic Projects Initiative: Wicklow County Arts Office is seeking applications from interested parties for funding to collaboratively develop and deliver new projects of high quality and impact during 2014 and 2015 which will enhance and complement the Arts Office strategic development of the arts in the county. This Scheme is being managed by Artem Management Services on behalf of Wicklow County Council. www.wicklow.ie

Creative & Cultural Belfast Valued at £900,000 over the next three years, the new Creative and Cultural Belfast fund will support projects, delivered jointly by cultural organisations and community groups, that reach out to people who are less likely to participate in culture and arts due to social, economic or other barriers. The aim is to challenge social exclusion in Belfast by creating new opportunities for all people and all communities to engage with high quality culture, arts and heritage. www.belfastcity.gov.uk

Arts Management Launch The School of Art History and Cultural Policy at University College Dublin has announced the launch of the Irish Journal of Arts Management and Cultural Policy (www.culturalpolicy.ie), a new peer reviewed, open access e-journal publishing original research on the arts and cultural sector in Ireland. www.culturalpolicy.ie

Kilkenny Arts NEW DIRECTOR Kilkenny Arts Festival, has announced the appointment of Eugene Downes as Festival Director.Downes served from 2007 – 12 as Chief Executive of Culture Ireland. Remarking on his new role Eugene Downes commented, “… I’m excited, and honoured, to be asked to lead the Festival at a time of real potential to enhance both its artistic programme and its reputation at home and abroad”. www.kilkennyarts.ie

Occupy Space H-Q Occupy Space has announced its move to 9 Cecil St, Limerick City. This is a new chapter for Occupy Space and with it comes the beginning of a new project, H-Q, which has been developed with artist Gemma Gore. H-Q is a cultural hub offering a platform for the arts in Limerick City. H-Q is currently forging links with international organisations to develop an artist residency programme for 2014. hqlimerick@gmail.com

New Wicklow Strategy Wicklow County Arts Office, Wicklow County Council have announced two new schemes, the New Artist Support Scheme and the New Strategic Projects Initiative.

The New Artist Support Scheme is being put in place as a replacement for the Artlinks Initiative (see www.artlinks. ie) and is designed to provide artists living in County Wicklow with access to professional development assistance. As

Visual Director Appointed The Board of VISUAL Centre for Contemporary Art and The George Bernard Shaw Theatre has announced the appointment of Ann Mulrooney as the first Chief Executive of VISUAL. Ann Mulrooney, previously Manager and Curator for the National Craft Gallery (NCG) in Kilkenny, has extensive managerial and curatorial experience and will be bringing her wealth of knowledge to Carlow from 12 November 12, 2013 when she takes up her new position. www.visualcarlow.ie

Irish Arts Worldwide Jimmy Deenihan TD, Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, has announced the allocation of funding of over €440,000 for Irish artists and organisations to present their work on the international stage in late 2013 and 2014. The funding – which will help to support projects across disciplines including music, dance, theatre, film and the visual arts in Australia, China, India, the USA and across Europe – is being allocated by the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht’s Culture Ireland programme.

Siamsa Tíre Award Winner Jason Dunne (B. 1987) is the 2013 recipient of the Siamsa Tíre Emerging Artist Award. Dunne’s work is currently on show in the venue (26 Oct – 7 of Dec).

November – December 2013

To accompany the exhibition, a specially made publication has been produced by the artist. Alongside original drawings and fictional writing, it features contributions by artists Frank Wasser and Joseph Noonan-Ganley. The book, which has been designed in collaboration with Hatopress, London, provides an adjacent space which sheds light on the disparate strategies of production, thought and working together with others that form an integral part of Dunne’s approach to making. www.jasondunne.net

ACNI Youth Arts Strategy The Arts Council of Northern Ireland has launched its new Youth Arts Strategy which provides strategic direction and vision for the youth arts sector for the period 2013 – 2017 and announces new programming to help meet the development needs of our young people. www.artscouncil-ni.org

Touring & Dissemination The Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon are working together to encourage arts organisations and individuals to extend tours across the border. The application process has been streamlined to make it as straightforward as possible for companies and artists from both jurisdictions to tour their work in the North and South of Ireland.

The deadline for applications is 5.30pm, Thursday 14 November 2013. www.artscouncil-ni.org / www.artscouncil.ie

TBG+S Book Fair The third annual Dublin Art Book Fair at Temple Bar Gallery + Studios will take place from 8 – 10 November. The event, which will host over 30 international and Irish publishers, will be held in the gallery space at TBG+S and provides a much needed platform for the distribution of art texts and artists’ self published projects.

Firestation Artists’ Studios Following an open call for applications from artists for residential studios at Firestation, Dublin, commencing in 2014 and following a competitive selection process, the artists that have been selected for long-term residencies (two years andnine9 months) are: Ruth Lyons, David O’Kane, Seamus Nolan and Gareth Kennedy. International artists selected for short-term residencies are: James Westwater (USA), Jean-Paul Kelly (Canada), Leah Garnett (USA) and Julia McInerney (USA). www.firestation.ie/studios

Fingleton & NEshat Lisa Fingleton was recently selected to take part in a ten day workshop with the world renowned Iranian artist / filmmaker Shirin Neshat at the London Film School from 20 – 30 October 2013.

Ten international filmmakers were chosen to work with Neshat during her visit to London. During the workshop the participating artists had one-to-one turorials with Neshat, present their work and create a short new film work.

The Visual Artists’ news sheet

November – December 2013

9

Cavan: Resources & Activities trans-art Festival

michelle Boyle I moved from Dublin to Virginia in Cavan 17 years

writing. There are some exciting private initiatives

ago and I’ve been working as a professional artist

such as the Moth studio space, the Bluewall Gallery

for 10 years. With help from Credit Union loans

(now closed) and several interesting and spectacular

and local tradesmen, I converted the outbuildings

one-off initiatives such as the arts events associated

of my house into two decent sized studios. I have a

with the Fleadh Ceol, Culture Night and an

large bright working space for myself and over

upcoming collaborative schools art project.

time equipped the second studio as a facility for

There are visual artists working throughout

visiting artists and for running run workshops

Cavan, yet the county has no clear focal point for

(www.whitethornstudios.com).

interaction, such as a dedicated visual arts space or

I work in paint and drawing, focusing initially

Non-Parade Parade, Sally O'Dowd and Jessie Keenan

TRAns-ART is a platform for contemporary art in

vantage point we can find and spend the next hour

Cavan. We showcase new work from around the

or so watching a conveyor belt of advertising for

world and are interested in artists who are

local business, while desperately hoping for a

committed to pushing the boundaries in their

touch of the exotic or a taste of the unexpected to

practice. We (Joe Keenan, Bluewall Gallery; Siobhan

numb the boredom…

Harton, designer and visual artist; and Sally

And so… we start at the corner of Main Street

O’Dowd, performance and visual artist) first came

and Thomas Ashe Street, lined up on either side of

together as curators in 2011 to organise an

the street… and then dancers are moving in the

alternative performance and exhibition tent for

street, creating patterns, sometimes walking at

Flatlake Arts and Literary Festival in Clones Co

speed, sometimes at a slow, stylised pace. Bunting

Monaghan (3 – 5 June).

is tied up, love hearts on banners fall into place,

We founded trans-art the following year and

three women in evening dress ‘vogue’ outside a

exhibited over 40 artists across 13 locations to an

local fashion house. A man on an office chair

audience of over 250,000 throughout Cavan town

wheels himself, furiously inputting data to his

during Fleadh Ceoil na hÉireann (11 – 18 August

laptop. They are exploring rhythm, tempo and

2012). Our aim was to bring contemporary art to an

architecture, within a riot of colour as music

international audience, expanding conventional

washed over us and then they are off, moving up

definitions of both art and community-based

Main Street. And in the next moments as the

practice, while engaging visitors and residents

crowds that filled the foot paths start to follow, we

alike. We partnered with artists, local community

realise that we the audience, the community,

groups, the Fleadh Executive Committee, chambers

‘become’ the parade. We are more than passive

of commerce, local businesses and churches to

observers; we have become active participants.

make this event happen.

We were engaged in such a profound way

This year, we transformed 61 College Street, a

with the beauty, the simplicity and the beating

terraced house, into an exhibition space showcasing

heart of the Non-Parade Parade. It challenged us to

drawing, painting, print, installation, immersive

re-evaluate our notions of how art can impact on

art, performance and video works, as part of the

us in public spaces. It was beautiful, inclusive and

‘Life Of Reilly’ festival (19 – 25 August). On 24

it felt like this was ‘our’ parade. In creating a

August we held a performance day with a series of

complicity between performer and audience we

live art works that took place in public spaces in

were reminded that good art is not a luxury, but a

Cavan town. Belfast-based artist Christof Gillen

necessity.”

drew his inspiration from a local 1847 famine

Our next project was ‘The Pensive Spectator’,

eviction. Dressed in black attire, Gillen walked

Laura O’Connor’s solo show, which took place at

sternly barefoot through the streets of Cavan

61 College Street during Culture Night 2013

carrying two buckets, one filled with smouldering

(continuing for the weekend). The exhibition

turf and the other with uncooked spuds. Chrissie

presented new film and projection works, which

Cadman sprayed yellow paint from her mouth and

considered media representations of women, a

wrote “Smile” onto the pedestrian crossing. In the

theme that Laura is also exploring in her PhD

same line of view, Sinead O’Donnell slowly rotated,

research at the University of Ulster, Belfast. trans-

binding her breasts with medical bandages, her

art’s Sally O’Dowd documented Culture Night

hair filled with small twigs and burning incense.

events at Cavan County Library and the Courthouse

We also developed the Non-Parade Parade, a

Assisted by Cavan Arts, IFI Culture Cavan,

conjunction with artists, facilitators and workshop

Cavan Town Council and the Gathering, 61 College

participants as a performance for a public audience,

Street has become our temporary art space for

which took place on 24 August on Main Street,

making and exhibiting contemporary art. We are

Cavan. We complimented this physical visual

fortunate to be part of such a supportive

piece with dancers and actors using silence, noise,

community; we beg, steal and borrow equipment,

music and group intervention. Erudite theatre

time and effort from forgiving friends and family.

as a spectator: “A Non-Parade, Parade: What is it? We all know about ‘real’ parades. We stand at the best

The Cavan Arts Office website and mailing

views of Farrelly’s Field from my studio window.

list are a valuable point of contact for many artists.

Alex Katz also spent three years painting one field

Local art events / opportunities are well publicised

on the outskirts of New York as part of his early art

by the arts office, but regional and national

education. Similarly, Farrelly’s Field helped me to

information is less well circulated. This presumes

learn the language of paint in order to articulate

that artists work and experience art within the

the things that now inform my work.

fixed geographical boundary of the county – which

For me, painting is a visual expression of our

of course is not the case. As both creators and

shared humanity – and as an object, it can

audiences, artists are part of a greater visual

commincate this presence into the future. My

community – national and international – and

paintings are informed by my life experience,

access to that is vital.

people I have met and literature which has

One recent key opportunity for me was being

impressed ideas on me. To borrow the expression

accepted as a new member of the Black Church

of the Matador – I work ‘close to the bull’, close to

Print Studio in Dublin where I will join a new arts

the things I know.

network. This arose after a chance encounter

I’m a self taught painter (my academic

earlier in the year with a New York based painter

qualifications are a degree in Cultural Anthropology

whilst on an artist bursary in Clo Cill Riallaig,

and a Masters in Landscape Archaeology /

Kerry. We worked together in the print studio

Architecture). My formative art experiences took

during the residency, with the support of technician

place when I was young, during the drawing

Stephen O’Connell. Print is a very new and exciting

sessions held for children at Dublin City Gallery,

process for me, which I think will open up

the Hugh Lane, and in my mid-teens at art history

possibilities and new ways of working in the

lectures in the National Gallery. I’ve since been

future.

fortunate enough to have had the opportunity to work with these institutions as an artist / tutor.

In the year ahead, I am working towards a solo show, which will feature a combination of

I’ve also undertaken focused and intensive

printmaking and painting, with the working title

training in Ireland and the UK: figurative painting

‘In My Father’s House There are Many Rooms’. In

classes at the Slade; a workshop in London on

2013, I showed some formative explorations of this

Chinese brush drawing with international artist

theme in new paintings at the Bankside Gallery in

Qu Lei Lei; and mentoring sessions at the Firestation

London; the RHA Annual Exhibition; Watercolour

Studios, Dublin. These varied courses combined

Society of Ireland Annual Exhibition and VUE,

with regular visits to exhibitions in Ireland and

Exhibition of Contemporary Irish Art. Two works

elsewhere are important to my practice. I always

on this theme have also been selected for the Art

find that experiencing contemporary art opens up

Collections of the OPW and the University of

news possibilities for my own work.

Limerick.

This openess is not always credited to artists

In my view, it’s benificial for my work to

working in rural contexts. I recently had to counter

combine the liberating aspects of working from a

the perception of Cavan by a Dublin based gallery

rural studio with the opportunities for learning,

which described the county as a ‘cultural

exhibitions and audiences present in the city. To

backwater’. I maintain that the best artistic

my mind, the rural and urban are both essential

expression often comes from the fringes –

backdrops to my work.

geographically as well as metaphorically. Cavan has great things going on in music, theatre and

through live drawing.

contemporary performance spectacle devised in

director Geoff O’Keefe wrote about his experience

sites for art information exchange.

on the local landscape. I spent three years painting

trans-art is an ongoing project. For more information contact trans.art.cavan@gmail. com or visit trans-art.cavan on Facebook. michelle Boyle, Here is where we meet, 2013, watercolour, pastel, 24ct gold leaf, gesso card

www.michelleboyle-artist.com

10

The Visual Artists’ news sheet

November – December 2013

REGIONAl PROFIlE:: CA CAVAN

John Byrne: Good Works

Yvonne Cullivan: New Vistas

I remember some years back attending a public art

assemble a new choir from the ranks of the Dublin

symposium, sitting through presentations on

Bach Singers and the Carlow Choral Society so that

making the best of our shared spaces, professions

Good Works could be reincarnated at the chapel in

on

the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham.

taking

the

correct

course,

collective

proclamations on the righteous steadying of our

IMMA was different, a more congruous

vanguard of discovery towards the common good.

assembly, teasing as much as preaching to the

While an adherent to the faith myself and a

converted, with responsorials and hymns with

practitioner conscious of the tenets that mark us

titles such as Discourse, Curate, It’s a Notion and

apart, I was reminded of a feeling of youthful

Enlightenment. Among the distinguished readers, Enlightenment

impatience during mass: wanting it to be over,

Brian Keenan read from the writings of Lebanese

craving the communion of coffee and biscuits, of

artist Khalil Gibran, who, through a lifelong

common speak – a story.

struggle with faith in creativity, came to the

Good Works (2012), a celebration of the visual

realisation that all life springs from within and

as the foremost articulation of meaning, was

that he himself had always been, was and always

initially set in the expansive surroundings of the

would be… Art….the Artificer.

Cathedral of St Patrick and St Felim in Cavan with

Until the 1960s, the Catholic Mass was totally

the Palestrina Choir singing new ‘Art Hymns’. I was

in Latin, which I suspect was all Greek to most. The

composer / artist-as-priest extolling to the gathered

performance to some extent pointed to the

faithful in solemn tones the high virtues of practice

Damselfly count, Heather

Yvonne Cullivan research images, Fergal identifying herbs

Pancho and Fergal kayaking

inevitable exclusivity of cultural hierarchies. Pius

In May of this year I was awarded a Public Art

there, provides fertile ground for public art and

and engagement in visual art. There was candle

religious conceit is akin in societal terms to the

Commission under the Per Cent for Art Scheme,

audience

lighting, bell ringing and gifts brought to the alter,

more insular and self-referential preachings of our

managed by Cavan County Council and pertaining

conversations on the role of public art have taken

including the presentation of a large salmon by

devoutly secular art world. Individualistic making is often subsumed by collective pioneering on our

to the new Belturbet bypass. For a small town like Belturbet at this specific point in our economic

place with locals, and continue to do so. The

Fergus Byrne via his hula-hooped journey up the

rigorous, research based journey to the now. We are

history, a bypass is an ominous development. As

be another positive step toward reviving public

central aisle.

engagement.

Some

interesting

expectation in Belturbet is that the outcome will

The congregation, which numbered over

intellectually seduced into a kind of belonging,

my work emerges from a deep observation of

engagement with the town and surviving current

2000, was a cross section of the local community;

which fulfils a reassuring and empowering group

personal, cultural and environmental spheres

economic difficulties. This outlook has allowed for

friends and families gathered to celebrate the

dynamic, but also encourages a collaborative and

undergoing transformation, and being familiar

a more natural mutual connection and constructive

town’s final year hosting the Fleadh Cheoil. The

ironically conformist passage onboard the good

with the territory as a native of Cavan, it seemed

collaboration with locals. Opportunities for

ship ‘contemporary’.

natural to respond to this brief.

professional collaboration have also emerged with

‘service’ was perhaps anticipated as a celebration of the arts – choral singing by a renowned choir – but

Good Works may have been another self-

Rhonda Tidy, Public Arts Coordinator with

not a critical questioning of belief. Speakers and

referential indulgence. The transference of the

Cavan County Council, initially established a

have expertise in audio recording, camera operation

hymns were enthusiastically received, but there

belief, language and ritual of art through mediums

steering committee of local representatives to liaise

and in particular poetry.

were some who took offence – whispers of a pagan

and into spaces normally given to religion sings of

on the writing of the brief and to participate in the

By the nature of its geographic route, the new

affair were overheard. Several people left, others

a suspicion that we are not perhaps as clever as we

selection process. She then organised a number of

bypass opens up vistas of the local environment

later told me that they “couldn’t make head nor tail

think we are or ever were. Yet this was also a

site-visits to the town during which community

that were otherwise hidden, including the presence

of it”.

artists living in or closely connected to Cavan, who

celebration of the creative sect in which we artists

members imparted information. One of those

of a woodland bog – designated a special area of

My star had risen briefly in Cavan over the

live and work: a formal ceremony of thanksgiving

involved was a man very knowledgeable in the

conservation under the EU Habitats Directive. In

preceding two years with Casting Light Light, a video

to the Art Gods of Chance. It was reclamation of

history of the town. In between facts, figures, dates

essence, this project leans toward a similar

mapped on to the façade of a bank in town during

the old and, for many, redundant temples of faith to

and names, he described a personal memory:

endeavor. Since commencing the research phase in

the Fleadh: a crowd pleaser. My safe pair of hands

set out our (or should I say ‘my’) confused but

running to the edge of the River Erne as a boy to

late June, I have met with local experts: a botanist,

were often gripped with an admiring, “Did you do

thoroughly optimistic stall of hope; a hope that we

catch the lapping waves on his ankles as the Fay

an engineer, an environmental consultant, artisan

that?” Surely the freedom of lake and drumlin

might, in fact, be living in a new era of

family’s motorboat went by. This personal, sensory

food producers, outdoor pursuits professionals and

would soon be mine.

enlightenment. Through art we can find salvation.

and location-specific piece of information remained

farmers. I have also met with locals versed in

with me as I developed a proposal.

history, youth culture, nature walking and boating.

While the intention of this new performative

The experience may have been disconcerting for some, particularly in Cavan, who were perhaps

I often welcome public participation in my

These meetings have involved discussion, hands

mimicking and mocking are close cousins and it

thrown by another allegiance – breaching their

projects in order to create outcomes communally

on participation in processes, walking together,

was perhaps naïve not to expect some bad feeling,

sacred space with an alien tongue. But in its attempt

shaped and collectively responsive. This project

navigating the river, site-visits and workshops. In

particularly given the venue. Despite my

to beguile, amuse and engage within a familiar

involves in-depth, on-site engagement with

each case, new elements of the landscape have

confessional overtures and protestations of

framework, Good Works was a questioning, a

selected members of the community toward the

been revealed to me, connections between

prompting of a new way to look at our own

gathering of information relevant to the location

individuals have developed, crash-course learning

personal notions of Faith.

and which is social, cultural, historical and

has occurred in a number of disciplines, insights

environmental in context and sensory or

into the nature of the place have been shared. All of

experiential in nature.

this forms and informs the research, in addition to

work was not to offend the Catholic faithful,

innocence, the clergy in Cavan felt they had been duped into something they weren’t fully in on. The Pro Cathedral in Dublin was contacted and the proposed upcoming performance there became out of the question. Moreover, the choir would no longer partake.

Good Works was supported by Cavan Arts and the Arts Council’s Artist in the Community Scheme, managed by Create. www.john-byrne.ie

Thankfully, Blanaid Murphy, the prolific and brilliant Director of the Palestrina, was able to

Spending time in Belturbet and engaging with

writings on psychogeography and sensory

members of the community over the past few

ethnography, historical publications and archives,

months, there is a sense of baited breath regarding

and relevant arts practices.

how the dust from the new bypass will settle, yet a

As the research phase of the project draws to a

simultaneous drive to reaffirm this place on the

close, I have an abundance of rich material to

map in order to counterbalance any negative

collate and develop toward the production of a

impact. Perhaps it is for this reason that I have been

number of related and location-specific audio and

met with openness and enthusiasm and with what

audiovisual works next year. Expertise has also

appears to be an unconditional acceptance of the

been sourced locally to liaise on the development

nature of my process and proposal.

of a digital dissemination mechanism for the works

This is also, no doubt, due to the continual mediation of the Public Arts Coordinator. Given John Byrne, Good Works, Cathedral of St Patrick and St Felim, Cavan

So far, working in Cavan is providing me with

the local community, Rhonda has been practically

a strong support structure, successful public

assisting the research process by suggesting and

participation and an opportunity for collaboration

organising meetings with suitable contacts for

and the development of my practice.

to discuss the project and to check that all the assistance I need is provided. Additionally, the steady growth of a visual arts culture in County Cavan propelled by the local arts community, John Byrne, Good Works, ImmA, Dublin

app and locative media tools.

the longevity of her position and her standing with

engagement and collaboration. We meet regularly

John Byrne, Good Works, Cathedral of St Patrick and St Felim, Cavan

at a later date in the project to include potential

particularly since the Fleadh Ceoil 2010 took place

Yvonne Cullivan is a visual artist, currently based in Galway, and a lecturer at the National College of Art & Design. This commission will be launched in May / June 2014.

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December2013

11

RegiONAl pROfile: file: CA CAVAN

Cavan Arts Office

Jane McCormick, Ireland Ireland, 2013

Ériu Dance Company performing Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring

Cavan Council’s Arts Office is staffed by an Arts Officer, a Public Arts Manager, a part-time Clerical Assistant, Culture Cavan’s project co-ordinator and a part-time digital media artist. The office is situated in the Directorship for Roads, Housing and Cultural Policy and has an inter-departmental ethos: a ‘can do’ attitude between colleagues across council departments. This has been beneficial in the support of arts development across the county.

The strategic objectives of Cavan County Council are set out in its Arts Plan 2011 – 2015.

They are: to support artistic excellence and innovation in the arts; to raise the public profile of the arts across County Cavan; to consolidate and build on strategic partnerships across all art forms; to foster public engagement and participation; and to strengthen the management and operation of the Arts Office.

In terms of venues, Cavan County Council has several events spaces: Bailieborough and Cootehill libraries; Ramor Theatre, (a former church); Cavan County Museum; the Eden Gallery (formerly the home of the St Clare’s Order); Bullock Lane (two former council houses) and 61 College Street (a former private residence). Local arts projects have also utilised streets, parks, former graveyards, churches, a tennis court, car parks and disused buildings to make and show work. The participating groups include: Windows Publications; Philip Doherty and the Gonzo Theatre; trans-art; Rianta artists; and The Moth magazine.

We see partnerships with artists and the community as essential, and securing funding and trying to mould our programmes to satisfy the funders while remaining true to the goal of arts development requires skill and tenacity. In 2011, the Arts Office, working with a steering committee, received funding from the International Fund for Ireland for a long-term project entitled Culture Cavan, which has the stated aim of fostering peace and reconciliation in the border community through four art strands. Over the past 18 months, this project has provided employment and professional development opportunities for artists, access to arts and enhanced participation. Artists from various disciplines who have engaged with the project include: Phantom Limb, Sally O’Dowd, Siobhan Harton, Kevin O Connor, Geoff O Keeffe, John Byrne and Tom Meskell. Our long-term relationship with the Arts Council and the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht also remains crucial. In 2014 we will work The Ark on Ark1x1.

The Arts Office has also worked with Dr Emer Coveney, of Cavan County Council’s Social Inclusion Unit, on a number of projects. One of these, ‘Liquid Art’ (3 December 2012 – 30 June 2013) was funded by the Arts Council as a contribution to the cultural programme marking Ireland’s Presidency of the European Union. ‘Liquid

Art’ explored and developed partnerships between recognised Irish and European artists in an intensive laboratory-type, risk-taking experience during a residency. The artists involved were Patricia Mc Kenna, Maura Williamson, Maria Kerin, Kim Doherty and Erki Kasemets (Estonia).

In 2014, between February and November, the Leonardo da Vinci Mobility Programme will fund a project entitled ‘Developing Creative Practice Across Borders’ with the Arts Office and various partner arts organisations: in Estonia the Tartu Centre for Creative Industries, Moks Centre for Art and Social Practice and the Tartu Print and Paper Museum; in Belfast, Feile an Phobail; in West Yorkshire, Arvon Lumbank; and in Scotland, Coatbridge College. Each venue will offer Irish artists short intensive work experiences.

The Public Art Manager Rhonda Tidy is guided in her work by Cavan Re-Imagined: the Strategy for Public Art Delivery in Cavan. The main tenets of this strategy, produced in 2010 and covering the period 2010 to 2015, are: to establish best practice in commissioning public art in accordance with the principles outlined in the General National Guidelines 2004; to seek opportunities and develop commissioning practice; to produce new work relevant to a Cavan context; to promote the development of the arts and audiences; to encourage opportunities to develop artistic practice; to promote ongoing arts infrastructural development; and to create a strong artistic and cultural identity for Cavan.

Recent public art projects include a digital sculpture garden at Dun a Rí Park, Kingscourt, featuring site-specific work by artist Joey Burns, installed in July 2012. An accompanying digital guide featuring artists Kerrie Duffy, RMA Creative and Margaret Maguire, and lead poet Tom Conaty will be launched soon. Brendan de Gallaí’s Ériu Dance Company, in association with Fidget Feet, performed a re-interpretation of Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, which was presented at the Cathedral of St Patrick and St Felim in 2012 and nominated for a 2013 Allianz Business to Arts Award.

Following the architectural residency 'Cavan Re-Imagined' culminating in 2008, a range of public art and grassroots projects have kept the discussion on arts infrastructure alive: John Byrne's Casting Light (2010), highly luminous projections onto the façade of the Ulster Bank in Cavan; Philip Doherty's 'The Town on Stage', a series of theatrical interventions around the town later inspiring The Begrudgers, a short film series; Mórtas an Chabhan Begrudgers (2010), a series of sculptural works in Cavan town celebrating music and culture to coincide with the Fleadh Cheoil. A series of screen-based, film, audio and theatrical works projects are planned for 2014.

Watch this space!

Catriona O Reilly, Cavan Arts Officer

STRIKE! A curated programme by Anthony Haughey

Allan Sekulla The Forgotten Space (1990) Sergie Eisenstein STRIKE! (1925) Naomi Klein The Take (2004) Charlie Chaplin Modern Times (1936) Harun Farocki Workers Leaving the Factory (1995) Declan O’Connell 161 Days (2012) Herbert J. Biberman Salt of the Earth (1957) Barbara Kopple Harlan County USA (1976) Socialist Party of Ireland The Gama Strike We are Workers Not Slaves (2006) Factory Floor Features : STRIKE - Sergie Eisenstein (1925) Thurs 14th Nov 7.30 - 9.30 pm THE FORGOTTEN SPACE - Allan Sekulla (2010) Frid 15th Nov 7.30 - 9.30 pm all details on www.nationalsculpturefactory.com

Democratic Cinema - Cinema Liberté Mon 11th - Sat 16th November 12 noon - 9 pm.

Screening Programme is selected by the audience from our STRIKE! library.

STRIKE! was orignially commissioned

by Limerick City Gallery in January 2013

12

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December

Project profile

New Others New Difficulties JONATHAN CUMMINS DISCUSSES ‘WHEN I LEAVE THESE LANDINGS’, AN EVOLVING FILM INSTALLATION PROJECT BASED ON CONVERSATIONS WITH POLITICAL PRISONERS, WHICH HAS THUS FAR BEEN PRESENTED IN PARIS AND MARSAILLE AND is being SHOWCASED THIS YEAR IN DUBLIN AND DERRY ALONGSIDE A MAJOR SEMINAR EVENT ENTITLED ‘THE IMPOSSIBLE CONVERSATION’.

JC: I don’t see the work as part of an interpretive process. That said, I do see a link if we take a position that the state was never fully formed. By this I don’t mean partition, rather that the relationship between citizen and state and the responsibility we as citizens take for our history, our institutions and those within them.

JO: Your films are based on long-term engagements with your subjects…

JC: Yes. I could speak about this process in terms of methodologies and so forth, but it’s more useful for me to think about it in terms of attentiveness towards another and how we carry ourselves when making work that involves someone’s life.

For me, the shows in Dublin were a success because the men and the families I worked with were also present and they were happy with the work. I see the films as visual documents that tell of a relationship built over many years. There is access there because there is trust, which was built over time. Those I worked with are co-researchers. There are sensitivities in the work and everyone involved has a right to inclusion, withdrawal, to use his or her name and also to anonymity. That’s what we all agreed, and that was our starting point. For example, the face of one of the men was obscured in the exhibition in Dublin. One of the films was only added for the last week of exhibition as per the wishes of that man. Context matters too. I didn’t seek funding from funds with socially motivated schemes that might have the potential to frame the work and words of the participants.

JO: What do you think artists can bring to documentary, and visa versa?

JC: The issues are not straightforward; one world feeds another.

Nonetheless, the gallery certainly puts a different light on work. The films in When I Leave These Landings are long, as they privilege the speaker and his or her story. As a form, this is not sustainable for TV

Jonathan Cummins Out the Road (2011 – 2013) . Installation view Dublin City Gallery, The Hugh Lane 2013

or cinema but it is possible in a gallery setting where it is easier for an audience to choose their level of engagement. The gallery, especially

Jason Oakley: Could you briefly introduce the films that comprise

Volker EhIers and the post-production facility, Screen Scene. In this

if it’s a public space, has a different relationship with society. It can

When I Leave These Landings?

instance I worked with the editor Martha Meyler, who had a great feel

operate as part of civic space and one that’s linked with notions of

Jonathan Cummins: The work began in a prison as a conversation

for the project.

culture and identity. While very few people are bothered with

with four anti-agreement political prisoners. This resulted in the five-

contemporary art, they do care about what happens in their cultural

film installation When I Leave These Landings (2004 – 2009). These are

JO: How do you support your practice?

and civic spaces, as they are often perceived as representing them in

frank intimate documents that touch on subjects such as the impact

JC: I received funding for Out the Road from Derry’s City of Culture

a way that cinema or TV do not.

of intense ideological belief on the self and on family members, and

artist award and this made a big difference in terms of developing the

mediation of life from within prison.

work. I teach part-time with Belfast School of Art and for many years

JO: Do you see the projects as being solely about its declared

I worked part-time with NCAD’s Prison Art Programme, which is

subject matter?

how the project got started.

JC: The work operates at a number of levels and can be read as such,

Go Home (2010 – 2013), a four-film work, extends the conversation with the same men to that period of time after release from prison. In terms of narrative, the work considers returning home to family and

but I wanted to take a position around the ‘human’ in art and its

to society, leaving a paramilitary organisation behind and resituating

JO: How and why did the partner organisations come on board?

difficulties in the context of material that draws in politics, history

the self within all this. The work reflects on home and its relation to

JC: The first installation in Dublin this year was very much embedded

and geography. I was resolute in retaining the face, the voice and

the self. Can we move too far from home to return? And if so, what

in NCAD, having emerged through the NCAD Prison Art Programme,

identity – with all its thorniness. Contemporary lens-based practice

then?

which was run by Brian Maguire when he was Head of Fine Art at

often downplays personal and biographical perspectives in order to

Out The Road (2011 – ), the last in the series, focuses on the

NCAD. NCAD maintained this interest as the project developed.

present a more ‘porous’ opportunity for audiences to construct

families of the men featured, looking at the impact of having a close

Declan McGonagle, the Director of NCAD, had seen related work

meanings – but identity is part of this process.

family member involved in political violence, and how this positions

when he was Director of Interface in Belfast and he invited me to

I think that as a society we struggle when we attempt to form

a family in society. The staging of the work tilts the audience towards

discuss the work at one of the seminars he was running, which is

and then embrace singular positions of identity and shared values,

a slightly more civic engagement in that it’s not purely cinematic but

where Siún Hanrahan saw it.

even when we approach the venture with a disposition of inclusiveness

Declan was involved in the exhibition and symposium in Paris

or indeed humanity. As soon as we agree what and who to include,

In developing the work, I was concerned with the relationships

along with Siún and Brian. Aislinn O’Donnell saw the exhibition at

there is something or someone else to grapple with that has not been

that had developed with the people involved. Underpinning the

Le Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris (18 June – 12 July 2009) and she

included. There will always be others, and new difficulties. Perhaps a

narrative form of the work is an engagement that reflects on themes

participated in the symposium ‘It’s Our Prison’. With these elements

willingness to accept the absolute awkwardness of our social nature

such as listening, encountering difference and the ownership we take

in place, a conversation started with Michael Dempsey and Barbara

might be useful, more so than notions of the inclusive society or

for the closed institutions that are ultimately in our care. If there is

Dawson at Dublin City Gallery, The Hugh Lane and the idea of a

broader notions of humanity.

politics in the work it is located here, in this movement from closed

collaborative exhibition strategy took shape with NCAD Gallery,

institution to civic space.

Hugh Lane and Void. Aislinn and Siún convened for ‘The Impossible

When I Leave These Landings opens at Void in the Shirt Factory, Derry,

Conversation’, a series of talks along with Declan and other

23 November 2013 and will be accompanied by further iterations of

JO: Did you work on these alone or with a team?

contributors (NCAD and Hugh Lane, Dublin 18 April – 31 May 2013

‘The Impossible Conversation’.

JC: I worked on the first phase of the project alone, from filming

and VOID, Derry 23 November 2013 – January 2014). It was a step-by-

through to editing. This was necessary as this work was made in

step process and everyone I have mentioned was instrumental in

Jonathan Cummins has exhibited and screened his film-based

prison and it was essential to protect everyone involved and the

bringing this work into the world. The mix of colleges and public

practice at: the Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris; Rencontres

process. When you bring camera or sound people into the room, and

galleries was important, as was the movement of the exhibition from

Internationales Paris / Berlin / Madrid; Hugh Lane; NCAD

all that equipment, you can break the intimacy.

the South to the North.

Gallery and he regularly contributes to art and academic events.

concerned with layout and awareness of others in the space.

Research took the form of meetings and conversations

The project was shown this year in Marseille (25 – 27 June 2013)

Cummins studied sociology at Trinity College Dublin and has an

beforehand and I tried to insure that there were no surprises for the

as a part of a large group exhibition and conference organised by

MFA in Media Art from University of California Los Angeles

sitter. The work is also an act of hosting so the location matters. All

Lieux Fictifs (www.lieuxfictifs.org) – a really interesting group of

(UCLA). He is a member of Void’s curating committee. Cummins

three works were filmed in an art studio setting and this is an

artists and filmmakers from Marseille. The event focused on the

has curated exhibitions by artists such as Eija-Liisa Ahtila, John

important thread in the work. The studio is a place where there can

relationship between the prison and the outside world.

Gerrard and Phil Collins. He teaches part-time with Belfast

be some sort of truth, free speech and protection.

Go Home and Out the Road were filmed on high-resolution cameras and I worked with cinematographers Nuria Roldos and

School of Art and Design and worked for 10 years with the JO: Was the context – the beginning of the decade of centenaries

National College of Art and Design (NCAD) Prison Art

/ commemorations of Irish independence – of any relevance?

Programme.

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

13

Festival financial crisis. Like all artists, I ask questions, but as my work is about sign writing I can pose them very directly – in a way that a lot of artists can’t or don’t do. I think this is what appealed to Josephine and Anna about inviting me to Kilkenny.

I want to inspire people to think that their thoughts and solutions have as much credence as what they are being told – and that by constantly asking questions, you really can influence politics.

Our Gove campaign in the UK, in a gentle but firm way, is having some success; it’s managed to delay things.

Bob and Roberta installation view 'Art Makes Children Powerful' Butler Gallery

Bob and Roberta Smith, Bonfire, 2007

Bob and Roberta installation view 'Art Makes Children Powerful' Butler Gallery

Questions & Change BOB AND ROBERTA SMITH TALKS ABOUT THE VALUE OF PARTICIPATION, ART AND DEMOCRACY; AND HIS PROJECTS FOR THE 2013 KILKENNY ARTS FESTIVAL. Bob and Roberta Smith (b. London, UK, 1963) is well known for his DIY aesthetic, humorous, sloganeering style, keen political intelligence and compassionate belief in empowerment and social progress. Smith’s first major Irish show was a highlight of the Kilkenny Arts Festival (8 – 17 August 2013), curated by Anna O’Sullivan, Director and Chief Curator at the Butler Gallery and Josephine Kelliher, Visual Art Curator for Kilkenny Arts Festival.

Smith presented a range of ‘Bob Centres’, public provocations dotted across the city alongside the exhibition ‘Art Makes Children Powerful’ at the Butler Gallery (10 August – 6 October).

Smith enlisted the Siteation collective (www.siteation.com) and other local artists to fabricate and animate his projects for Kilkenny.

Helpers inscribed the thoughts of Kilkenny residents onto the walls of the Butler Gallery in response to What’s What, a series of banners installed along the banks of the River Nore posing questions such as ‘What is a Bank For?’ and ‘What is Next for Europe?’. To further air these and other issues, Smith also set up A Centre for Argument, a dropin soapbox facility with full PA and recording facilities at Rothe House, operated by his cohort.

In the atrium of County Hall, visitors were welcomed by Smith’s Bonfire (2007), an assemblage of components from the artists’ previous works: a monument to agitation, anxiety and disgruntlement. At the Heritage Council of Ireland HQ, a former Bishop’s Palace, Smith housed Bobschool, an absurdist art school open to all and staffed by his collaborating artists. In the former Bishop’s robing rooms, Smith and Co presented Be Hannah Arendt, a reading room / performance space dedicated to the feminist political theorist.

Many stories circulate about the origins of the Bob and Roberta Smith moniker. For the record, it’s nothing to do with the New York Times art critic Roberta Smith. In short, it’s a gesture devised to stress collective creativity and a nod to feminist critique of gender roles.

Indeed, we can all be the ‘everyperson’, Bob or Roberta, if we follow the central thesis of the none-too-cryptically titled film, Make Your Own Damn Art: The World of Bob and Roberta Smith.

JO: In May you performed 'Why I named my son after Fergal Sharkey', for the launch of Derry City of Culture in Venice; do you have any special affinity with Ireland?

B&RS: Like many Londoners, my family have roots in Ireland. My real name is Patrick; I’m named after my Irish Uncle. We named our son Fergal for two reasons: after the artist Fergal Stapleton and Fergal Sharkey of The Undertones. When our daughter was born, my wife turned her name into an artwork, so I thought it would be nice to do that for our son too.

Resonance FM had asked me to come to Derry as part of their Residence at the VOID, and when they were invited by the British Council to do something to flag up Derry City of Culture in Venice they asked me along. Along the way I also managed to get the Mayor of Kilkenny, Seán Ó hArgáin, involved …

JO: Er, why the Mayor of Kilkenny?

B&RS: The VOID people wondered too – “Why are you the face of Derry?” I love the ways things can get twisted by chance. I ran into Seán Ó hArgáin in Kilkenny earlier this year, then met him on a Vaparetto coming back from the Irish pavilion (Richard Mosse being a son of Kilkenny). Sean had his Mayoral chains with him. I teased him, “Go on, show us your chains”. He didn’t have to wear them or do his speech that night, so I said “Come to the British Pavilion and we’ll do it tomorrow”.

Sean is a primary school teacher, so I asked him to introduce me, via saying how important art was in primary schools. My story about Fergal goes on to say how my parents’ lives were transformed by being really great at art.

JO: You’re a well-known advocate for art education, as the' Letter to Michael Gove' piece, on show at the Butler, makes clear.

B&RS: Gove has been trying to roll out cuts and an English Baccalaureate system (EBac) based on new core subjects for secondary education. If he has is way, art will become a subject on the curriculum like Latin and Greek – a language that people genuinely think is someone else’s. It’s insidious; it doesn’t apply to private education. It straight-jackets state funded schools. Gove’s plans mean no money for gyms, playing fields or art rooms for state schools.

Schools in the UK need expanding not cutting.

It’s just about being seen to be doing something about the budget deficit. This and cuts to the arts will damage the creative economy, and there’s issues around freedom and democracy. The government are frightened of art; they really don’t want generations of people who become interested in coming up with their own ideas and have a sense that they really don’t want a conventional job and will patch things together, doing lots of different activities. And it’s probably the same in Ireland; if you double or cut the UK government’s arts budget, it’ll make absolutely no difference to the country’s ability to pay off its deficit.

JO: The 'What’s What' banners and the 'Centre For Argument' are about similar issues in the Irish context…

B&RS: I didn’t want to come up with a glib response to the Irish

JO: The Butler exhibition features your 'Feminist Icons' prints and you’ve created the 'Be Hannah Arendt Bob Centre'. You would have come of age when feminist discourse was still strong on college and University campuses in the 1980s…

B&RS: Things changed while I was living in America. When I came back in the early 1990s, newsagents’ shelves were filled with lads’ mags and pornography. The country had taken a real step back and gone down a cul-de-sac. That made me very interested in trying to flag up feminist issues.

The thing about feminist discourse that I like is that it is very empowering for all kinds of people; politics begins at home. And it’s quite a personal thing on some level. My father died when I was in my very early twenties, so I grew up in a house with three very powerful women. Hannah Arendt’s key ideas are about performance, participation and association in democracy, and I’ve had an affinity with that way of thinking for some time.

JO: When did you first get the ‘public engagement’ bug?

B&RS: When I was in New York in my mid twenties I still had a quite straight sense of myself as a painter wanting to sell things. But a fundamental thing happened: I ran out of money. So I began to do sort of stand up performance comedy with props. I wasn’t very good at remembering all the lines, so I’d write them on signs. That’s still key for me – making a bit of a theatre set, a show.

JO: Which leads us back to Kilkenny. What have you found especially interesting about working in the festival context?

B&RS: Firstly, footfall. The breadth of individuals seeing things and questioning is important to me. For a gallery show you only get gallery-goers. You also have to make your work interesting enough for the public. Outside the gallery, the idea of putting anything in a space and it becoming ‘art’ disappears. You’ve got to create a dynamic that will work with and for the public – at least that’s what I want to do.

What I especially like about Kilkenny is that there are lots of different kinds of things going on; one of my absolute heroes, Mark E Smith of The Fall, is playing here.

Jokingly, the Butler Gallery have described what I’m doing as a ‘Bobumenta’, but it’s genuinely amazing and extraordinary that I’ve been able to do so many different things here and create this journey of experiences. The Venice Biennale, Documenta or Manifesta don’t offer artists that opportunity.

JO: Expand a bit on this ‘journey of experiences’ idea …

B&RS: Free-associative activities and serendipitous responses. You come out of one space and think, Hannah Arendt – she was into performance and participation. And then you do a bit of lateral thinking and make a drawing of something a bit absurd. You might think, This is nonsense – I want to do something traditional, or, This it isn’t zany enough, or, I’ve got much better ideas – so you go to the Centre of Argument.

And I really hope it’s an opportunity for the artists I’ve enlisted – who are really making these spaces dynamic – to develop their practices, to do their own thing and experiment.

JO: Returning to the idea people ‘patching it all together’ in terms work, which a reality for most artists, is this how you get by yourself?

B&RS: I’ve little interest in artists but I’m passionate about art and how people can participate in it. Once you think, I am an artist now, suddenly you can think, There are these people who are not artists. I have three types of income. I teach (I run the MA at The CASS London); I sell work; and I do projects like this – money from the public purse. I don’t apply for money to do things very often.

It’s of no interest to me that I don’t live solely of my ‘art’ income.

I don’t think it’s a marker of success, or anything very much actually.

If you beat yourself up constantly about not being a millionaire like Damien Hirst, you’re on a hiding to nothing. You’ll never relax the agency that says, I’ve got to make something I can sell, that this curator can include in this show or that puts me in line for this grant.

Art has to be driven by demands inherent within it.

14

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December

international controlled. In addition, the role of publically funded museums (especially from an international point of view) is getting weaker.

There is a cluster of commercial galleries that participate in international art fairs too, which is good, but they are still small in number. We don’t have any tax exemption scheme for visual artists – only in the performance arts sector.

So the importance of alternative, underground, independent and artist-run-spaces is growing. But this also means dealing with budget cuts, lack of alternative financial sources and searching for international funding. Due to the financial crisis, there is only a small amount of private / corporate money available to the visual arts. One of the few exceptions is the Bloom award.

JO: Tell me about this year’s award.

PC: The 2013 Leopold Bloom award winner was Csaba Nemes. His work – paintings, drawings, animated and puppet films – reflects upon on contemporary issues in Hungarian society, such as ethnic discrimination and the increased presence of extreme right politics in Staircase at the Ludwig Museum, Budapest, all images courtesy of Balázs Glódi

public life. The jury described Nemes’s work as not only technically

Hungarian Connection

superb but also emotionally intelligent and conceptually rigorous.

THE LEOPOLD BLOOM ART AWARD is a HUNGARIAN CONTEMPORARY ART PRIZE, sponsored by the irish company Maurice Ward and co. The prize's THE JURY IS HEADED BY IRISH ART WORLD FIGURES OF INTERNATIONAL REPUTE. JOHN WARD, DIRECTOR OF MAURICE WARD & CO, AND PETRA CSIZEK OF ACAX / THE LUDWIG MUSEUM, BUDAPEST, DISCUSS THE INITIATIVE.

Eszter Szabó and Péter Ildikó received special commendations.

The year’s jury comprised Katia Baudin (art historian, Deputy Director and Senior Curator of the Museum Ludwig Cologne), Annie Fletcher (Curator of Exhibitions at the Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, and tutor at De Appel, Amsterdam), Tihomir Milovac (art historian, Head of the Experimental and Research Department at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb). They selected nine artists for the finalists’exhibition: Dávid Adamkó, Bernadett Alpern, Anna Fabricius, Gábor Kerekes, Csaba Nemes, Péter Ildikó, Péter Puklus, Eszter Szabó, Eszter Szigethy. The exhibition of the shortlisted artists ran 7 – 29 September at the Ludwig Museum – the Museum of Contemporary Art in Budapest.

JO: What kind of contribution is the award making to the contemporary visual arts sector in Hungary?

Petra Csizek: One of the key contributions is the enhancement of the artist’s international profile, as the winner gets to realise an exhibition in a renowned European art institution – in this case the Museum of

installation view, Csaba Nemes, Leopold Bloom Art Award, Ludwig Museum, Budapest

Tijana Stepanovic, Petra Csizek (ACAX), John Ward, Csaba Nemes, Julia Fabényi (director of the museum) and the judges: Katia Baudin, Tihomir Milovac, Annie Fletcher

Modern and Contemporary Art in Rijeka, Croatia. There are only a few other awards in Hungary, and they are either not so financially

My only imprimatur was that the head of the judging panel

well endowed, have a tighter focus (ie only painters can apply) or are

John Ward: My Transport and Logistics company, Maurice Ward &

should be Irish or have Irish connections, to keep the Hibernian

state-funded, which can be problematic, especially nowadays. What

Co, is based in a Business Park near the main airport that serves

connection from both the Joycean and Maurice Ward point of view.

is unique about the Leopold Bloom award is that there is no age limit,

Budapest. It was originally my intention to host an event along the

Joyce’s Bloom character in Ulysess has a Hungarian émigré father. The

no restriction regarding the medium and it’s a private initiative.

lines of ‘bringing art to the business park’, where we could show

Maurice Ward group was established in Dublin in 1968 by my

The €10,000 prize money is a very remarkable degree of support

contemporary art from a variety of Hungarian artists and hopefully

parents. Alice Maher was head of the judging panel at the first

in the context of Hungarian living conditions. This year we focused

introduce contemporary art to a lot of corporate folk who could

Leopold Bloom award in 2011, which received a lot of very positive

more on local advertising but with an e-flux announcement also

become engaged with art and artists and perhaps become long term

publicity from many quarters.

reached out to the international professional scene. The award is

JO: How did the Leopold Bloom Art Award come about?

becoming more and more accepted, with more applicants and the

collectors. In my view, the purchase of contemporary art is the acid JO: What do Maurice Ward get out of it?

venue for this year's finalists’ show, the Ludwig Museum, Budapest,

After a meeting to discuss this objective with a prominent

JW: It’s great fun for logistics people like us to interact with artists and

also increased the prestige of the award. The long-term goal is to

contemporary art gallery in Budapest, the ACB gallery (www.

the art world; we find it hugely stimulating and enjoyable. The main

make this award a regional event; this will be the next step.

acbgaleria.hu), I was introduced to ACAX Agency for Contemporary

benefit to Maurice Ward is knowing that the winning artist may have

Art Exchange (www.acax.hu) and, over time, the concept for the

a better chance at sustaining a full time career in the arts, whilst

JO: As Petra notes, you want to expand the award across the

Leopold Bloom Art Award was fleshed out.

being able to put food on the table. Essentially, we are trying to give

region…

something that we deem worthwhile.

JW: Yes, we would like to regionalise the award for 2015, pull in the

test of meaningful support for the artist.

We don’t get a lot of ‘spin’ from the award. As I said, we’ve not

Balkan countries and possibly the Czech Republic, Slovakia and

JW: The key components are: supporting living artists to build their

devised the award for corporate benefit; it is primarily an arts venture

Romania. It depends on how much money we have or if we can pull

international career; completely independent and neutral judging –

for us. In addition to general transport and logistics services, we do

in supportive sponsors. I would like to think that Budapest is the

all the judges are from outside Hungary, so the work is judged with

have fine art handling and transport operations in both Hungary and

‘outside eyes’, no local relationships are involved; and that it’s a non-

Ireland, which are already very successful.

natural historic capital for many of the surrounding countries in geographic and cultural terms. In the longer term, I do believe that

JO: What is the award concept?

the Leopold Bloom Award, primarily because of its values and

corporate event. The Leopold Bloom Award brand supports the concepts of humanism, citizenship, independence and daily life. The

JO: What are ACAX’s main activities?

structure, can turn into the primary European if not worldwide, art

driving force is not a corporation trying to fulfil its social responsibility,

Petra Csizek: ACAX’s primary goal is to build and strengthen the

award for contemporary visual art.

as per its mission statement and boost its public image by so doing.

networks between the local and international visual art scene, and to facilitate and support the presence of contemporary Hungarian art

JO: Do you think the award could possibly inspire other

JO: How did the partnership with ACAX evolve?

abroad. We operate residency programmes for artists and for curators.

companies in Ireland to consider at the benefits of conducting

JW: Once I’d formulated this vision and these values for the Leopold

We run a curatorial visitor programme, so that international art

similar arts sponsorship within Ireland?

Bloom Award in my own head, I then shared them with ACAX. After

professionals can become acquainted with our local art scene – Irish

JW: The award is branded so that it can be hosted in any country. Its

that, some highly capable people in ACAX took over in terms of

art professionals are very welcome to participate. In addition, we also

values, structure and underlying administration are built on strong

structuring and administering the entire event. I had very little to do

act as producer and organiser for the Hungarian artists taking part in

foundations that appeal to the artists as opposed to corporate

with the structure, as I have only a limited knowledge of how the art

major international exhibitions and projects.

concerns, so I would welcome any effort to open an Irish Leopold Bloom Award. The award is open for anyone to support – via the

world is run.

JO: Could you briefly sketch the kinds of support infrastructure

Leopold Bloom Art Foundation – so long as it does not compromise

transferable and has a great deal of credibility with artists. This is

in place for the visual arts in Hungary?

the integrity of the award itself. As my wife and I are the sole funders

what the event is all about: trying to put artists at the centre,

PC: The National Cultural Fund of Hungary is a key source of support,

of the Leopold Bloom Award, we are limited in how we personally

empowering artists in the art world.

but with the new cultural politics of the ultraconservative

can develop the award.

ACAX built a robust methodology and structure that is scalable,

government, support is getting tighter and the system is ideologically

www.leopoldbloomaward.com

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

15

Seminar report

Resonant Chamber JOANNE LAWS REPORTS ON 'PARTITION' A SEMINAR HELD AT THE CITY FACTORY GALLERY, VOID, DERRY (16 –17 JULY 2013). THE EVENT WAS PUBLICISED AS PREFIGURING A SIX-WEEK EXHIBITION, BUT CONCLUDED IN A MORE TELLINGLY AMBIGUIOUS RESULT – AN EMPTY SPACE.

installation view, Csaba Nemes, Leopold Bloom Art Award, Ludwig Museum, Budapest

“Let's go. Yes, let's go.” 1 “Nothing to be done... There’s nothing to show.”

2

The panel stood up, walked out, and left everything behind – microphones, name-tags, doodlepads, coffee cups – to be preserved as it was left, empty, but resonating with the activity of the recent past. Thus concluded ‘Partition’, a two-day seminar (16 –17 July), held at the newly developed City Factory Gallery, above Void, Derry. With regard to the fate of this empty room, even in the last few minutes of the talks, opinion was divided. Notionally, the event was pitched as prefiguring a six-week ‘exhibition’ of some kind. But what was left to show?

The discussion had arrived at a concensus of sorts – placing ‘objects’ in the space seemed unnecessary and disingenuous, inferring that there was an easy solution to the complexities site-specific responses, glossing over the historical and political conditions inherent in the very conceptual issue of ‘partition’. As well as this, the participants agreed that the conversations that had taken place amounted to a ‘co-authored artwork’.

Fear of the Invisible Void A room in a building in a city with bi-sected name – Derry / London Derry – in Northern Ireland, divided by a make-shift partition wall, was the setting for the event. Leading international curators, critics and academics were invited to discuss ‘What – if anything – should be located in the vacant space on the other side of this very literal partition?’ 3 Would the space ultimately remain empty or be rendered obsolete? How might its persistent emptiness influence the discussions? The event was developed by Paul Sullivan of Static Gallery, Liverpool, whose previous projects ‘Terminal Convention’ (2011) and ‘Exit Limerick’ (2012) were devised as discursive platforms to examine, critique or agitate the mechanisms of production surrounding contemporary art.

In addressing the empty space concealed behind the partition, it was suggested that no greater metaphor exists than that of the ‘blank page’. Anna Dezeuze offered the philosophical insight that an empty room need not necessarily be empty – there is light, temperature, air, sound, subtleties which cannot be overlooked. “Is there anything wrong with invisibility?” asked Francesco Manacorda, using Brecht’s Invisible Theatre as an example of an audience ‘not knowing they were in art’.

Mark O’Kelly countered this idea with the proposition that, “Where there is nothing to see, perhaps there is nothing”.

The question of whether the room needed to be ‘filled’ with artwork at all dominated much of the discussion. Art as a meeting place, a site of discussion or leisure and an extension of the everyday, featured in the conversation, underpinned by curatorial and the theoretical insights including relational aesthetics, art in the public realm, and the functionality (and subsequent dematerialisation) of the art object.

Several participants suggested that the space could function as a virtual library of relevant publications – a civic amenity offering a place of

dialogue – or as an archive documenting off-site projects. Interestingly, in focusing on the empty space, participants began to think about the peripheral exterior, using ‘partition’ metaphorically as a threshold between the gallery interior and the outside world.

On the first morning, it transpired that several artists had been invited to participate in the project, under the premise that they may or may not be required to produce artwork for Room Two, depending on the conclusions reached by the panel. This set an uncomfortable tone, implying that art might be somehow ‘on trial’. Commenting on a contemporary ‘event-driven’ art experience, Frederic Pradeau spoke about the over-production, theorisation and academisation of art, citing ‘Partition’ as a prime example of putting the ‘apparatus’ and ‘metanarrative’ before the art process. Breaking his self-determined silence on the second afternoon, Seamus Nolan provided a pensive summary of his position. For him, this conversation was the co-authored artwork, and the prospect of ‘art by committee’ was deeply flawed.

Theatre of the Absurd 4 On entering the partitioned space, the discussion area had the appearance of a mock press-conference, complete with round table format, name tags and microphones. An unnerving symmetry permeated the space, with a centrally-placed wall clock, dual video cameras and a stenographer seated at the lower table to transcribe the conversation live as it unfolded. Spectators assembled on side benches, moving freely in and out of the viewing area over the course of the debate. On the stud partition wall a flat-screen depicting CCTV-style footage of the adjoining vacant space reinforced the notion that the far side would be subject to intense surveillance and scrutiny over the coming days. Examining the seminar in terms of its production, many of the participants described the event as a spectacle, stage set, or location for a dramatic production. With everyone ‘playing their part’, the dramaturgy extended to the inclusion of various props and objects (including the wall), which functioned as prompts for dialogue.

Performativity was captured and the spoken word was transcribed without anyone knowing why. Was this a performance? An historical event? Did it need to be preserved, its substance re-enacted at some later date? Mark O’Kelly suggested that, “If actors re-enacted the transcript of this conversation, it could be endlessly looped in a facsimile production”.

Caoimhin Mac Giolla Leith prompted the panel to consider what might happen if all of the documentation was erased.

Following French artist Frederic Pradeau’s insight into his proposed project, issues pertinent to Northern Ireland became more central. The G8 Summit, which took place in Co Fermanagh in June, was discussed with reference to the ‘fake shop-fronts’ that were installed by local councils to mask vacant and derelict commercial premises, therefore concealing the economic hardship being experienced in the locality.

Window stickers depicting bountiful produce were accompanied by signs saying ‘do not touch the goods’. The theatricality of such a phenomenon, suggested Katherine Waugh, has become part of a new regime of governmentality. With self-reflexivity ‘factored in’ to the

process, irony becomes permissible and naturalised. Waugh also made reference to philosopher Paul Virilio, whose theories on the 'logistics of perception' and the links between visuality and information in war, seem particularly well placed here to assess the relations between culture and Capital amidst diminishing human control over democratic processes, not just in post-conflict regions, but in society as a whole.

The shop-front theme also resonated with Mary Conlon, who spoke about the perceived function of artist-led spaces as ‘prettifying’ lacklustre commercial zones, generating visible activity, and attracting investment to the area. George Yúdice suggested that a sophisticated Mise-en-scène is needed to tackle and engage with the enduring legacy of partition’s post-colonial narrative, rather than papering over it.

As a subtext to theatricality, discussions on the Broadcasting Ban referenced a broader culture of surveillance and censorship across Derry’s militant history.5 Responding assertively to a lack of local representation on this subject, Derry artist Anne Crilly temporarily joined the panel. Her intervention was welcome; I have never been so glad to hear a northern Irish accent. Recounting the psychic effect of media censorship in the North, she outlined the isolation felt by local artists at the time, and how the farcical situation of dubbing and lipsynching had contributed to a personification of nationalist culture in the global media. This discussion on the ‘partitioning’ of the body and voice may have influenced the decision to include a ‘disembodied’ audio (of the conversation) in the subsequent exhibition.

A New Story for Derry? The concept of ‘partition’ was used metaphorically throughout the seminar, in order to consider a number of spatial and philosophical propositions. However, the most literal and loaded elements associated with partition – regarding the territorial division of north and south –were only tentatively addressed by the panel. These issues would have benefitted from the input of someone with greater local knowledge or an Irish historian. As Aislinn O’Donnell suggested, people from the south quite often consider the historical complexities of partition (border discourse, religion, governance etc...) to be an almost exclusively ‘northern issue’ With the majority of the participants not coming from Northern Ireland, it fell mainly to Damien Duffy to outline the conditions precipitating Derry’s UK City of Culture designation, which he believes only became tenable following the publication of the Saville Inquiry in 2010, providing vindication for Derry’s Catholic Nationalist population.

The UK City of Culture rhetoric was robustly tackled, which proclaims ‘joyous celebration’ amidst ‘cultural renaissance’ in (the newly hyphenated) Derry-Londonderry, after years of ‘turmoil’.

Employing culture as a regenerative force and facet of the tourism industry, its success will be measured in economic terms, including hotel room consumption and global media coverage value – emphasising the impact of an improved media profile as a component of regeneration.

The role of the publicly funded gallery under this remit was also debated at length by the panel, along with the merits of preserving the ‘empty space’ at the institution, suspended from broader commercial interests. In the end, the partition wall and the discussion area remained untouched for the subsequent exhibition, with the addition of an audio and a (somewhat garbled) transcript of the conversation attesting to the performative process.

Given the pre-determined aesthetic and intellectual parameters of the event, it is difficult to identify alternative ways in which the event could have been resolved. Judging by subsequent exhibition reviews 6, audiences who had not attended the seminar felt quite alienated from its theoretical content and perceived it as an indulgent exercise by an ‘invite only’ group of intellectuals – something the participants themselves acknowledged as problematic from the outset . Although a complex proposition was made more complex through dialogue, the event was informative, memorable and worthwhile, with the binary format of Partition becoming enlarged and ‘spatially fragmented’, producing an enduring legacy of expanded discussion.

Joanne Laws is an arts writer based in Leitrim.

Notes 1. Final line of Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot (Last line, Act II). As observed by Anna Dezeuze, ‘Partition’ ended with the same concluding statement as Samuel Beckett’s absurdist play. Following Sigi Sigurdsson’s proposition that the conversation should not continue, Stephen Wright responded with the words “Yes, let’s go”,.

2. Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot (Estragon, Act I) 3. Participants: John Byrne (Co-Director, Static Gallery, Liverpool & Programme Leader of Fine Art at Liverpool School of Art &Design), Mary Conlon (Director, Ormston House Gallery, Limerick), Anna Dezeuze (Senior Lecturer, History of Art and Theory at University of Marseille) Aislinn O’Donnell (Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, Mary Immaculate College, Limerick), Mark O’Kelly (artist / Lecturer in Fine Art, Limerick Institute of Technology), Caoimhin Mac Giolla Leith (critic / curator & Lecturer at the School of Irish, Celtic Studies, Irish Folklore &Linguistics, UCD), Francesco Manacorda (Artistic Director, Tate Liverpool), Seamus Nolan (artist), Frederic Pradeau (artist / Professor of Sculpture, University of Marseille), Sigi Sigurdsson (artist, Marseille / Reykjavik), Padraig Timoney (artist, New York), Katherine Waugh (writer, filmmaker & curator, Galway), Eyal Weizman (architect, Professor of Visual Cultures & Director of the Centre for Research Architecture, Goldsmiths, University of London), Stephen Wright (Professor of the Practice of Theory, The European School of Visual Arts), George Yúdice (Head of Department of Modern Languages, Literatures and Latin American Studies at the University of Miami).

4. Theatre of the Absurd: A form of drama which employs satirical, philosophical and nihilistic dialogue in exploring the absurdity of human existence.

5. The Broadcasting Ban was a form of media censorship in the UK which prevented the voices of IRA and Sinn Féin members from being broadcast, dubbing speeches with the voices of actors.

6. The most well considered of these reviews is John Higgins, Art Review: Partition, www. culturenorthernireland.org 08 / 08 /2013

16

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December

Institution profile

Anne Marie Savage, Camera Obscura, photographic paper, 2013

Anne Marie Savage, installation shot of pinhole cameras and car contents

Relocations

papermaking workshops, I decided I wanted to make handmade paper out of turf. I was unsure what the outcome would be but set about making small rectangles (12cm x 8cm) of turf paper. My aim was to create an installation made with 120 individual pieces of handmade paper suspended from wall to floor by trace wire (270cm high by 120cm wide). Each singular piece of paper – unique, fragile and sometimes translucent – now represented my very own Portach (bog). The turf paper was just the beginning and so, informed by this experience, my practice took a completely new direction. A book I was reading at the time, The Art of Richard Tuttle, inspired me and I forged ahead, completely uninhibited. I found myself producing simple line drawings using pieces of turf paper whilst also incorporating it into oil works on linen board.

Every evening after either a productive or a non- productive day in the studio, myself, Rebecca and Sue met up, opened a bottle of wine and discussed the day’s events. Early on in the residency, one of these discussions led to a very simple idea: to designate a day for experimenting with pinhole cameras. We decided to start off big and use the old, abandoned car that sat outside the cottages. It needed to be completely wrapped in tinfoil to make it impenetrable to light apart from the pinhole device we would install in the front windscreen.

From here, we embarked upon a process-based collaborative project that recorded our ‘response to place’ using only immediate and found resources. Central to the work was an investigation of the possibilities inherent in making photographic images using recycled and obsolete objects; these included the abandoned car as a camera obscura and discarded drink cans as pinhole cameras. The resulting mixed media installation, ‘CeAmaRa agus other pinhole devices’, which comprised video, film snatches, stills, drawings, artefacts and pinhole images, documented our endeavours and the resulting outcomes – both the successes and failures. After a month of working together on the project, Oona and Ian gave us the gallery space at Cló and ‘CeAmaRa agus other pinhole devices’ opened for public view on 23 May 2013.

As an artist who predominately works in 2D, I believe the most valuable thing I will take away from this residency was the connections I made with other visual artists of varying and distinct practices. I was able to work with two other practitioners to collaborate on a site-responsive project and therefore found myself more receptive to other disciplines. For me, the making of the work is of the utmost importance and the experience at Cló increased my sensitivity to my surroundings and the vision of what I was creating.

ANNA MARIE SAVAGE DESCRIBES HER RESIDENCY AT CLÓ CEARDLANN NA GCNOC, DONEGAL. In March 2013 I was awarded a residency at Cló Ceardlann na gCnoc, Donegal as part of the Úr programme supported by EACEA, Culture Ireland and the Arts Council of Ireland. This provided me with an exceptional opportunity to immerse myself totally in my practice, in a continuous and consistent manner that I seem unable to achieve in my own studio. The residency began in May 2013 and was a month long. It included a stipend of €180 per week, €50 towards travel costs to Donegal, living accommodation / studio and use of the visual art and media workshop facilities.

With the luxury of uninterrupted time and space combined with near isolation, I knew I would be able to concentrate on complete experimentation and resolve a lot of issues I had within my work. Without the interruption of many modern conveniences or work demands, I would be able to concentrate on making work and, ultimately, produce an assemblage of works based purely on my surroundings.

Cló Ceardlann na gCnoc is nestled in the foothills of Mount Errigle in the townland of Mín a Léa, Gorta Choirce in a remote part of the Donegal Gaeltacht. I actually drove past it a couple of times, as the centre itself blends completely into the terrain and lunar-type landscape of turf bogs and abandoned ‘lazy beds’. Cló is professionally managed by Oona Hyland and Ian Joyce and is a not-for-profit company that acts as a local, regional and national resource facility for the creation and production of art.

The Artist-in-Residence Programme offers accommodation at Teach an tSléibhe, two self-contained residency cottages. One of these hosts the Living Archive: an extensive library of books, CDs, DVDs, video, 16mm film, slides and photographs. The areas of special interest to me were: Gaelic literature, architecture, archaeology, photography, artefacts and artworks from the Gaelic speaking areas.

The visual art and media workshop, situated less than five minutes walk away from the cottages, was another amazing feature of the residency. As a resident artist, I had 24-hour access to the facilities and, as Oona Hyland and Ian Joyce, the managers and facilitators of the Cló project, live on site, they were there to help at all times with anything I needed. They made me feel very much part of their family and invited me, along with the two other Úr Programme resident artists (Sue Morris and Rebecca Strain), to dinner on a number of occasions. I felt this was a very special and unique part of the experience, as I haven’t come across it in any other residency projects I have been on.

I have found that since graduating from university in 2009, I constantly need to challenge my practice by continually relocating myself. By allowing the work and processes to be informed by these ‘relocations’, I am always attempting to interpret the relationships between indigenous cultural forms and new forms of expression. My practice explores the idea of studying identity and, more importantly, how cultural and national identity is realised today.

As an artist, I work with paint, sound, photography and drawing; the initial works I produced are composed of multiple layers of paint and other substances – usually ‘found’ organic substances that I just

Anne Marie Savage, installation shot of Living Archive, 2013

have to hand like silica salt, oxides or turf. Chance is crucial to my work and the outcome is often generated by the exploration of processes and the complexities of working on different surfaces.

In addition to this ongoing project – investigating this idea of identity – I have also been working on a collaborative-based project exploring cross-disciplinary drawing. Whilst utilising drawing as a fundamental tool for thinking across disciplines, I was keen to address how the use of other materials challenge the assumptions of what drawing is or might be – conceptually, visually and technologically.

After a couple of days at Cló, I made a conscious decision to keep my approach to work very much unrestricted and experimental. I didn’t want to constrict myself by labelling the work under different project titles; I wanted to let my reaction to the immediate surroundings take over. This freedom allowed me to simply record my response to the environment. As part of the Úr Programme, I had the great fortune to work alongside other artists of varying disciplines.

Sue Morris and Rebecca Strain held paper / print workshops that I participated in, which helped me become more open to other practices, allowing them to infiltrate my own work processes.

I had a real breakthrough in my work when I began to utilise a found, organic substance: turf. I was surrounded by it; everywhere I went, there it was. I used to cycle around the bogs for hours drawing turf, writing about turf, photographing turf and getting down on my hands and knees collecting turf. Some days I would just sit in the bogs and look at the marks made by shovels, reminiscent of hand carvings from ancient Mesolithic tombs. The landscape is so barren but so very beautiful at the same time; it is indescribable. During one of the

Anna Marie Savage graduated from the University of Ulster in 2009 with a First Class BA Honours Degree in Fine Art. Her residency at Cló Ceardlann na gCnoc as part of the Úr Programme was supported by EACEA, Culture Ireland and the Arts Council of Ireland. The turf installation 'An Portach' and other resulting works can be seen at: ‘Line- An Ambiguous Journey’ (Anna Marie Savage, Craig Donald, Doris Rohr, Joanne Proctor), the Drawing Project, Dún Laoighaire 16 – 30 October 2013 and the Crescent Arts Centre, Belfast 7 – 28 November 2013. www.annamariesavage.com www.clo.ie

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

17

how is it made

Louise Manifold, In Death & Fiction installation view, Siamsa Tire, 2013

Louise Manifold, In Death & Fiction video still, 16mm film transferred to DVD, 2013

Chance is the Objective LOUISE MANIFOLD OUTLINES THE DEVELOPMENT OF HER WORK IN DEATH AND FICTION CREATED IN COLLABORATION WITH THE AUTHOR KEVIN BARRY.

Louise Manifold, In Death & Fiction installation view, Siamsa Tire, 2013

Louise Manifold, In Death & Fiction video still, 16mm film transferred to DVD, 2013

If your artistic aims and outcomes are diligently premeditated, to drift away from your proposed result towards an unexpected possibility can feel pretty worrying. Two years ago I began a collaborative process that led me on exactly on this kind of detour, one that ultimately prompted me to think beyond given sets of objectives.

From December 2010 to April 2011 I undertook a residency at the International Studio and Curatorial Program in New York, supported by the Arts Council of Ireland and Galway City Council.

During the residency I developed some work concerned with ideas around extinction and post-death mythologies.

Many of my ideas arise from encountering ‘found narratives’ about personal experience. During the residency, I came across a case study of a man suffering from what is known as Cothard’s Delusion – a rare condition. Sufferers hold the persistent belief that they are dead, do not exist or, occasionally, may even believe themselves to be immortal. Other significant symptoms include experiencing an uncanny ‘absence’ of bodily parts and an inability to recognise oneself.

I love the process of making sense of the subjects I am drawn to – by forging links to connect seemingly disparate materials are areas of interest together. I began to collect as much material about Cothard’s Delusion as possible, including case histories, experiences of sufferers and the life of the physician Jules Cothard, whom the illness is named after. I also became fascinated by some Samuel Beckett texts that related to post-death existences. Beckett is reported to have researched the experiences of Cothard's Delusion sufferers, particularly for his 1946 short story The Calmative.1 Whilst in New York, I began making a series of studies – using 16 mm film – of the interior spaces of an old movie theatre in Patterson, New Jersey, a building in its final days and due for demolition.

In late May 2011, I returned to Ireland armed with fragments – research texts and films – that, I think, had more control over me than I had over them. Nonetheless, I did have something of a vision in mind as to how I would consolidate the material, though the outcome I had in mind reminded me too much work I had previously produced. I decided, therefore, to delay finalising the work.

Collaboration seemed like a good way to proceed. As the material I was collecting was rooted between fact and fiction, I was interested in what could happen if I presented it to a fiction writer. I discussed this idea with curator Maeve Mulrennan, Head of Visual Arts at Galway Arts Centre, who I have worked with on previous

projects. Maeve suggested working with Kevin Barry. I’d read and been impressed by There are Little Kingdoms (Stinging Fly, 2010). I really liked his style of writing – the way it reveals strangeness in people in a very ordinary way, which makes things even stranger.

Galway Arts Centre had worked with Kevin during the Cúirt International Festival of Literature, Galway’s Annual Literary festival.

Maeve made a request on my behalf to Kevin, and I was very appreciative when he agreed to work with me, as I knew that he had significant commitments of his own.

Like many other cultural projects being executed in this economic climate, it proved difficult to match the available funds to my ambitions. I made a number of funding applications and I was fortunate to receive an Artist Bursary from Galway County Council.

The amount of financial support set a limit for what I could realise. I was originally interested in producing a radio play as part of the work, but I had to cut things down and focus my vision for the work.

However, in doing so, I believe that a much tighter, clearer and more focused project emerged. The resulting work was a video installation, entitled In Death & Fiction, presented as part of a solo exhibition of the same name at Siamsa Tire, Tralee in February 2013. In June it was also screened at the final Live@8 event in Galway organised by Vivienne Dick, Aine Phillips and Maeve Mulrennan.

Over several months I communicated with Kevin, mainly via email. I sent on textual materials that I had collected – some of which I edited and some I just left alone. These comprised numerous threads of small histories that were ready to be picked at, whilst retaining the possibility of leaving things open.

The difference in how different creative disciplines – visual and literary – interpret narratives was something that began to interest me. In our case, we were dealing with source materials themselves that were heavy with associations, so it would be challenge for both of us to consolidate these into our respective forms, the visual and the literary.

One of the differences between us was how Kevin worked geographies and locations into his narratives in order to give them a sense of ‘being somewhere’. In my work I usually seek to erase or disrupt any sense of specific place. My work is located ‘nowhere’ or ‘anywhere’. However, in the course of our collaboration, when Kevin told me that he had heard of a case in Ireland of a man who was believed to have suffered from Cothard’s Delusion, I became interested in presenting a protagonist in the work, who could be from a particular place.

Louise Manifold, In Death & Fiction video still, 16mm film transferred to DVD, 2013

As our work developed, the question of what we each would ‘deliver’ was discussed. I was delighted when Kevin offered to narrate the finished film work, as I knew he was a good orator. In the recording of his finished text, the importance of ‘the voice’ within the work became clear to me – as a means of giving weight to the ideas I was exploring.

In terms of presenting this element within the work, I decided that that I wanted the audio to be fed out through the speakers of an old 1950s valve radio. Besides Kevin’s text alluding to Cothard’s Delusion, the form of this work addressed themes around extinction and mortality – through the alien antiquity of the old radio technology and the alarming redundancy of celluloid film in our digital age.

I have worked with old speakers and valve amplification in previous sculptural and installation works. I like the tone they give to the spoken voice, and they’re a very tangible way of physically embodying the voice. It also connected to my original idea about creating a radio drama. I have a fascination with radio plays, where the human voice, almost hanging in mid-air, can give a sense of both location and dislocation. It’s an idea Kevin summed up in what is perhaps my favourite line in the text he wrote for the work: the closing line “I am there, I am not there, and I have become water, wind, light”.2 From this experience, I’ve realised that many different layers of possible collaboration exist within individual practices. Some are concrete – concerned with decision-making – and others more esoteric, about shared energies and enthusiasms. My collaboration with Kevin was an incredibly positive experience for me. Had I held on to the objective I originally set for my self, many of the notions that I wanted to get across would actually have been compromised.

I do believe the success of the project had a lot had to do with holding back – being held back – until the right possibilities arose. In fact, it is only recently – during a workshop I undertook this July in Spain – that I came to appreciate the impact of letting an idea ‘fester’ until the right possibility emerges.

The workshop was hosted by the Botin Foundation in Santander and was lead by Tacita Dean, an artist very well known for her film works. Throughout the workshop, a key notion that was repeatedly reflected upon was ‘objective chance’ within the art-making process; specifically, how it can shape outcomes if you are open to it. It’s a notion coined by the Surrealist Andre Breton, and refers to an acceptance of the ways in which unconscious desires can fruitfully drive real world manifestation. This idea resonated strongly with my recent experience of the gestation and realisation of In Death & Fiction.

This amazing workshop experience is still fresh in my mind and has given me the clarity to recognise the strong presence of ‘objective chance’ within my own process, shifting a course of action that revived an idea when I had hit the proverbial blank wall.

Louise Manifold is an artist living in County Galway and a member of Artspace studios. She holds an MA from Central St Martin's Collage and BA from Galway / Mayo Institute of Technology. Recent projects include: ‘Taller, Tacita Dean, Botin Foundation Spain; ‘Proximal Distances’, Chicago; Tulca, Galway; The Hellfire Club, Askeaton Contemporary Arts, Limerick. www.louisemanifold.com Notes 1. Peter Fifield, Beckett, Cothard’s Syndrome and the Narrative Patient, 2008, www.ccsenet.org 2. Kevin Barry, On being there and not being there, script composed for In Death & Fiction, video installation 2012, shown at Siamsa Tire, Tralee and Live@8 Galway 2013 3. James Leveque, Surrealism and the ‘Fissured Subject’: Breton, Éluard, and Desnos, University of Edinburgh Postgraduate Journal of the Arts www.forumjournal.org

18

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December

PROJECT PROFILE workshops and walking tours; interventions such as Colm Clarke’s sculptural installation in an abandoned, fenced-off building site; Deirdre McKenna’s large scale collage on a gable end; and the mysterious ‘historical right-of-way’ sign that appeared next to a newly-created gap in the Ormeau Park railings (the metal bars in the fence were temporarily removed, resulting in an opening that people could pass through).

Indoor interventions were often quiet and subtle, like Jane Butler’s sophisticated and exquisitely simple installation: a strip of shimmering material suspended over a bath, so that the light that came in through the adjacent window illuminated one side of the room in a soft green glow and cast a pink hue over the other, animating and lifting the entire room above the everyday domestic Mary Carter, The House, image by Simon Mills

Maeve McGreevy, Disrupt, Ormeau Park Bowling Green, image by Jordan Hutchins

mundane to the startlingly extraordinary.

In the same house, Dorothy Hunter had emptied all furniture and decorations out of the downstairs front room, so that only two cream couches faced each other in front of a black fireplace. A faint reverberation came from deep inside the chimney: the sounds of another space (recordings made at the east-facing hatch at the abandoned Teufelsberg listening station in Berlin), of voices and distant echoes. They effectively transported listeners to another place beyond the visible: constructed in the mind, yet just out of reach.

We organised a programme of talks in the Ormeau Road Library that contextualised and critically examined how space in the city is used, and connotations invoked by the term ‘home’. Declan Hill from the Forum for Alternative Belfast spoke about the distribution

Visitors to Tonya McMullan and Colm Clarke's 'Surrender Yourself, image by Jordan Hutchins

Satsumas Aural Conditioning, Improvised Drone Performance, image by Jordan Hutchins

Connecting Domestic Hubs ALISSA KLeiST PROFILES HOUSEHOLD FESTIVAL (23 – 25 AUGUST 2013), HELD IN SOUTH BELFAST IN ORDER TO CREATE NEW WAYS TO EXPERIENCE ARTWORK IN UNRESTRICTED, NON-COMMERCIAL AND NON-INSTITUTIONALISED CONTEXTS. In cities such as Amsterdam, it is possible to wander the streets and

Homes are subjective environments often charged with intimate

glimpse the lives of others through open and un-curtained windows.

personal memories and projected, loaded associations. So far, during

Whereas what happens behind the closed doors and draped curtains

each iteration of the Household Festival, the context of the ‘the home’

of Belfast homes is often only experienced by those who claim

has routinely appeared as a silent background character that

ownership over these spaces.

influenced the final outcome – whether this was intentional or not.

From the 23 – 25 August 2013, over 100 creative practitioners at

This year, invitations were issued to those who had participated

more than 40 domestic, public and alternative locations around the

in last year’s event and to others who’d expressed an interest in being

Ormeau Road area in South Belfast presented a variety of outputs to

involved. In addition, news of the event was spread by word-of-mouth

local and visiting audiences. The occasion was the second Household

and subsequently various people contacted us with proposals and

Festival, an annual event that encourages visitors to renegotiate the

ideas; many also offered spare rooms or even entire houses. Those

way in which they view and interact with contemporary art.

that joined in last minute, though too late to be included in the

Household Festival caters to a community of practitioners keen to

printed programme, were nonetheless welcomed into the fold.

invite new audiences to view contemporary work produced in

Work made for Household Festival 2013 included exhibitions,

domestic spaces, unhindered by the demands and restraints of the

dance, music, theatre, dinners, workshops, performances, talks,

conventional gallery and institutional modus operandi.

demonstrations, poetry, screenings, tours and interventions. To create

The idea for this festival crept up gradually, covertly and

a cohesive, easily negotiated event, we provided recognisable and

organically through kitchen-table conversations, as projects like this

consistent branding to unite the myriad projects that were shown

so often do. Household Collective, which comprises Sighle

during the festival.

Bhreathnach-Cashell, Eoin Dara, Ciara Hickey, Kim McAleese and

This year’s festival hosted some beautiful, serendipitous

myself (and in organising the festival Ruaidhri Lennon, Tom Hughes

moments. Maeve McGreevy’s outdoor dance performance,

and Faye Hobson), shared the belief that somehow the timing for this

accompanied by Tom Hughes on cello, was scheduled to take place

event seemed propitious. South Belfast is increasingly recognised as

on Friday evening at the Ormeau Park Bowling Green but was

an area defined by its thriving, welcoming and dynamic resident

threatened by a bout of rain. This didn’t keep the audience and

cultural community. However, other than at Satis House (an

Bowling Club members at bay, however, as they stood quietly under

exhibition space Eoin and Kim run in their home), there are no

the dripping trees and watched McGreevy, soaking wet and covered

contemporary gallery spaces around the Ormeau Road in which

in grass, perform a delicate, poignant, moving piece that was somehow

these practitioners feel they can exhibit or meet.

complemented by the still sadness of the precipitation.

The necessity to organise an event that showcased the

On Saturday night, Marty Carter and members of the Lawrence

multifaceted work of artists living in South Belfast – while connecting

Street Workshop brought their own brand of anarchic activism to the

and highlighting these pre-existing, creative domestic ‘hubs’ – led to

front of the Ormeau Park gates. In plain view of the Ormeau Road’s

the inaugural Household Festival 2012 and later Household Festival

steady flow of weekend taxis and buses, they quickly constructed the

2013. Artists’ houses became makeshift venues and urban public

façade of a makeshift house. The propped-up wallpapered set walls

spaces were temporarily transformed into open platforms.

made it look three-dimensional from the outside; inside it was lit and

Using domestic spaces as exhibition venues is certainly not a

animated by a DJ and a large audience. Carter wanted to make the

new concept in Belfast. Over the years, artists and curators have

entrance to the park literally feel like an ‘open house’ and a shared

opened up their homes for projects such as residence and Delawab

space. In particular, this work offered a sense of ownership to

(www.delawab.wordpress.com) and organisations such as Catalyst

members of the Ormeau Road community living on ‘the other side of

originated from home-based projects. To the general population,

the bridge’, a historically working class area.

of green space and trees in the city, and how this can affect inner city neighbourhoods and their perceived ‘value’. Ray Cashell, Chair of Shelter NI, discussed housing issues and tenants’ rights in rented property. Lynne McMordie and fellow staff members, as well as service users from the Welcome Organisation, a charity addressing the needs of people who are homeless or sleeping rough in the city, spoke about their experiences of homelessness, makeshift housing and what it means to be without the security of a home. A discussion between Eugenie Dolberg – a curator and photojournalist who, as part of the project ‘Open Shutters Iraq’, lived and worked with a group of Iraqi women for three months – and Belfast Exposed Director Pauline Hadaway concluded the programme of talks. Their conversation focused on private and public space, and how ‘the private’ and ‘the public’ are jeopardised in both Middle-Eastern and Western society.

The Household team aimed to lightly curate, and predominantly just facilitate and support each proposed project. We were very aware that, to ensure the success of the festival, we should not and could not attempt to intervene too much with what participants decided to do in their homes; we should simply trust that they would deliver what was agreed. Participants, in turn, had to trust both the organisers and the visitors. Thus, each project retained its autonomy, and no one lost a sense of personal ownership. In fact, the festival only works because common ownership, trust and responsibility had to be shared equally between participants and organisers.

As is nearly always the case, funding is tight if not non-existent for events such as this. However, this year Household Festival partnered with PS2, the innovative city-centre gallery that constantly pushes boundaries, and was consequently supported by some funding through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland’s Small Grants programme. With this funding, and thanks to additional fundraising and donations, we were able to print programmes and signage, allocate a modest materials budget to each venue and supply visitors and our dedicated team of volunteers with subsistence. Private sponsorship and in-kind support meant we could provide hospitality at openings and use a number of venues for after-hours activities.

In Belfast, projects are often encouraged to be ‘community’ orientated. What the word ‘community’ really signifies in the context of a city like Belfast is heavily debated – it remains a complicated, sometimes difficult subject. However loaded the word ‘community’ is, we do consider the festival to have been ‘communityled’: an event created by a group of people living in an area that they can respond and relate to – and react against – by creating contemporary works accessible to a large, and not just exclusively ‘art’, audience. Household Festival is a project that could never have happened without the enthusiasm, hard work and generosity of all of those involved.

however, domestic spaces remain largely secretive and private, even

Other examples of events that used outdoor spaces as venues,

Alissa Kleist

though the domestic sphere is one everyone is acutely familiar with.

include: the various architectural, poetic, storytelling and foraging

www.householdbelfast.co.uk

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

Critique Supplement Edition 14

November – December 2013

Sculpture in Context National Botanic Gardens, Glasnevin 5 September – 18 October 2013 Stationed in the verdant surroundings of the National Botanic Gardens, ‘Sculpture in Context’ is an annual open submission exhibition drawing entrants from Ireland and abroad, with some Irish graduate artists also invited to participate. This year there are over 150 artists taking part, the majority working in traditional media including stone, plaster, glass, metal and wood, and drawn from a large pool of both established and less wellknown artists.

Installed throughout the 50 acres of gardens, greenhouses and the Visitor Centre Gallery, this is the largest outdoor sculpture exhibition in the

Evelina Wojtowicz, Nothing Softer Than Water, ceramic

Claire Halpin and Madeline Hellier, Fordlândia, 2013, mixed media

Mags O’Dea, Tree Dressings, blown glass

country, though there is little in the way of a uniting thread to this sprawling array of works.

Many pieces draw on the natural world, with the female form garnering predictable focus, and many offer visual puns relating to their placement.

Nevertheless, throughout the gardens one can experience the anticipation of discovery, unearthing works that are enhanced by and enhance their context. Pieces like the metal blooms of Lynda Christian’s Untitled clamber gloriously over sun-warmed walls. While Celia Moore’s The What-Not’s Dream, a single (found object) drawer, reveals itself between branches, inviting the curious to open it if they dare.

The works displayed outdoors and in the greenhouses are most successful in addressing the idea of context; there is a relationship between the works and the habitat in which they are installed.

For example, the delicate porcelain feathers of Karolina Grudniewska’s A Thousand Feathers drift from beneath the branches of its host tree like falling blossom, while Con Gent’s Revealing, a block of cedar wood formed into vertical curves,

echoes the same undulating form as the Caucasian Zelkova tree it is positioned next to.

Another tree provides the installation space for Mag O’Dea’s Tree Dressings, where her blown glass balloons bubble lazily out of the cracks and fissures of the ancient gnarled yew like escaping sap, part of the tree itself.

The celebrated Victorian Great Palm House offers an opportune setting for Claire Halpin and Madeline Hellier’s Fordlândia, a mixed media installation that reimagines the town Henry Ford built in the Amazon rainforest in the 1920s in a bid to establish a cheaper source of rubber for the tyres needed by his burgeoning automotive empire. The tiny scale model rests under the Palm House’s imported rubber trees, also displaced from their original habitat into an exotic and hostile environment.

Ford’s hubristic vision of an efficient and productive model town was doomed even at its inception, with his plans to forbid alcohol and women foiled by the building of bars and brothels beyond the settlement’s boundary, and his decision to put engineers, rather than botanists, in charge of establishing his rubber plantation. The enterprise ended in rioting within a year. This reimagined Fordlândia, if left in place, may not endure violence, but like its interloper namesake, will eventually be reclaimed by the jungle.

In the arid confines of the Cactus and Succulent House, the glossy metal capsules of Jesse Gunther’s Desert Ophidians probe the air, for all the world like Star Wars pod racers navigating the pebbled landscape, while the frozen lace form of Jane Groves’ Rain Cloud hovers like precipitation in the damp Curvilinear Glasshouse.

Other pieces are less in tune with their surroundings, their presence occasionally jarring.

Indoors, the Visitor Centre Gallery is a repository for fragile or non-weatherproof objects, offering a jumble of works, wall-mounted and on plinths.

This is a great shame for Evelina Wojtowic’s Nothing Softer Than Water, a diorama of crisp ceramic waves peaking in a central crescendo, which is placed in a corner preventing the viewer from wandering freely around it. Lack of space also restricts comfortable viewing of Tom Dalton’s Angle of Repose, a structure with a mobile wheel driven by a built-in weight, which for now is locked in place, restricting the scope of the work.

The sheer number of works on view at Sculpture in Context is a problem for viewers, as it must have been for the curators. Showing fewer pieces could have more effectively illustrated the breadth of work submitted while allowing for more comfortable and in-depth contemplation.

In terms of exhibition making, the overall feeling with ‘Sculpture in Context’ is of a place being found for work, rather than a sensitivity to the idea of work and context emerging together. To paraphrase Dorothee Richter, How are we to determine meaning from this staging, when it appears to be the result of happy accident when successful, and a lack of reflexivity when not? 1 Perhaps this is a question to propose to future iterations of ‘Context’, when we might see its further development into a robust platform for Irish sculpture as well as an opportunity to see myriad works in the context of this engaging setting.

Anne Mullee is a Dublin-based writer and curator. She is currently based at The LAB gallery where she is a freelance curatorial assistant and gallery coordinator.

Notes 1. D Richter, A Brief Outline of the History of Exhibition Making, on www.curating.org, Thinking About Exhibitions

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet CRiTiQUe SUppleMeNT

November – December 2013

'Death Drive' Vanessa Donoso Lopez, Stine Marie Jacobsen, Maximilian Le Cain, Siobhan McGibbon galway Arts Centre 7 September – 5 October

installation view of Siobhan Mcgibbon, What's between our legs ain't no bodies business but ours and Stine Marie Jacobsen, It’s less an edit afterwards if you edit while you shoot, image by Aisling Bradley

developed in Beyond the Pleasure Principle, Sigmund Freud’s contested Theory of Death Drives posits instincts that strive towards a zero-point of tension; opposed to the life instincts, they yearn to bring the living back to an inorganic state. For the exhibition ‘Death Drive’ at Galway Arts Centre, four artists were invited to consider manifestations of the death instincts in their own work; whether through childhood play, recurring dreams or obsessive re-enactment of traumatic memories.

Seven sculptures by Siobhán McGibbon, dispersed throughout the gallery, punctuate the exhibition. The first artworks the visitor encounters are Parapagus and Omphalo-Ischiopagus Omphalo-Ischiopagus, two small skeletons made from human toenails and fingernails. Craniopagus twin headband headband, in the next room, is a double headband-like form, covered in McGibbon’s trademark thin layer of wax sprouting a growth of human hair. The titles of these works are the medical terms for the different conditions of conjoined twins.

If her use of human residue has shifted from previous combinations with chairs and car parts to the medical grotesque, her exquisite workmanship continues to engender a distinctive mix of fascination and repulsion. The Freudian focus of the exhibition on inorganic states draws the viewer’s attention towards the peculiarity of those parts of our body that evade organic decomposition and are even said to keep growing some time after death. Like bones and teeth, they are the stable mineral part of us that we will leave behind.

Upstairs, an assemblage of second hand furniture and low hanging lights serve as a display setting for Vanessa Donoso Lopez’s playful scenography of craftily mended found objects.

Doily flowers, mobiles of tiny paper boats, flags, pinwheels, handmade dolls, spools, feathers, needles, parts of clock mechanisms and various other things are animated with a whirring and clicking simulacrum of life created by electric fans, engines and magnets. With names like A nervous punch of flags interfering with a chasing or The sunflower project revised revised, each little arrangement invites further contemplation of these repeated acts of collating. The colorful epiphany of time captures the overall atmosphere best: a clock with its second hand slowed down by an adornment of colourful threads.

Three of Maximilian Le Cain’s films are presented in the exhibition. Point of Departure (2007) is a beautifully shot black and white HDV film of an elderly woman (Anna Manahan) in a retirement home. The film works through cuts and repetitions to suggest her confusion between her desire to

dress up and go out and her constrained reality.

Background (2011) and Areas of Sympathy (2013) push the logic of cuts and edits further in freely juxtaposing 16 mm film, Super 8, HDV and VHS footage. If there are elements of narrative woven into the fabric of images, they do not foreclose our reading of the film, and suggest multiple associations. The mix of elements in Area of Sympathy gives it the final texture of an old VHS, a noisy low contrast medium that breaks down the tension between the black and the white into a greyness that recalls the sandbox experiment described by Robert Smithson to prove the entropic irreversibility of time, in his 1967 essay A Tour of the Monuments of Passaic, New Jersey.

Stine Marie Jacobsen’s wall text printed on vinyl is a sober counterpart to the other works’ sensuousness. In unadorned grey lettering, It’s less an edit afterwards if you edit while you shoot demonstrates Jacobsen’s interest in the verbal re-enactment of visual memories and what this says about our relationship with images. She questions the identification of memory with film, describing a short scene in cinematic terms – a screaming Danish sculptor running towards a river and stepping into it. Unlike with film, we are free to construct this verbally described scene whichever way we want.

The exhibition highlights the best and worst features of the Galway Art Centre’s Georgian premises. The middle room on the first floor, with its elegant fireplace and wooden panelling, enhances the classically smooth forms of McGibbon’s What’s between our legs aint no bodies business but ours. In the adjacent front room, the tall interior window shutters darken the space just enough to complete the impression of a forgotten cabinet of curiosities. Less felicitous is the monstrous electric heater and the none-too-pristine walls of the back room, which jar with the delicate growth of Epidermodysplasia verruciformis (tree man) or the crisp cinematography of Point of Departure.

If they often sin by over-theorising, curatorial propositions can nonetheless offer alternative ways of thinking about an artist’s work and enrich our appreciation. Freud may well have first developed the Death Drives theory as a counterpart to the Pleasure Principle, but there was still plenty of pleasure on offer in this exhibition.

'Alphabet' West Cork Arts Centre 21 September – 9 November 2013 as a research exercise, I asked a child, an adult and an artist to recite the alphabet, allotting each letter a word that begins with that letter. I implored them not to think about it too much, to simply say the first thing that popped into their heads. As expected, the child came up with A is for apple, D is for dog, H is for house and so forth. The adult’s words were mostly the same but with a general slant toward more weighty concerns; the cat was replaced by a car, the orange by an oven and the monkey by money. The artist allotted his letters the most unpredictable words, but cheated by thinking too much. He came up with J is for juggernaut, P is for porcupine and, after a brain-racking pause, he conceded X would have to be xylophone.

For the exhibition ‘Alphabet’, 26 artists from Cork Printmakers were issued with a letter and invited to make an artwork in response to it. They were encouraged to “investigate what a specifically Irish alphabet should look like” and “to take on cultural and economic challenges that are relevant to contemporary Ireland”.

I was surprised to find only one print based on the Early Medieval Ogham alphabet. It came at the very beginning: Zoe Dalton’s A for Alpha. It’s less surprising that several of the artists’ instinctive reactions to the mention of ‘contemporary Ireland’ was one of discontent, despair, even fury. In the exhibition literature, Valerie Gleeson described her B for Burst as a “true reflection of the current state of the Irish economy”. Her letter broke through its clear lines and exploded into a splattered mess.

Claire Nagle chose the title Nama for her etching to represent N, and Shane O’Driscoll’s Z for To the Future depicted a tiger’s regal face with two lines of text printed in Irish below. The slogan translates as ‘I’m only sleeping, strength will come into me again’.

Other pieces were less forthright but equally disgruntled. Marianne Keating’s W for Class War was a doctored image of the Dublin Metropolitan Police charging a rally that took place in the aftermath of the 1913 lockout. Sean Hanrahan’s I for Keep your homes, pay no debt makes reference to the days of Daniel O’Connell and the Irish Land League.

Both pieces were rooted in the past yet relevant to the current climate of social unrest.

Aspects of the local were present in Paul Le Roque’s F for Forde Forde, which paid tribute to Henry Ford’s link with Ballinascarthy and the tractor factory in Cork city in the 1920s. Sylvia Taylor’s E for Evening Echo was a gorgeously detailed relief on

Japanese paper. In front of a wall covered with insects, a badger peruses an animal-oriented edition of the Cork newspaper. Illustrative in style, it bore resemblance to a picture in a children’s book, which was especially apt in the context of the exhibition.

For me, the most interesting artworks were those that took the alphabet’s indelible association with childhood into consideration. This was done darkly in the case of Aisling Dolan’s S for Precious Child and Heike Heilig’s P for P˙ca, both of which made subtle reference to child abuse. A p˙ca is ‘a creature of Celtic folklore that can assume a variety of forms’ and there was something immensely unsettling about this definition coupled with Heilig’s image of a ghostly figure lingering in a gloomy room. Peter McMorris took a lighter approach in Each to their own H H, which cleverly explored classroom politics by underlining the difference between the spelling of the letter H as taught by Protestant and Catholic schools, ‘aitch’ and ‘haitch’, respectively.

Several artworks incorporated some element of fauna or flora, and it was heartening to find that the suggestion of contemporary Ireland still gives rise to associations with the splendour of the natural world.

Aoife Layton’s masterfully executed mezzotint U for Ulchabhin depicted a native barn owl with uplifted wings framed by a U-shaped window, while Tom Doig’s D for Drizzle comprised an assembly of wellwatered flowers bloom beneath gathering rain clouds. Shirley Fitzpatrick’s K is for Knowing celebrated our strong mythological connection with nature as well as emphasising the “urgent need for trees to be planted in Ireland” and Georgina Sutton’s etching for X gracefully shunned the xylophone.

Axil (latin axilla) depicted an unfolding bud in a simple yet striking symbol of restitution.

Only two artists chose to focus solely on the form of their letter. May Holland’s M shed its amenable curves in favour of bold red and black blocks. Eileen Kennedy’s V was pared back to an inverted heap of parallel lines. Both were eyecatching and gratifyingly uncomplicated, yet overall the exhibition was more interesting for its subtext than for its forms. Each artist eschewed the first thing to pop into their heads and rummaged about a bit, exactly as artists should. The finished prints came together into an alphabet that represents contemporary Ireland in its timely spirit of restiveness.

Sara Baume is a writer based in East Cork

eileen Kennedy, V V, 2010, hard ground etching and aquatint

Michaële Cutaya is a writer and co-editor of Fugitive Papers. She lives in Galway.

Valerie gleason, B is for Burst Burst, 2013

Sylvia Taylor, E For Evening Echo, 2013

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet CriTique SupplemeNT

November – December 2013

Cora Cummins 'The Black Rose, The Green Pool and The Blue Sky' Visual, Carlow 05 October – 05 January

Cora Cummins, Pool, HD video, 2013

In her book The Artificial Kingdom, the writer Celeste Olaquiaga borrows the metaphor of dust to describe the rundown state of dreams in modernity. This exhibition by Cora Cummins, ‘The Black Rose, The Green Pool and The Blue Sky’, employs the imagery of the remnants of private leisure spaces. Like Olaquiaga, she is drawn towards the striations in our minds and the landscape that this accumulation of ‘dust’ can effect.

Pastoral sounds are emitted in waves from two video works in this show, enhancing the sense that these key artworks are quietly reveling in the insistent and potentially overpowering effects of unhindered nature. The camera work in both video pieces is patient and observant. The central focus in the larger of the two video projections, Pool Pool, concerns a geometrically shaped, aging, outdoor swimming pool.

In fixed-camera positions, the video piece very slowly circumnavigates this formerly grand space.

The cut-stone paving surrounding the pool has been forced upwards by the swelling ground beneath; moss and lichen have long established themselves along the inside wall of the pool. Objects designed to aid human use, such as handrails and a diving board, are encroached upon by nature and seem increasingly stranded and obsolete.

The Fold is an occasional and experimental publication that Cora Cummins co-founded. Issue 8 has been published to form a part of this exhibition.

In this sensitively designed issue, we are introduced to eight tangentially connected stories, which relate back to the environs depicted in the works on display. The selection of stories contain an energetic fluidity, moving from a personal family anecdote to macrocosmic and lyrical descriptions by the writer Rebecca Solnit of the colour blue in the earth's atmosphere. In a story entitled The Green Pool Pool, we learn that Cummins' grandfather told her as a child about a bed of rare black roses which were removed from an area in this local estate to make way for a swimming pool. While Issue 8 of The Fold stands alone as a beguiling and idiosyncratic art object, it also functions by vectoring potential 'meanings' towards other works on display.

The video piece Rose is projected onto a wall adjacent to the Pool projection. Much like Pool, Rose displays an intense and steady concentration, concerning itself entirely with the exploration of a single rose plant. The fixed-camera angles in Pool mirror the geometric human-made forms which populate the work and contrast with the more intimate, hand-held approach at work in Rose. Here the camera weaves and winds in amongst the gnarling tendrils of the rose bush, the angle of the camera mostly positioned upwards, as though mirroring the heliotropic growth-instinct of the plant.

Cora Cummins Walled Garden 2013. etching and aquatint

The content and form of these two video works play in subtle and intelligent ways with each other.

Aside from the easily identifiable connection between the story of the artist’s grandfather and the pool and rose at the centre of the video works, the other contributions to The Fold criss-cross the videos in oblique ways, drawing attention to the stratified layers of dust which both enrich and challenge our understanding of the landscape and human interventions into it.

Four of the eleven etchings on display in this exhibition depict various types of private gardens.

Unlike other works in the show, these images appear entirely removed from their wider landscape. In the print The Walled Garden, for example, the space outside the garden is represented by blankness. Such images lack the tension, or untidiness that this breach brings to bear upon the works. This series of prints seems more cautious than others and as a result they lack a sense of urgency.

The highly personalised and intimate potential of printmaking techniques are used effectively in four different etched interpretations of the swimming pool – present as a subject in both The Fold and Pool Pool. Here, multiple depictions of the same subject underline the sense that our understanding of a place or state of being is ever-shifting, depending on the stories that accumulate around it, or the level of sensitivity we may have to more enigmatic forces such as the changing light reflected in still water.

This exhibition weaves a quiet spell, in which slow but powerful forces have prised open and found fissures in the walls of these private spaces.

The dust settling around these particular aging modernist dreams is nuanced and worth sifting through. Ruins can illicit a sublime and melancholic outlook, yet the title of this show suggests that they can also trigger a visionary perspective, whereby stories have the potential to eclipse their concrete sources and spin out in all sorts of wild and independent ways.

'False Memory Syndrome' Micheal Boran, Sabina McMahon, Sarah Pierce, Alan Phelan Temple Bar Gallery, Dublin 5 – 26 September 2013 In September 2013, Temple Bar Gallery + Studios marked three decades of prominence in Dublin’s designated cultural quarter. The ground floor gallery is an accessible exhibition space, open to the busy street through its entirely glazed south facing façade.

Four artists were invited to “imagine alternative histories” for TBG+S in response to their archives, with the results veiling the institution's literal and metaphorical ‘transparency’ in a number of complex scenarios.1 50 was a very mixed-media installation by Alan Phelan. It comprised a sequence of tableauxs, consuming a large area of the exhibition space. 50 was the number of energetically recycled motifs and in some cases original objects from the loosely archived remnants of a series of fund-raising exhibitions called ‘Multiples’.2 Wittily compiled and cross-referenced, these physical histories, arranged in composites and layers, offered potentially endless hours of archeological fun. Phlean's prject was more generous than irreverent, and extended to the participation of others. Sarah Doherty, a recent graduate from DIT, contributed Found (2013), a soap carving that incidentally pointed backwards to an earlier soap piece by Jeanette Doyle. In reconsidering a lavender-infused eye-pillow by Sarah Pierce, the artist’s mother, Harriet Phelan, covered a black eye mask with hundreds of tiny shells.

Michael Boran’s set of black and white photographs, Far and Away, depicted wagons parked along cobbled streets, and might have come from the National Photographic Archive just up the road in Meeting House Square. Dusted off images of old Temple Bar perhaps? A humdrum heritage before the cultural circus came to town? Then you notice the anachronisms, suspiciously modern-looking crash barriers, passers-by decked out in modern gear.

In fact the photographs were taken in 1991 when Temple Bar was dressed up as a film-set to resemble Boston in the 1890s. Printed here for the first time, the photographs embody their own history; the gap of 22 years between the instance of capture and eventual release is just one aspect of their peculiarly time-warping effect. In an area now synonymous with the creative interpretation of provenance, Boran’s archive brought to light a coalescence of the real and the fabricated, the before then, the then, and the now.

The real and the fabricated achieved a dry synthesis in A Temple, A Bar, An Excavation and An Elephant Bone Bone, by Sabina MacMahon. The artist cornered off an area of the gallery to display artifacts unearthed during a 1993 excavation of the ground directly beneath the gallery space. A miscellany of objects arranged in back-to-back vitrines was clearly labeled and catalogued. Number 17, a ‘Fragment of

terracotta’, number 16, an ‘Earthenware pot’.

Accompanying descriptions varied from the fulsome to the pithy; the ornately decorated ‘Plate’ had a detailed back-story, while a neighboring lump of matter was simply, ‘Brick’. The style of MacMahon’s presentation rang true, but tales of immolated elephants were less easy to swallow. This dichotomy of truth and fiction was exemplified by the cohabitation of the unlikely ‘Elephant Femur’ with the more prosaic ‘Potato’. Boiled, chipped or fried, the humble potato reminds us of the potential within the ostensibly mundane. An elephant could burn to death on Essex Street, proving that days, like the spud, are protean.

Sarah Pierce presented a video recording of a debate, Artist or Superartist?, hosted by the Temple Bar Gallery in 1998. Donning headphones in time to hear Campbell Bruce say, “The creative act is something that emerges, it is not something that is pre-ordained by words”, I found myself nodding along with the audience. In a debate fixated on language and its determining role in artistic opportunity, no one was cutting words any slack. 15 years later, with art practices increasingly under the aegis of the PhD, I wondered if words had eventually got the upper hand?

An opening night performance saw Pierce sitting before the monitor repeating the words of the participants.3 Her practice tends to flatten the temporal spaces between creative events and these overlaps, however precisely layered, benefit from unpredictable slippages. Repetition creates a space, not unlike the one between the shooting and printing of Boran’s photographs (or the spaces between truth and fiction, originality and copy, in the works of MacMahon and Phelan) for a third memory to emerge.4 This is less a false memory than a new register, a register that sits between the first instance and its reiteration. Recovering a multi-layered past, the exhibition, smartly curated by Rayne Booth, found lots of new spaces to look at.

John Graham is an artist based in Dublin. notes 1. Gallery press release 2.‘multiples’ (1998 – 2003) attempted to make art collecting more accessible while raising funds for TBG+S’. more than 150 artists took part.

3. i didn’t witness the performance. i’m told it was uncanny, weird, compelling.

4. pierre Huyghe’s Third Memory (1999) is perhaps the best-known iteration of this idea.

Sabina macmahon, A Temple, A Bar, An Excavation and An Elephant Bone

Sarah Lincoln is an artist based in Waterford. installation view 'False memory Syndrome' TBG+S (forground to background. left to right) works by Sarah pierce, Alan phelan and micheal Boran.

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet Critique Supplement

November – December 2013

'Labour and Lockout ...'

Limerick City Gallery of Art 9 August – 1 October 2013

Megs Morley & Tom Flanagan, The Question of Ireland, 2013

‘Labour and Lockout ...’ formed part of a nationwide, labour-themed visual arts programme, devised in response to the centenary of the 1913 Lockout. The exhibition, augmented by the seminar ‘Land / Labour/ Capital’, reflected on contemporary labour conditions against the backdrop of the ‘precarity’ prevalent under late capitalism.

Deirdre O’Mahony’s installation T.U.R.F (Transitional Understanding of Rural Features) addressed the ban on turf cutting in certain Irish bogs designated under the EU Habitats Directive. A turf stack installed in the middle of LCGA’s large permanent collection room provided a sculptural focal point and reminder of the material subject in hand. Newspaper clippings, photographic documentation and reading material attested to a bitter standoff. O’Mahony’s documentary film portrayed turf cutting as a self-sufficient, irreplaceable way of life, and alluded to the wider social implications of its loss, beyond the immediate impact on rural communities. Further illustrating the relationship between ‘Irishness’ and the land – as a site of exile, famine and political conflict – O’Mahony included a selection of nineteenth and twentieth century Irish landscape paintings drawn from LCGA’s collection.

Within this frame of reference, Vivienne Dick’s 16mm colour film Rothach (1985) presented a slow horizontal-pan across a vast rural landscape.

Amongst the occasional activity depicted in this space, a child’s fiddle playing gradually morphs into screechy b-movie drones, suggestive of impending doom. An acknowledgement of the underlying tensions of mid 1980s Ireland – Irish nationalism versus a desire to embrace European economic modernity – proved pivotal in understanding the wider context of this exhibition, with Rothach providing a psycho-geographic map from which all of the other artworks could plot their co-ordinates.

Anthony Haughey’s DISPUTE (1913 / 2013) documented the 272-day strike by workers of Lagan Brick Factory in Cavan, which closed in 2011 due to the collapse of the construction sector. Although redundancy payments were eventually awarded, the workers’ names and years of service, displayed in horizontal uniformity across the gallery wall, attested to a greater communal loss concealed beneath their modest victory. Haughey displayed some of the last red bricks produced at the factory, inscribed with optimistic words such as ‘justice’, ‘equality’, ‘trust’.

Post-industrial social landscapes were further explored in Sean Lynch’s DeLorean Progress Report, comprising archival material and photographs, as well as cables and car parts strewn across the gallery floor, with a small portable TV perched on an upturned log. This was the latest incarnation of Lynch’s ongoing inquiry, which records the aftermath of the former DeLorean car factory in Belfast, unearthing the financial paper trail, and the whereabouts of original fabrication tools and surviving DeLorean automobiles. Seamus Farrell’s

Agri-culture (2013) also utilised auto-parts, presenting the windscreen of a tractor, which had pulled a caravan to Ireland from the Netherlands over 20 years ago. Farrell engraved the windscreen glass with a harp and an Irish passport, memorialising a seemingly borderless Europe. Darek Fortas’s Coal Story (2011) traced the development of the Workers’ Solidarity movement in Poland. Portraits of miners and photo-documentation of incidental objects found at the mine sites, express the realities of heavy industry in human terms.

Deirdre Power explored the ways in which people co-exist in Seduction of Place (2013), considering visibility in public spaces; while The Struggle Against Ourselves (2011) by Jesse Jones focused on representations of the body in film, identifying parallels between Hollywood dance spectacles and the constructivist choreography of Vsevolod Meyerhold. Mark Curran’s dimly lit installation The Normalisation of Deviance comprised a stack of printed A4 sheets, accompanied by an unexpectedly soothing sound composition, algorithmically derived from the number of times Michael Noonan has used the words ‘market’ or ‘markets’ in his public speeches since taking office. As a monument to capitalist abstraction, Curran’s artwork reveals economic forces in every facet of life.

Megs Morley and Tom Flanagan’s film work The Question of Ireland (2013) considered the relevance of Marxist ideas in post-Celtic Tiger Ireland. Scripts were devised by prominent Irish figures and enacted across three sections. The first depicts an educated, middle-aged woman delivering a rant about the demise of the Irish Free State and modern-day negative associations of ‘solidarity’ with conspiracy and terrorism. An account of inner-city life under the current austerity regime is offered by a young Dublin woman, who speaks of ‘neglected places’ and the ‘dismantling of a generation’, calling on the viewer to actively envisage a fairer future. A red-faced gentleman, whose breathless, mocking, comedic delivery recalls a closing-time encounter at a bar, delivers the third act. Following his descriptions of a ‘class-war’ and the ‘gospel of permanent austerity’, the camera pans to an empty theatre auditorium.

Then the lights go out and we are left to wonder: Who is listening? Where are the citizens?

Cumulatively, the works in ‘Labour and Lockout…’ looked beyond current economic tunnel vision and long-standing hierarchical formations.

Instead, there was a strong emphasis on horizontal collectivity, and meaningful artistic engagement in social and political realities, bearing witness to existing, evolving and alternatives forms and conditions of labour. In the context of the backwardglancing nature of centenary commemorations, this task is as urgent as it is compelling.

Joanne Laws is an arts writer based in Leitrim, who has written for Art Monthly (UK), Art Papers (US), Cabinet (US) and Variant (UK).

Rachel Joynt RHA, Heads or Tails 1 (detail), 2013, Bronze, led light, Portland stone, 40 x 20 x 20 cm, Image courtesy of the artist.

RHA Winter Exhibitions Showing from 15 November – 20 December

FUTURES 13 Jenny Brady, Neil Carroll, Anita Delaney, Emma Donaldson, Eleanor Duffin, Tracy Hanna, Maggie Madden Rachel Joynt RHA, Sea-Change Tony O'Malley, Constructions Stephen Brandes, April 22nd – From the Last Travellogue of A. Sitzfleisch Admission free

GALLAGHER GALLERY / 15 Ely Place, Dublin 2 +353 1 661 2558 / info@rhagallery.ie www.royalhibernianacademy.ie

23 NOV - 21 DEC THE ARTISTS, STAFF AND BOARD OF RUA RED INVITE YOU TO JOIN US FOR THE PREVIEWS ON FRI 22 NOV, 6PM - 8PM

WINTER OPEN GALLERY 1

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GARRETT POWER GALLERY 2 RUA RED SOUTH DUBLIN ARTS CENTRE TALLAGHT DUBLIN 24

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OPENING HOURS MON - SAT 10AM - 6PM

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

23

Career Development

Considered, Stuttering Progress ELLA DE BURCA reflects on SOME of the GUIDING PRINCIPLES of her practice

Ella De Burca, Anemic Circles, The Emergency Pavilion, Venice Biennale, 2013, photo by Renato Ghiazza

Since 2011 (I obtained my BA in Visual Arts Practice from IADT in 2009, and then went straight on to do a two year Masters in Fine Art at NCAD) the directions my career has taken have developed organically. However, even as a young artist just starting my career, there are some common factors underpinning the development of my work and the decisionmaking processes that guide the trajectory of my practice.

In my opinion, one of the most important things for an artist – whatever stage of career they may be at – is ensuring that you have the best opportunities for creating work. Obviously some of the factors involved might be beyond your control, but the elements we can influence include our commitment to production / studio time; participation in a strong peer network; and ensuring you are situated in the right place to make your work ‘work’. Some of the key questions that spark and motivate my sculptural practice are focussed on ideas around ‘work ethic’.

Along with this, I have an ongoing curiosity – for which I am grateful – about the various situations I have found myself in, so far, while attempting to understand what a career as an artist might mean.

For example two upcoming projects of mine stem from on going discussions with a Russian curator, Katia Kruppenikova, concerning issues of labour and memory. The works in question are performance pieces that will happen simultaneously. One as part of ‘Playing Nature’ a special project of The 5th Moscow Biennale (19 Sept –20 Oct 2013); and the other at Vienna Art Fair (10 –13 Oct 2013.). Both these works are supported by Culture Ireland and Fingal County Council and there will be a book published next year that physically links the two works.

Over the last few years my interest in the subject of labour, particularly within a post Cold War context, has brought me to Estonia, Canada, Miami, Antwerp, Venice, Moscow and Vienna. However, I think it is important to state that I still consider my base to be Dublin, where a lot of my inspiration and influences are; and where the majority of my work is made.

My father was a Garda and my mother was a nurse. Their almost religious commitment to work ethic has inspired me greatly. Coming from that background it has taken me a long time to accept ‘thinking’ as a form production. I think the Irish psyche is sometimes typified as a little too eager to embrace a ‘get the job done’ attitude, which can have adverse effects on quality. In contrast, I like to think of my practice as something that stutters along, creating art via a work ethic of careful consideration and reflection.

In 2010 I was the joint recipient of Fingal County Council’s Amharc Fhine Gall Emerging Artist Award, along with fellow artist Aoibheann Greenan. This was an important moment as it established a strong relationship with my local county council, one that is still going strong.

Residencies are one of the most important and exciting opportunities available to young artists. My first overseas residency experience was at The Banff Centre, in Canada. I was one of around twenty participants in The Soiree Retreat: A Bit of a Chekhovian Situation, a gathering that took place at Banff from 12 September to 28 October 2011. This project was led

by Icelandic performance artist Ragnar Kjartansson, and comprised of performance evenings; poetry readings; and a frenzied concentration on the sharing of ideas.

Ella De Burca, White Flag (Irish), Dublin Contemporary, 2011, photo by Renato Ghiazza

Before arriving at Banff, I was awarded the Evelyn Wood Memorial Scholarship by The Banff Centre; and with Arts Council covering my travel costs, I felt very encouraged by the support I had received – and confident in my work. I think residencies offer a kind of adrenaline shot of inspiration for artists; and can also open up doors to new opportunities.

However, I have had interesting conversations with older artists who are critical of residencies for only catering to younger artists – it’s not always that easy for an artist to temporarily uproot their life in pursuit of creative rainbows.

At Banff I met Domingo Castillo, who invited me to have a show with his space in Miami. This is a nomadic artist-run project, that I would define as a kind of Seth Siegelaub influenced mutable gallery, that changes its physical form in response to the parameters of the artists needs 1. The project is entitled ‘Springbreak’ in autumn-winter, and ‘The End’ in spring-summer. At the time I wanted to take a ‘sculptural break’ from creating objects, and was interested in making an exhibition focused specifically on discussion and thinking.

Drawing influence from the situationist theories of the 1950s, the Spring Break ‘gallery’ facilitated my solo show – entitled ‘De Facto.’– by declaring the entire Miami cityscape as its premises. Everyday (except for Mondays) during February 2012, Castillo and I walked the same walk through the streets. We would start walking at 11am; and at 5pm the ‘gallery’ would close for the day as we walked to the nearest bus stop to go home. This meant we were walking on average of 25 km a day.

Over 70 spectators joined us in walking throughout the month, and there were endless discussions attempting to iron out conflicting opinions concerning documentation, objects and death. What I got out of this month devoted to peer discussion was a profound appreciation of the potential of durational, time-based work, and an on-going excitement and enthusiasm regarding the possibilities to be found in creative friendships.

In some ways my Miami project was the culmination of the Banff residency. The next project I embarked on worked in direct opposition to the socially extrovert nature of both these experiences. I was invited to live in an old lock keepers house on the edge of Antwerp for six months as part of AIR Antwerpen’s residency program (March – Sept 2012) 2. The invitation came when the director; Alan Quireyns contacted me after seeing my work White Flag (Irish) at Dublin Contemporary.

What I found excellent about this residency was the freedom it afforded me to think. As opposed to Banff, where you need to develop a proposal or plan before arrival, at AIR Antwerpen the emphasis is placed on spending time letting ideas develop naturally. Accommodation and a stipend are provided, as well as a bike to cycle into town. On reflection, AIR Antwerpen offered the quiet solitude that one usually only reads about in books like Mann’s The Magic Mountain.

There were numerous other international artists there, but one of my most memorable experiences of the residency was one ‘empty house occasion’ in August – when I went four whole days without talking to another person. I think isolation with your own thoughts like this, is an important experience that every artist should have. There’s a strange feeling in your throat the moment your voice box begins to work again.

Surrounded by canals and tall old walls, I spent six months in Antwerp reflecting on my art; reading Heidegger and trying to defy gravity by learning how to do a handstand. In September 2012 I had a solo show ‘Aviary Asterism,’ situated in a closed down mechanics warehouse, as the culmination of my labours at AIR Antwerpen (7 – 16 of Sept).

Belgium is a glorious place for art, there seems to be such a huge public appetite for experiencing visual culture. I remember hundreds of people at the Jimmie Durham opening on the rooftop of MUHKA; the summer opening at the Middleheim Park, where every inch of grass was packed with picnickers; and almost not getting into Leigh Ledare’s opening at Wiels because of such huge crowds. Etablissement d’En Face, Objectif and Komplot have exciting openings every month, and with La Loge, Bozar, Jan Mot and Motive gallery, you can be sure that there is always something to see and to go to.

It’s for this reason that I moved to Brussels, after my residency at AIR Antwerpen finished. Following the solitude of the lock-keepers house, I craved that metropolis feeling for a while, and the Belgian capital seemed to offer everything I needed. A foreign language to master; a job teaching English; a city centre apartment; a healthy network of artist friends and an endless stream of openings kept me occupied for the first few months.

Around the same time I had also been invited to participate in ‘The Emergency Pavilion,’ a collateral exhibition as part of The 55th Venice Biennale, curated by Jota Castro 3. My work for this show took form as a poem and a sculpture called Anemic Circles, which was originally shown in ‘Disavow,’ a group exhibition in The Joinery in 2011, curated

by Marysia Wieckiewicz Carroll and Enagh Farrelll 4. For this piece I was heavily dependent on my family in Ireland to create the work, as I had been away from Ireland for almost two years. There’s a funny conversation that happens when you ring your 80 year-old grandmother in Roscommon to ask her to go to the local scrap yard to enquire about tyre tubes for you – I think it’s one of the reasons why I make art.

But then, one day, something changed. During the process of making work for an upcoming show, I needed to observe fishermen and realised that there was nowhere in the world that this would be more possible than in my home country.

Setting up a base in a foreign city takes a lot of energy and there came a point when my work demanded more than half conversations in broken French. It may have been wonderful to live in the centre of Europe, but it didn’t feel relevant in regards to making good art. I think at a certain point it becomes necessary to re-evaluate and assess, to spend time taking stock, and then once again, Dublin was there.

Ella De Burca www.elladeburca.com Notes 1. Seth Siegelaub (born 1941, Bronx, New York - June 15, 2013, Basel, Switzerland) was an American-born art dealer, curator, author and researcher. He is best known for his innovative promotion of conceptual art in New York in the 1960s and 70s.

2. www.airantwerpen.be 3. www.emergencypavilion.org 4. www.thejoinery.org

24

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

VAI Membership activities

VAI Professional development

Show & Tell: Galway

Develop Yourself!

RICHARD FORREST REPORTS ON HIS EXPERIENCE OF THE VAI SHOW & TELL SESSION HELD AT 126 GALLERY, GALWAY (12 SEPTEMBER).

VERA MCEVOY, COLIN MARTIN AND MONICA DE BATH, SHARE THEIR VIEWS ABOUT THE ROLE OF TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT IN THEIR PRACTICES.

I recently invited a few artists who have taken part

critical perspective and practical knowledge that fed

in recent VAI Professional Development Training

and nourished both the studio side of things and

sessions to reflect on their motivations for taking up

career development. I’ve also found it interesting to

training and how professional development training

meet like-minded peers and share information and

has benefited their practice. These artists were also

experience.

invited to respond to a range of questions about how

I think a mixture of both formal and informal

they go about finding training and supports for their

paths for development and training is good – both

studio practice; whether formal or informal

can be supportive and encouraging. However formal

professional development suits them best; and what

paths can offer the opportunity to experience and

real or perceived barriers there might be to accessing

meet expertise that you might not ordinarily.

training.

http://www.colinmartinartist.com

Monica Flynn, VAI professional Development Officer

Monica de Bath As a mature artist, I do like the mix of early career and mature artists participating in VAI training

Richard Forrest, Interaction II, dimensions variable. 2013

Richard Forrest, Untitled (UV Cube), dimensions variable, 2013

This was my first time both visiting the 126 gallery and attending a VAI Show and Tell event, and I was looking forward to the chance to present in front of a new group of peers and the subsequent exchange.1 The other artists presenting were: Ceara Conway, Nuala Ní Fhlathúin, Ruby Wallis, Joyce Little, Tom Meskell and Una Spain.

I was both excited and apprehensive, as this presentation format is fast and informal – comprising a one-minute intro and ten slides shown only for thirty seconds each. I knew this would be a challenge. However, as I was third in line, I got some preparation time and a feel for the format. I started with a brief introduction, explaining that I had graduated from the Crawford College of Art in 2011, and for the last nine months have been based in Dublin, where I rent a space at Richmond Road Studios.

I showed documentation from two bodies of work. The first was artwork exhibited after college, in and around my first solo exhibition ‘Persistence of Vision’, which took place at The Joinery in 2011. My last five slides were from my second solo show, ‘Sensorium’, curated by Anna Crudge and held in Soma Contemporary, Waterford this July. The work from this show was the freshest, so I was most excited to talk about these pieces.

The first slide from ‘Sensorium’ depicted a light-based installation. This comprised a wire-frame cube form made from fluorescent tubes, hung from the centre of the ceiling of a darkened room. Images of platonic solids were printed directly on the walls

in UV inks. The cuboid light sculpture was timed to flicker on and off, in order to distort the viewer's spatial awareness of the environment and the objects and images within it.

The next slide showed three trained rats housed within a Perspex and steel structure. Over the period of four months before ‘Sensorium’, I trained the rats to use the electronically activated doors and a feeding system within the sculpture. This work re-appropriated a Pavlovian conditioning experiment, with the aim of guiding viewers to reflect upon notions of habitual and embodied actions. I explained that I saw this piece as a microcosm of the concerns I was exploring in the show.

I also showed documentation of a work from the exhibition that combined sculpture, body modification, photography and video. For this piece I paid a professional body modifier to implant a rare earth magnet in my finger. The implant seamlessly fuses with the nerves of the fingertip allowing the wielder to physically sense magnetic fields as the magnet vibrates when in the proximity of a magnetic field. In this way one can experience forces, which are normally intangible.

The other artists' presentations followed in quick succession and this was followed by an opportunity to talk with the attendees. I found the short time frames allotted to each artist allowed for a greater exchange with the audience and fellow presenters in the second half of this event, as the fatigue usually associated with delivering and sitting through longer talks was absent. While the brevity of the presentations did make it a real challenge, I doubt anyone was really stressed, as the atmosphere was very relaxed. I found this event to be fun and informative – I’d encourage artists to give it a go.

Richard Forrest www.richardforrest.info Note 1. The Show & Tell took place after 126 had hosted Tim Durham's VAI professional development workshop ‘Documenting Your Work’. The session, which was presented in in partnership with Crafts Council of Ireland, offered a methodical step-by-step guide to obtaining the best possible results when using either digital compact or SLR cameras. Due to popular demand further ‘Show and Tell’ events will be taking place across the county.

Vera McEvoy

sessions – as there is the opportunity to learn and

I always look for professional development training

swop information between people at different career

and other supports through the VAI e-bulletin or the

stages.

VAN. I try to do at least one training course each

In accessing training or developing my skills

autumn that is affordable and suited to my needs as

I’ve usually bartered with artist friends or peers for

a developing artist.

services and support – and there’s usually been a

As someone who returned to college to study

give and take in that. I’ve also taken up technical

fine art as a mature student, I sometimes feel that I

sessions at Fire Station Artists Studios – as well as a

have a lot of catch up to do to obtain an equal

master class with Susan MacWilliam.

standard with my fellow artists. But of course when

Taking part in VAI’s Peer Critique session with

you join a group of artists to do training, what you

Kati Kivinen during February was a super

often find is a mix of abilities, disciplines and styles.

opportunity for me to see what’s happening overseas

The most beneficial VAI training for me was

– as well as serving as a starting point for a

the practical session Writing your Artist Statement.

conversation with a curator whose interests are

The format suited my needs, we had a brief intro and

similar to my own. Also, meeting with artists like

then each of the participants set about writing a

Elaine Leader and Colin Martin and others at the

brief artist statement. We each presented the

session – basically just getting to check in with other

statement along with images of our work, receiving

artists – was a valuable experience.

feedback and questions from the tutor and the

As a member of Ground Up Artists collective I

group. It was really useful to receive feedback from a

know that Ennistymon Courthouse Gallery and

variety of artists at various stages of development as

Studios welcomes the access to training that

well as different disciplines.

partnership with VAI brings. One barrier that I’ve

In terms of formal and informal training a mix of both formats suit my practice and my style best.

observed is distance – traveling long distances to sessions can be difficult for rural artists.

Another VAI training session that was of value to me

I’ve noticed that there is a return to painting

was a Peer Critique and a Mentoring Session. We

again – perhaps as a ‘thinking space’ – and to mixed

met as a small group with two mentors, discussed

practices that incorporate painting. So I think it

and presented our work and met again some weeks

would be good to see support for an open-studio

later to receive further feedback having worked on

approach, where practitioners come together over a

specific goals or plans.

few days and get to meet repeatedly to focus on http://www.veramcevoy.com

studio practice around drawing and / or painting.

There is also an opportunity here to build links with

Colin Martin

Irish artists and those working in institutions abroad;

I have participated in professional development

as a means of opening international development

courses and groups with Visual Artist Ireland; Fire

opportunities and peer-to-peer networks. I think

Station Artists Studios; Royal Hibernian Academy

that mature practitioners would welcome the

and Temple Bar Gallery & Studios. I generally hear

opportunity, to engage in collective or small peer

of them through the VAI website or e-bulletin, other

group based skills exchanges with peers and

artists or social media. I also engage with peers by

curators in other countries – coordinated by VAI.

holding informal peer critiques and exchanges.

In particular, I would be interested in professional

I found the VAI Peer Critique session with

development opportunities, which pull together

curator Kati Kivinen, particularly valuable as an

specific contexts such as the environmental issues

opportunity to present recent and current projects

being played out in rural contexts.

to an experienced curator and peers and receive

http://guac.ie/portfolio/monica-de-bath/

critical feedback. It is a positive thing to do this with other artists – who are maybe encountering your work for the first time – as it allows you to evaluate how a critically minded audience would respond to your work.

I’ve had a tendency to concentrate on the studio practice side of things. I’ve participated in some masterclasses (Gerard Byrne, Stephen McKenna) and Curator workshops (Val Connor, Kati Kivinen, Padraig E Moore) and found they offered

the s of l i a Det t VAI l s late essiona t f e o m n e Pr elop mes ar v e D gram pro age 35 on p

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

VAI help desk

25 VAI Advocacy

Reasonable Expectations Café Culture WHAT ARTISTS should EXPECT FROM EXHIBITION AGREEMENTS. A Cautionary Tale Earlier this year, an artist was invited to exhibit at a regional art space. She was delighted to be able to show in her hometown, especially as she was producing a new body of work. Although she was provided with little information other than a loose indication of when the show would take place – eight months on – the artist agreed in principal to do the show and asked the gallery to send on an exhibition agreement.

Time passed and the artist made repeated requests for further details. Concern began to set in when it was revealed that the space was understaffed and had no dedicated gallery administrator – the person responsible for the exhibition programme also looked after venue hire, front of house, theatre and cinema programming.

Eventually, the artist was given a draft agreement, including details of insurance, some publicity information, the exact dates of the show, commission rates and a modest artist’s fee. No details were provided about the opening night, the security of the works, invigilation, sales opportunities, marketing or publicity.

Despite this, the artist was satisfied that she had something in writing, and proceeded to finish the works and begin negotiations on the details of the agreement. As the opening date drew near, the artist contacted the gallery and enquired about invitations and publicity and a few other details. Only at this point was she informed that the space doesn’t run opening events and doesn’t possess a budget for publicity because “the local population doesn’t come to gallery openings”. In addition, it became clear that the show would not be invigilated (thereby putting the security of her work at risk) and would only be on public view for a limited time; the space was utilised for yoga and pilates two days a week and closed at the weekends. Disappointed and deflated, the artist contacted the VAI Help Desk…

No Agreement – No Show Situations like this are not uncommon. This was just one recent example of the types of difficulties artists have reported to the Help Desk when comprehensive exhibition agreements are not in place In this particular case, VAI was compelled to advise the artist to cancel the show. There was no advantage to the artist in showing in this space – it offered next to zero opportunities for sales, exposure or publicity. Proceeding with the exhibition would have left the artist significantly out of pocket.

It should be noted that the VAI Help Desk maintains that it is unfair for galleries to take commission from sales, if it does very little or nothing to actually facilitate any opportunities to make sales via publicity or opening events. With regard to publicity, publicly funded spaces in particular have a responsibility to develop audiences and engage with the wider community.

Agreements Are Vital The period leading up to an exhibition can be an exciting time for an artist, but it can also be beset with practical problems. Therefore it is vital to put together a comprehensive agreement at the earliest possible state, in order to reduce any likelihood of major problems and misunderstandings arising.

Ideally, venues should already have standard set of terms in place, which can be tailored to suit particular projects. Typically, these can be incorporated into a letter of agreement or contract, which the artist should confirm their acceptance of.

Agreement Checklist Confirmation that the gallery agrees to mount the exhibition Duration and dates of the exhibition.

Number and description of works to be exhibited (so far as possible) including dimensions, media, framing and any other relevant details – these can be set out in an additional schedule to the initial letter or agreement.

Date for delivery of the works to the venue Information about the party responsible for transit arrangements, & insurance while in transit.

Responsibility for hanging / installation – and any special requirements of the artist.

Times and terms of access to the gallery by the artist, while the exhibition is being prepared.

Sale terms or other remuneration for the artist, with date of payment by the gallery.

Sales commission rate.

Details of artist fee and payments for facilitating talks / workshops (if applicable).

Arrangements for opening reception, including publicity.

Arrangements relating to exhibition catalogue, including permission of the artist for reproduction of artworks in the catalogue (if applicable).

Insurance of works by the gallery for the duration of the exhibition.

Security and invigilation arrangements Procedure in case of damage to work Responsibility for delivery of sold works to purchasers & for dismantling / return of unsold works to the artist, responsibility for carriage and insurance in transit.

A procedure for handling disputes – ideally by mediation.

Negotiation When presented with an exhibition agreement, the artist may find that not all matters are covered.

Artists should act immediately to settle these via negotiation and insist upon written confirmation so that a proper paper trail reflecting all matters that have been agreed is in place.

Payment Guidelines The VAI Help Desk recommends that artists and galleries factor in the newly launched Payment Guidelines for Visual Artists into exhibition agreements.

For the first time in Ireland, venues and artists can properly calculate equitable levels of payments, properly budget for their programmes and for the variety of work that professional artists undertake in not for profit spaces.

These guidelines, based on international best practice, for both organisations and artists – offer suggested fees for a wide variety of activities, such as: exhibiting in solo and group shows; commissioning new work; participating in festivals or events; installing work; production of work; facilitating talks and workshops; curating and more.

Full details can be accessed via the front page of the VAI website www.visualartists.ie Further Guidance The VAI Help Desk is happy to provide template exhibition agreements to artists and galleries on request – E: info@visualartists.ie / T: 01 672 9482 Niamh Looney Communication Officer , Visual Artists Ireland

VAI’S COMMON ROOM CAFÉ EVENT AT ORMSTON HOUSE, LIMERICK

On 4 October, Ormston House, Limerick hosted a VAI Common Room Café event at their beautiful premises on Patrick Street in the centre of Limerick City. The Common Room Café is an initiative of VAI’s Local Groups project, which brings artists together to network, share skills and knowledge; and to discuss issues of common interest and concern.

Operating under the Creative Limerick initiative, Ormston House delivers a programme of multidisciplinary exhibitions and events and is currently developing a series of research-based and archival projects. The concept for the Common Room Café came about following a meeting between VAI West of Ireland Representative Aideen Barry and Ormston House Artistic Director Mary Conlon.

VAI members, especially those in rural areas, have informed us that isolation from their peers and knowledge bases, coupled with a general lack of networking opportunities are major issues. But even in cities this can also be a problem – as evidenced by one artist who travelled all the way from Dublin to attend the Common Room Café in Limerick, because they wanted to find meet likeminded artists to collaborate with.

The Common Room Café has been devised by VAI as a ‘pop up’ venture that provides an informal space for artists to meet, network, socialise and address issues. The Cafés are co-ordinated by VAI in collaboration with local volunteers – VAI members or artist groups. Attendance is open to all those with an interest in the visual arts – artists, curators, writers etc.

The Limerick Common Room Café session addressed a range of issues, commencing with a presentation and explanation of the newly launched VAI Payment Guidelines for Professional Artists. The guidelines, which have been devised to enable venues and artists to properly calculate equitable levels of payments, were warmly welcomed by the group. Their importance was underlined by the fact that many of the artists attending the Café noted that thus far they had very little experience of receiving fees for their work.

The topic of economic survival dominated the discussion. Common issues for several attendees included difficulties encountered with the tax system and accessing unemployment benefit. A musician and a representative from the Limerick Writers' Centre also attended the Café and spoke of similar problems and how all creators should work together to address shared challenges and improve working conditions.

It was suggested that the Common Room Café could be a useful vehicle for such cross-disciplinary conversations and actions, and that the Cafés should become a regular fixture in Limerick, hosted in turn by various artist-led organisations. At the time of writing, Occupy Space have already kindly agreed to host another Common Café event in their new space, H-Q on Lower Cecil Street, in December.

The need for a register of vacant or ‘slack’ spaces in Limerick was discussed; according to a recent study by CBRE Ireland Research, Limerick has one of the highest unit vacancy rates in the country. It was agreed that a listing of register of empty buildings suitable for creative and cultural initiatives would be a very useful resource.

Some other ideas arising included the concept of Monday morning meetings for Limerick arts professionals – in order to share ideas and get energised for the week ahead. There was also some discussion regarding the Common Café format itself, with the suggestion that a facilitator / animateur structure be deployed, in order to ensure a positive dynamic for the sessions.

The next Common Room Café, hosted by Occupy Space, takes place on 11 December. It will be followed by a ‘Show & Tell’ event where artists are given the opportunity to present their work to an audience of peers in an informal and social setting.

A Common Room Café is currently being planned for a Northern Ireland venue – to take place before the end of the year. Details to be announced in the VAI e-bulletin. If you are interested in the local groups initiative or in hosting a Common Room Café, contact alex@ visualartists.ie Alex Davis, VAI Advocacy Programme Officer

Artist Led Spaces Directory On a related topic, an up-to-date directory of Artist-Led Spaces in Ireland has been recently added to the VAI website. The directory lists not-for-profit galleries, studios and dedicated art spaces that have been developed by artists.

It’s hoped that the directory will be a tool to aid collaboration and networking, to raise the profile of the spaces and to promote their importance to the visual arts sector. Please get in touch with alex@visualartists.ie to add your space to the directory.

26

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

Organisation profile

November – December 2013

Organisation profile

Food for the Soul

A PROFILE OF THE CRAFT & DESIGN COLLECTIVE, BELFAST The Craft & Design Collective is an independent The Craft & Design Collective co-operates with

Daphne Wright, Where Do Broken Hearts Go, 2000, Continuous tone photopolymer intaglio plates, tinfoil, glue, resin, woman's voice reading Country & Western songs, dimensions variable, Collection Irish Museum of Modern Art, Purchase, 2000. Installation view Luan Gallery, Athlone,2012. photo by Corin Bishop

Shane Cullen, Fragmens sur les Institutions Républicaines IV, 1993 – 1997, painted text, acyrlic on 96 styrofoam panels, 12 blocks of 8 panels, each block 251 x 480 x 6 cm, Collection Irish Museum of Modern Art, Purchase, 2000.

Installation view Luan Gallery, Athlone, 2012, photo by Corin Bishop

Luan Gallery, Athlone, photo by Ros Kavanagh

Championing Innovation

membership organisation formed in 1997 by artist / designer / makers for artist / designer / makers. With over 100 members, we are the largest craft network in Northern Ireland and have a considerable reputation and admirable track record for delivering a programme of activities of direct relevance to artist / designer / makers.

We are passionate about craft and dedicated to the promotion, representation, understanding and development of craft, applied art and design in Northern Ireland and beyond. Membership of the Craft & Design Collective is open to artist / designer / makers working in craft disciplines recognised by either the Crafts Council (UK) or the Crafts Council of Ireland.

What does the Craft & Design Collective do?

The Craft & Design Collective has a shop, gallery and exhibition area at Space CRAFT in Belfast The Craft & Design Collective has a website – www.craftanddesigncollective.com – that enables members to contribute individual listings The Craft & Design Collective organises events to facilitate sales, networking, social contact and the sharing of information, experiences, knowledge and resources amongst the membership and others The Craft & Design Collective makes representations and lobbies on behalf of artist / designer / makers

statutory bodies, local authorities, private and voluntary organisations whose objectives compliment those of the Craft & Design Collective

About Space CRAFT Space CRAFT is a shop, gallery and exhibition area located up the escalator at the the Fountain Centre, College Street, in the heart of Belfast City Centre. The venue presents a constantly changing programme of exhibitions that provides a feast for the eyes, food for the soul and a challenge to the intellect. Other services include specialist help and advice to anyone wishing to purchase, commission or collect craft, applied art and design. Space CRAFT is a non-profit taking social economy enterprise owned and managed by the Craft & Design Collective.

Space CRAFT has been devised as a focal point for the commissioning, exhibition, promotion and sale of Craft, Applied Art and Design to enable the purchase of work made by emerging and established artist / designer / makers.

The Craft & Design Collective is supported by the National Lottery through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and Belfast City Council.

Jan Irwin, Co-ordinator, Craft and Design Collective

A profile of athlone's luan gallery Luan Gallery, Athlone’s contemporary visual art gallery, was officially opened on 29 November 2012

by Jimmy Deenihan TD, Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. Luan Gallery is the first purposebuilt, municipal art gallery located in the midlands.

The aim of the new space, run by Athlone Art and Heritage Ltd, is to promote a dynamic contemporary visual art programme of both established and emerging artists.

Keith Williams Architects, whose other projects include the Wexford Opera House, the Novium Chichester Museum, and the Marlowe Theatre, designed the 575m sq gallery space. In July 2013 they received a prestigious architectural award for the best cultural building from the RIAI. The new, dedicated art space is located on a spectacular site overlooking the River Shannon, adjacent to the town’s historic bridge, Athlone Castle and the Catholic Church of St Peter and St Paul. The scheme adapts the town’s historic 1897 Father Mathew Temperance Hall into a contemporary gallery, adding a new wing with state-of-the-art audio-visual capabilities and a riverfront gallery space overlooking the Shannon.

The development of the Luan Gallery is part of a larger ‘cultural revival’ programme being implemented in the midlands town. Athlone Castle also re-opened in November as a state-of-the-art, multi-sensory visitor attraction following an extensive renovation project carried out by Event Communications, a London and Dublin based company that also developed the Belfast Titanic Visitor Experience and the Giant’s Causeway Visitor Centre. Athlone Art and Heritage Ltd. have also developed Abbey Road Artists’ Studios, supporting the professional development of local and visiting arts practitioners in a dedicated space.

Luan Gallery has enjoyed a diverse and vibrant visual arts programme to date, featuring works in a myriad of media from artists at various career stages, from the local region and beyond. Our inaugural

exhibition, entitled ‘Borrowed Memories’, featured works from the Irish Museum of Modern Art’s permanent collection as part of their national programme. The exhibition showcased works of acclaimed Irish and international artists. Following this, the gallery assumed a more regional focus, showcasing works by local and midlands based artists. Luan Gallery has collaborated with Graphic Studio Dublin in showing works of fine art print from their Visiting Artists Programme, and with the RDS, hosting the Student Art Awards travelling exhibition. In addition, we have shown work by contemporary Irish painter Sinéad Ní Mhaonaigh and will feature James Hanley, RHA in November. A presentation of ‘Visual Music’ also took place, and showcased works by a collection of national and international artists, designers and electro-acoustic composers. This project showcased the audio-visual potential of the space.

We attempts to bolster the exhibitions programme at Luan Gallery with an educational programme, which ensures that access to and engagement with the arts in a gallery context remains at the fore of operation. This education programme has been extremely successful to date and the gallery is fast becoming a social space in which lively discussion, workshops, classes, talks and events contribute readily to the social calendar in the town.

Luan Gallery caters primarily but not exclusively for the visual arts, with an emphasis on meeting local audiences’ needs in terms of art exhibitions and engagement. We feature both national and international projects, ensuring a varied and engaging programme is delivered to the people of Athlone.

Luan Gallery aims to champion innovative, challenging and engaging arts practice. The space is dedicated to progressing, strengthening and inspiring audience engagement, perception and appreciation of traditional and modern approaches to the arts.

Emilia Krysztofiak, Arts Administrator www.athloneartandheritage.ie

Garvan Traynor, Closed Circuitry, 2011, three sterling silver brooches, fabricated, pierced, filed and soldered, photo by Rory Moore

Catherine Keenan, Eye Candy, 2010, blown glass sculpture, using the colour application technique of cup overlay, sandblasted and lenses then carved into the surface, photo by Rory Moore

Rachel McKnight, White Twisted Ruffle Neckpiece, 2012, laser cut polypropylene discs, folded and threaded together onto nylon-coated stainless steel, photo by Trevor Hart

Adam Frew, Tall Lidded Jars, I, II and III, 2009, wheel thrown porcelain with inky cobalt drawings, photo by Rory Moore

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

27

Project profile Discussing the project with the artist in Dublin, we agreed that the focus would predominantly be on showing a selection of works from the past five years – a period which began with a profound shift in O’Malley’s style. We also agreed to represent the breadth of her practice – from video to sculpture to drawing. During reconnaissance trips, we discussed which works would most favour the character of each venue, along with installation and construction issues.

We developed a budget for the Arts Council Touring and Dissemination Grant with four priorities: to produce an excellent catalogue for the artist; to aggressively market the project; to address specialist audiences such as schools and artists resident in the area; to purchase HD video equipment that would remain with the venues as regional resources. The thrust of the grant application was about the dissemination of information – in this case O’Malley’s work – throughout the county. Mayo County Council Arts Office were excited to offer support to this collaborative process, and saw the benefits of combining budgets to leverage additional funding.

The success of this first Mayo Collaborative is down to excellence of Niamh O’Malley’s artwork. In turn, the project inspired everyone involved to go that extra mile to ensure the seamless presentation the work both demanded and deserved. As a group, I believe that the Mayo Arts Collaborative intend to pursue this process on a biennial basis. As a model it is innovative, and very adaptable to other geographical regions. Collaborations are a sensible and desirable response to these times of ever dwindling resources. alice maher, artist

Niamh O'Malley, Screen, 2011, birch, oak, two-way mirror, mirror, glass, coloured glass, graphite, oil paint., 3530 x 700 x 2610mm approx A freestanding birch plywood and stained oak structure supports overlapping two-way, mirrored and coloured glass panels; marks and traces of graphite and oil paint are applied to selected panels

The Mayo Collaborative Marie Farrell, Pat Murphy and Alice Maher discuss Niamh O'Malley's multi-venue exhibition (31 AUG – 30 SEPT), that inaugurated the Mayo Collaborative, a co-operative venTure supported by MAYO County Council AND the county's VISUAL ARTS venues marie farrell, director, linenhall arts centre With projects that are several years in the making, it’s often difficult to pinpoint the starting point. But in this case I can confidently say that the artist, Alice Maher, a member of the Linenhall board, was the inspiration for the Mayo Collaborative. Alice had the vision to see that Mayo’s five publicly funded visual arts spaces offered a unique opportunity to make something special happen. I contacted my colleagues to see if they might be interested in some sort of joint venture: Brendan Murray, Artistic Director, Aras Inis Gluaire, Belmullet; Sean Walsh Director, Ballina Arts Centre; Úna Forde, Managing Director, Ballinglen Arts Foundation, Ballycastle; and John McHugh, Director, Custom House Gallery, Westport. From the get-go we were all committed.

At our initial meetings in early 2011, the idea of showing the work of a single artist, rather than a thematic group show, quickly took hold.

We also understood that a curator would be essential and we approached Patrick T Murphy, Director of the RHA. Patrick responded enthusiastically and worked with us on devising a shortlist of artists. In his calm, quiet way he instilled in us a belief that this project was perfectly realisable.

Selecting Niamh O’Malley was a no-brainer; she already had a substantial national and international reputation and, working in a range of media as she does, and considering the range of spaces we offered, delivering the show would present a robust challenge for the curator, venues and the artist. The fact that Niamh was originally from Mayo was simply a bonus.

The Arts Council Touring and Dissemination Award wasn’t immediately obvious to us as a funding source. I’d always considered it more a support for musicians and theatre companies. However, while we wouldn’t physically tour O’Malley’s work, we were certainly judiciously disseminating it across our venues. Also, our audience would do the touring – from venue to venue around the county.

A key part of the Arts Council application was a substantial commitment of support from Mayo County Council Arts Office if we were successful. The Arts Office were as excited about the project as we all were. It presented a fabulous opportunity to showcase the visual arts infrastructure in Mayo, much of which was developed over the years with capital funding from Mayo County Council.

It’s rare that a project makes so much sense, that it seems to happen almost by itself, but the Niamh O’Malley Mayo Arts Collaborative was one of those projects. Throughout the process, the choices were so blindingly obvious that decisions were easily made. It’s a lovely concept: Mayo becomes the gallery, and audiences move from ‘room to room’ through the beautiful Mayo landscape. patrick t murphy, director, rha gallery County Mayo holds a unique set of visual arts resources. While the Claremorris open exhibition (now in its 30th year) commands an annual place on the cultural calendar, the northern half of the county supports five organisations devoted solely or partly to the visual arts. It seemed obvious that a simultaneous use of these spaces would create the greatest impact, promoting both the artists involved and the county’s unique disciplinary commitment.

The challenge was to decide the strategy for choosing a suitable project. Two thoughts presented themselves. The first was not about the venues, but the space between them. The North Mayo landscape is epic in every sense, but one of the starkest contrasts is between its vast emptiness and the commercial exploitation that has taken place. From commercial forests to the controversial gas refinery; from wind farms with mountainsides of turbines to its coastal mariculture, the perception of its value as wilderness is always tainted with its vulnerability to commercialisation – the sublime thwarted by the banal.

The second idea was a softer determining factor. Over the years, during many regular visits to the venues, I had noticed that very little media based work was being shown, so I wanted to favour that approach in my choice.

The decision to work with Niamh O’Malley stemmed from a combination of the factual and the artifactual. There is a point on the road between Bangor Erris and Belmullet where half a mountain has been excavated for a quarry. Seeing that quarry started me thinking about O’Malley’s video installation Quarry (2011). Her work offered a connection to the landscape and directly engaged in the debate on just how acculturated that relationship is.

When I joined the Linenhall board, we began considering the county’s visual arts policy. We quickly realised that we had to up our game and do some forward planning. There were just not enough really good shows of challenging contemporary art taking place in the region, in order to stimulate engagement with and debate around the visual arts.

While there were plenty of good Mayo venues, the palpable sense of competition between them – for both shows and for funding – was a situation only conducive to mediocrity. So the challenge was to both attract really good artists along with proportionate funding to present and contextualise their work correctly.

I was adamant that there should be a curator for the project, as it involved several diverse spaces and would present a ‘journey’ of engagement. The appointment of Patrick Murphy was therefore a great coup, not simply because he lives in the region and knows the venues intimately, but because he is plugged in to contemporary practice and knows what is happening on the ground for artists all over the country.

Ireland is now home to an amazing generation of mid-career artists in their 30s and 40s, all of whom have built up great bodies of work, and have shown all over the world, travelling here and there on residencies and projects. The work of these artists needs to be seen.

Dublin just does not have enough spaces to host them all. These artists may think that the ‘regions’ are not equipped to install their multimedia work, but they are wrong – three of Mayo’s regional venues are attached to theatres and access to first class technical assistance is easily achieved.

So it was with great joy and anticipation that we heard Patrick Murphy’s choice was Niamh O’Malley: a really good choice, and an artist well up to the challenge. Her practice – a body of high-quality mature work in film, drawing and sculpture – was both sufficiently diverse to inhabit five different spaces and sufficiently cohesive to be read as a unified statement across the venues.

Two sculptural pieces were shown in Westport (Window 2013, Screen 2011); HD videos in Castlebar (Island 2010) , Belmullet (Quarry 2011) and Ballina (Bridge 2009, Flag 2008) and a set of new beautiful drawings alongside a sculpture (Shelf 2012) in Balinglen. Each of the venues did a magnificent job installing the work, which were shown to their full strength in each case. A superb publication accompanied the exhibition.

On the opening day, the bus journey from place to place, work to work, object to image was a great way for a captive audience to spend sufficient time with the art and to discuss and debate it as they went. It really gave a breadth of time and space to the appreciation of the work.

I spoke briefly at each show from a text I had written, with the expressed intention of foregrounding ways of responding to and analysing visual art in non-narrative ways.

There were a great number of artists from the region on the bus.

Besides getting a first class contemporary art experience, they were also networking on the journey, and getting to know the venues. The staff at each venue pulled out all the stops in hosting the audience as well as the work, so that it felt not only like a great celebration of art, but also a celebration of co-operation and unity within the arts. It was good for the audience, good for the venues, good for the artist and good for the art. www.arasinisgluaire.ie www.ballinglenartsfoundation.org www.thelinenhall.com

www.ballinaartscentre.com www.customhousestudios.ie

28

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

VAI COnsultancy

IL: It was totally natural to add expression to these characters and, when we did, we loved it. The funny thing, the excitement we felt on discovering the idea is the exact same excitement we notice in other people when they see the works. We came up with many characters, some site specific and some interchangeable. We also realised that for these pieces to become part of the community here, they would have to blend in and to do that we decided to use the system’s anatomy to build the arms, the connecting cables, turnbuckles and tubes.

Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo.,RPA / Luas Dublin Docklands Public Art Commission

Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo, RPA / Luas Dublin Docklands Public Art Commission

Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo, RPA / Luas Dublin Docklands Public Art Commission

Mick Kelly and Istvan Laszlo, RPA / Luas Dublin Docklands Public Art Commission

Street Life

Istvan Laszlo: I was born and grew up in Romania as an ethnic Hungarian, where I studied art from a really early age. At the time there was this education model for arts and sports that was designed to

JO: Did you face any challenges in making work for such a complex context? I’m thinking of the infrastructure and utilities embedded in the site for Luas lines: power supplies for the streetlights etc…

MK: Yes, there were many challenges relating to these factors. It wasn’t as straight forward as making a traditional piece of artwork; but why would you choose to do something easy anyway? And of course there were some communication difficulties; there were a lot of people involved, so there were learning curves on all sides.

glorify a social and political system that was no longer in place. By the time I went to university my interest shifted towards what was happening in the contemporary art world and became more focused on a global rather than local visual language. I was the founder and member of a contemporary art group that focused on ‘art for the masses’ and started exhibiting internationally in 2002. It was around that time that I became interested in how creative input can readjust our perception of the urban landscape and its active or passive agents.

In 2003 I moved to Dublin and it has been my base ever since.

From that point on, all my works have dealt with intervention that I call ‘readjustments’ – photographic, video, sculptural etc. I am interested in re-contextualising historical events, objects and images; I view this as being the material itself.

Outside of this practice, I had a great experience here in Dublin working on a variety of creative jobs in theatre, museums and galleries, an experience that I can channel in to my work. I met Mick in this context and have worked on numerous jobs and projects since.

JO: Having addressed these issues, how did the design and fabrication processes then progress?

IL: Fabrication started in April 2012, after receiving the first instalment of the budget. We initially worked out scale prototypes from light materials, to see how the sculptures would work. The proposed deadline for completion of the commission was March 2012, but this changed because of the nature of the project.

We took a meticulous approach to deciding on the movement and expression of the arms and hands. We went for an exaggerated and animated look. One of the most challenging things was make it work on that scale, to translate the digital models and renderings into the physical form. This took quite a long time, as we wanted to achieve a natural, organic look from every angle.

Having built and assembled the sculptural additions to the street lamps ourselves, they were sent down to Kent Stainless in Wexford around August or September in 2012 for testing and reinforcing. Kent also undertook the bespoke fabrication of the smaller ‘child’ street lamp made especially for the Mother and Child piece. The finished works were sent back to Dublin in May / July 2013 and then sent to Galco in Ballymount for galvanising and painting. The work was installed in August 2013.

JO: How did you hear about the RPA Luas Docklands commission?

And what especially interested you about the project?

IL: In July 2011 we saw the commission advertised on the VAI website.

It came exactly at the right time for us. We had already been developing ideas about how we could creatively intervene in the cityscape.

JO: What’s your appraisal of the project, in terms of meeting your initial hopes and expectations and the experience of working with all the various project partners?

MK: It was a long process but I think we managed to do what we set out to do, which was to create something fun and inclusive.

MK: From the beginning it was pretty straightforward. We walked up and down the Docklands Luas line for days studying the space, discussing ideas and searching for some kind of anchor that would fix us on one thing, in the end it was the limitations of space. There were defined ‘red lines’ we couldn’t cross, pedestrian spaces, rail space and the power lines but we found freedom in the poles, those beautiful poles. Istvan noticed how the lights looked like figures with heads; all of a sudden we had the ‘characters’ we needed to express what it was we felt this place was all about: a gentrified place full of new and old – a mix of locals, newcomers and passers by.

IL: I believe that we managed to get our idea across and it has been a great team effort from the RPA, VAI, Veolia (the Luas management company), Alstom (the company that does all the physical work on the Luas, they installed the pieces), Kent and Galco. From the workshop to the meetings and factory experiences, the installation process and working with the people to bring this to life, it was a great experience.

MICK KELLY AND ISTVAN LASZLO discuss their work for the LUAS / RPA DOCKLANDS PUBLIC ART COMMISSION, WHICH WAS MANAGED BY VISUAL ARTISTS IRELAND. Jason Oakley: Mick and Istvan, what's your background in terms of working in the public realm?

Mick Kelly: During 2005 I had made some pieces for an exhibition entitled 'Save the Robots' in Dublin and there I met Chico MacMurtrie, an American kinetic artist and sculptor. At the time, I had been working with young people in Rialto. Chico and I spent the summer creating a fantastic mechanical mural, which we wheeled through Rialto for the summer festival. It wasn’t long before I found myself in New York working with Chico – it was a very creative time.

I met like-minded people there, all kinds of maker-artists from around the world. The most important turned out to be Susan Williams, NCAD-trained, from Virginia, county Cavan, who was to become my business partner.

Back in Dublin, I set my sights on getting a workshop. I’m not sure if it was procrastination but I realised I didn’t have the money to pull off the ideas I had and I couldn’t just live the life of an ‘artist’, whatever that is. So I set about starting a company with Susan in 2006 – Spiderfish Limited – to make and sell products and designs that I had developed in my workshops. Susan and her husband moved back to Dublin to give this a shot. I also started work on projects with the Science Gallery, including 'Hear Hear' for the Biorhythm show in October 2010.

These were busy times. My workshop began to fill up with ideas and the tools I needed. I’d do one job, buy the best tools I could afford and keep them for life. We did well but the crash came and much as we tried not to we had to move the Spiderfish endeavours back to New York. During 2008, I was asked to create a couple of rooms to celebrate Irish scientists and engineers in the new Wax Museum on College Green. It was here that I met Istvan and developed an interest in and respect for his work.

JO: How did things proceed once you were appointed, in terms of working with Visual Artists Ireland as mediators between yourselves and the RPA? IL: There were numerous meetings, on and off site visits, factory visits, workshop meetings, complex communication processes and coordination between all departments. This was a new challenge for me, a bit more routine for Mick perhaps, but I do think that all parties involved did their best to realise the pieces.

The deadline was 16 September 2011, so we worked on it for over a month. After being shortlisted, we had a meeting with VAI’s CEO Noel Kelly. We made a revised second stage proposal. After being notified that our second round proposal was successful, we received a €500 honorarium for the completion of the second stage. According to the structure of the commission, there was supposed to be site visits on request, which did not happen. Mick and I did our site visits and received maps of the site from the RPA. We were notified that we had been granted the commission in October 2011.

The first meeting we had with the RPA, with Noel Kelly in attendance, we presented our plans in detail, including budget management and a work structure. We had further meetings where Alex Davis from Visual Artists Ireland also assisted us with various contractual issues.

www.luas-public-art-dublin.tumblr.com www.spiderfishmakers.com

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

29

VAI northern Ireland manager

VAI west of ireland representative

Clare's Cultural Climate AIDEEN BARRY, VAI’S WEST OF IRELAND REPRESENTATIVE, TAKES A READING FROM HER CULTURAL THERMOMETER IN COUNTY CLARE.

Signe Pucena, ‘The Future Is Domestic!’ tincture workshop

Presentation by Dave Loder at PRIME Peer Review at the Bathhouse

‘The Future Is Domestic!', Courthouse Gallery

'Templemore Baths Open House' signage.

Making a Splash FEARGAL O’MALLEY REPORTS ON PROMISING NEW CULTURAL DEVELOPMENTS IN EAST BELFAST, INCLUDING THE PRIME COLLECTIVE. East Belfast has been in the news recently, for all

Prime were keen to establish an international

the wrong reasons. If you manage to look past the

residency programme, and invited their first curator

media focus on civil unrest, however, you will

in residence, Jussi Koitela from Helsinki, to stay in

notice that there has been a slow buildup of

the house while researching and visiting artists in

interesting small-scale local artistic endeavors. The

Belfast this summer. The Bath House initiative is

addition of the East Belfast Festival to Northern

self-funded, and further repairs will take place as

Ireland’s cultural calendar has certainly drawn some

and when funds become available. The interior of

Culture Night is a good starting point for taking

Ireland’s presidency of the EU. The collective were

much-needed positive attention to the area while

the space is simple and bright, with furniture and

the temperature of visual art activity in a particular

supported through Clare County Arts Office with a

established creative centres like the Engine Room

fittings sourced from free-cycling, skips and gallery

region. This year, Culture Night in County Clare was

bursary award to pursue a new pedagogical project.

Gallery – the only public gallery promoting

storerooms. There are no shower facilities, so Jussi

quite hectic, with activities taking place not just in

O’Dwyer told me how a VAI workshop – ‘DIY

contemporary art in East Belfast – are worthy of a

had a daily walk around the corner to the pool to

urban centres such as Ennis, but also in locations

Media and Object Hacking’ with Cliona Harmey and

column themselves.

shower, with the added bonus of an early morning

such as Mountshannon, Ennistymon, Kiladysart,

Saoirse Higgins, held in 2012 – had a profound affect

swim in a beautiful heated Victorian pool.

Killaloe and Kilkee. Pop-up curated projects appeared

on the artists based in North East Clare. Not only did

The East Belfast Arts Festival (28 August – 1

‘The Future Is Domestic!’ tincture workshop, all photos by Michael Walsh

September) is a relatively new event that features

Jussi Koitela said of his visit, “Belfast’s art scene

for one night only in places such as at Glór – with

it sate a hunger for new modes of artistic enquiry but

music, visual art, comedy, theatre, film, literature

felt to me to be full of space. Due to the ongoing

‘Signal to Noise’ curated by Sarah Lundy – and ‘Call

it encouraged the participants to consider

and heritage. Its purpose is to celebrate the positive

Belfast economical situation, it felt to me that as an

it what you will’ curated by Shelagh Honan at the

collaborative modes of working and was the impetus

side of East Belfast and to share the creativity, energy

artist that you could have cheap space – compared

Five Star in Ennis.1 Attendance was fantastic and

behind the foundation of the Outrider Artists group.

and passion of the area through arts and

to the situation in Helsinki. There are a lot of studio

many venues were heaving both with a public

The members of Outrider Artists have a shared

entertainment. In addition, the festival showcases

collectives and project spaces with lots of possibilities

audience and visitors from within the arts

history of merging domestic and public spaces

venues that may not be familiar to many people and

to experiment with gallery spaces and organise

communities. Attendees displayed a healthy

through hosting artists and projects in their homes

are not usually used for arts events.

interesting and different events, such as ‘Individual

curiosity, support and indeed a hunger for more

and creating pop-up galleries, in addition to sharing

One of the highlights of this year’s festival

Citizen: Learning Experiment’ in Platform studios.

projects of this nature.

facilities, knowledge and skills. Working in

(amongst many) was Prime Collective’s 'Templemore

This multitude of spaces allows artists to work more

Clare boasts an infrastructure that some west

conjunction with artists from MoKs, Centre for Art

Baths Open House' event. Prime collective comprises

freely and not to deal with exhibition space as a one-

of Ireland counties could only dream about: a third

and Social Practice, Estonia and SERDE, a centre for

Charlotte Bosanquet, Alissa Kleist and Tonya

time experience. Low rents also allow multi-function

level art college of both national and international

art, folklore and heritage in Latvia, Outrider Artists

McMullan. In their own words they aim to possess a

spaces like the Bath House”.

importance with its own significant exhibition

have hosted a series of exhibitions, laboratories,

“flexible working ethic that encourages collaboration

In October, Prime also presented a series of

programme (www.burrencollege.ie); the purpose

performative interventions and pop-ups in and

and communication between members of the group,

photography workshops in partnership with Belfast

designed Tulla Studios, managed by Clare County

around Ennistymon and the rest of the county. This

other artists and organisations. These collaborations

Exposed, Belfast City Council and the Paul Hamlyn

Council Arts Ofice; and the fantastic, ever-evolving

initial collaborative project by Outrider Artists,

can take the form of guest artist / curator visits,

Foundation. The workshops took place in the Bath

education, exhibition and studio programme at

entitled ‘The Future is Domestic’, has brought about a

seminars, talks and critiques, as well as collaborative

House and were open to local residents, who used

Ennistymon Courthouse (www.courthousegallery.

art projects within the group”.

photography and postcards to represent their

com). However, there is definitely room for

new level confidence amongst the visual arts community.2 The Courthouse acted as a central point

experiences / recollections / opinions of inner East

improvement.

for the group and remains a meeting place for the

Prime's interest in unusual and unused spaces led them to the Templemore Swimming Baths, a

Belfast to the wider world.

Ennis, the capital of the county, has very few

artists, where they can go discuss, review and plan

Victorian edifice in East Belfast. Opened in 1893, the

With opportunities for young artists /curators

visual art facilities, and many artists spoke to me

baths and pools have served over five generations –

at a premium, the Bath House project is a welcome

about their exasperation at the lack of a more

In my next article, I will report back from the

thousands of people – within the community.

addition, offering a professional programme and an

ambitious exhibition programme in Glór, and the

first in a series of Common Room Cafes, held in

Templemore Baths are still in use today and the

innovative use of space.

their activities.

absence of strategic development in the town

Limerick, which VAI hopes to conduct on a regular

facilities also include a steam room and gym. Prime’s

It might sound brutal, but the world is never

towards encouraging experimental initiatives. The

basis in art venues across the city. I will also report on

project originated when they were given a guided

going to be in perfect harmony with artists’ career

sense of a geographical divide in the county –

the forthcoming Limerick City of Culture programme,

tour of the building after taking a morning dip. They

ambitions. You have to stand up to be noticed, and

between West and East Clare – was also mentioned,

looking at the views of local artists about the

were shown several previously unseen parts of the

the noisier the wider culture becomes, the stronger

and the need for a central focus for the visual arts

implications of the title.

building: disused cubicle baths where people once

the artist’s voice has to be in order to be heard above

was emphasised. The majority of activity appears to

bathed after a day’s work in the shipyard; the coal

the din. This is exactly what Prime have done; they

happen in the North West.

boilers, still intact; and the adjoining caretaker's

needed a base that could give a platform for their

Fiona O’Dwyer is an artist based in Clare who

house, known as the Bath House, which was

ideas and they went out and found one. I would

has contributed to countless projects and

Aideen Barry

unoccupied and falling into disrepair. Prime later

normally wish an enterprise such as Prime all the

manifestations of visual cultural activities. O’Dwyer

approached the baths with a proposal to use the

luck in the world, but with their assertive track

is a member of the Outrider Artists Research

house as a multi-functioning art and residency

record, I don’t think they’ll need it.

Initiative, which was set up in Ennistymon earlier

Notes 1. 'Culture Night at the Five Star', curated by Shelagh Honan. Participating artists: Shelagh Honan, Maria Finucane, Trudi Van der Elsen, John Hanrahan, Fiona O’Dwyer 2. ‘The Future Is Domestic!’, participating artists: Signe Pucena, Uis Pucens, John Grzinich, Evelyn Muursepp, Shelagh Honan, Sara Fuller, Sara Lundy, Maria Kerin, Pat McInerney, Maria Finucane, Saidhb O’Neill, Veronica Nicholson, Trudi Van der Elsen, Marianne Slevin, Danny Burke, Rupert Bagwell, Michael Walsh, Michaela Cutaya, Fiona O’Dwyer.

space. The proposal was accepted in December 2012 and since then Prime have redecorated, repaired and used the space for a range of artistic activities.

Feargal O’Malley

this year. In May 2013, they initiated their first national and international research project as a part of the Culture Connects Programme, celebrating

In December, I will be running a Common Room Cafe in Clare; check the VAI ebulletin and website for details.

30

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

CONFERENCE

November – December 2013

CONFERENCE

Listening in Brussels SVEN ANDERSON assesses ‘TUNED CITY BRUSSELS’ , 27 - 30 June

Dublin Laptop Orchestra, photo by Linda O'Keefe

Bandwidth & Fidelity

FERGUS KELLY REPORTS ON 'Transmission Drift' , THE THIRD ISSTA CONVOCATION, IADT, DUN LAOGHAIRE (29 – 30 AUGUST 2013).

The Irish Sound Science & Technology Association (ISSTA) is a relatively new organisation that aims to “bring together practitioners integrating fields of music, sound, science and technology based in Ireland. It serves musicians, researchers, scientists, engineers and artists by promoting the art, music and research in Ireland, especially in international communities”.

ISSTA’s third convocation, ‘Transmission Drift’, held at IADT Dun Laoghaire (29 – 30 August 2013) focussed on how artists, composers, writers and scientists of sound engage with the concept of transmission. The promotional information for the event outlined the theme in evocative terms, “In negating temporal and physical boundaries, transmissions sustain traditions between generations and broadcast across borders... mediated and buffeted by the motions of fashion, genre, bandwidth and fidelity, electromagnetic transmissions are an everincreasing constant. Electromagnetic frequency bands can be commercialised, purchased and sold, making the content of broadcasts answerable to financial enterprise”.

This convocation comprised a schedule of talks, workshops, installations and concerts. The presentations covered such topics as: user interfaces for gestural control of granular synthesis; perceptual effects in multi-channel audio environments; a people's soundscape of Limerick; domestic sound and architecture, and radio. This last topic was covered very engagingly by Robin Parmar, in his talk Radio Before & After Radio Waves, and was one of the more memorable presentations.

Parmar outlined how initial approaches to radio were radical and utopian, up until the medium was used as a propaganda tool during the great wars, and how, post WWII, it was co-opted by commercial interests. The airwaves, though regarded as a public trust, were nonethless sold off to private companies or held by central state authuorities. Parmar examined the true idea of radio as a broadcast medium – one source radiating out to many listeners.

The original meaning of the word ‘broadcast’ was as an agricultural term referring to seed dispersal.

Parmar’s proposed a definition of broadcasting that not only permited, but actually required uncertainty – broadcasting as a distribution to a dispersed and unknown audience.

Other highlights included Patrick Macklin's talk Heima in Two Apartments, which addressed the relationship between citizens and city spaces, and the potential to evoke, describe and delineate the parameters of domestic environments, along with the creation of acoustic models of two dwellings.

The keynote speaker was sound artist Darren Copeland from Toronto. Copeland has created works for radio, performance and installation, focussing on soundscape composition and multi-channel spatialisation. He is also artistic director of New

Adventures In Sound Art (NAISA). Copeland gave an illustrated overview of how the innovative use of network / online contexts, site specificity and interdisciplinary methodologies have diversified the ways sound art is shared with audiences. Copeland also outlined the different approaches Canadian sound artists have taken to presenting their work, through site specific performances, soundwalks, performances and radio broadcasts, as well as how NAISA has developed various presentation contexts in response to this growing diversity, by offering innovations of its own design. Benoit Maubry, Viv Corringham, Paul Scriver, Tetsuo Kagawa and Anna Fritz are amongst the artists that have worked with NAISA to date. NAISA is particularly interested in working with artists to develop innovative performative approaches to replace the standard laptop presentation format of many electronic music performances.

Irish artist Sean Taylor took a group on a tour of the sound installations created for ISSTA, with opening introductions and elaboration by some of the artists present, which lead to further discussions by the group.

Amongst the highlights was Alyssa Moxley's Still Here, which used recordings from the Greek island of Santorini, which were broadcast to small birdcages which the audience were invited to move around the space with, thus changing the reception, and creating in turn a series of shifting layers of static and clear recordings as people moved around the space, chasing the soundscape of birds, bells and other incidental sounds.

Another piece, Waveguides, by Lisa Reburn, a work about communication in a sea of sound, made very clever use text messaging to set off small motors to vibrate a large copper bowl with water, which created a delicate resonance whose pitch was randomly and subtly shifted by the movement of water as the bowl wobbled.

The evening concerts of pre-recorded and live material took place in IADT The Drawing Project space in Dun Laoghaire, using an eight channel speaker array that encircled the audience. Space doesn’t permit an overview of all the pieces, but amongst the highlights were Mike Bullock's Ritual For The Alleviation Of Dimitri Shostakovich's Fears, For Chris Marker. This was a simple, subtle and intriguing piece, with manipulated video, which the composer describes as built on memory and forgetting, using a cassette recording of piano solo in a practice room as the sole sound source.

Between 27 – 30 June, Tuned City Brussels showcased an international (primarily European and North American) community of sound-based practitioners through installations, performances, lectures, workshops, and walks. Staged across a multitude of sites scattered throughout Brussels, the event explored the relationship between sound, urban space and the built environment.

Tuned City (www.tunedcity.net) is an initiative of Berlin-based curator Carsten Stabenow, its framework lying somewhere between a festival, a conference and an urban intervention. The event has previously been staged in Berlin (2008), Tallinn (2010 / 11) and Nurnberg (2011). In Brussels, Stabenow worked with Q-02, a workspace for experimental music and sound art.

The festival's programming provided an active interface between the audience, the city and the work being presented, shifting to a new territory each day to explore a different theme. The first day of the festival focussed on Relational Noise around the Botanical Gardens. Day two explored Situational Listening across a stretch of territory between South Station and the Cemetery of Ixelles, and the final day investigated Ephemeral Atmospheres around Haren, a former chicory-farming village in the north-east extremity of the city.

The first symposium commenced with Hillel Shwartz’s search for Missing Persons implicit in historical accounts of noise in the city, followed by Cristoph Cox’s venture towards a metaphysics of sound that collapses the distinction between listening and hearing, extending his enquiry beyond the human or animal ear. Mattin and Kobe Matthys presented a dialogue personifying the cities of Stockholm and Brussels, discussing social noise and gentrification.

The Botanical Gardens hosted a range of works including: a new iteration of Christina Kubisch’s Electromagnetic Walks; Dawn Scarfe's Listening Glasses, through which the sound of the city was accessed through carefully-tuned glass resonators held to the ear. Will Schrimshaw's roving Module for a Comprehensive Instrument forged an abstract connection between urban noise and spoken language. Evening performances in a train station (Lukas Kühne & Robyn Schulkowsky) and a church (Wessel Westerveld & Yuri Landman) respectively explored physical public rhythmic variations and improvised noise featuring reconstructed intonarumori distilled from Futurist designs, both set within reverberant architectural contexts.

The second day of lectures presented perspectives on walking methodologies going beyond the Situationist dérive or formalised notions of the ‘soundwalk’. These ranged from Francesco Careri's exploration of nomadic trajectories and urban transformation to the interdisciplinary DOC Team’s incorporation of walking-based strategies into urban planning processes. Brandon Labelle's

presentation Shared Space highlighted the potential of aural space in negotiating the self in relation to public space.

In the evening, Franziska Windisch’s performance Sonata For 4 Cardinal Points, for voice and megaphones, spatialised vocal passages in a tiny park, shifting around the audience and merging with the ebb and flow of traffic. The Stalker / ON Collective led an ambitious journey through the city over the course of the day, presenting the walk less as a site of performance or a vehicle for passive listening and more as a tool for delving deeper into regional microhistories and tensions, concluding in the dusk outside of a historic squat barely holding its place in a line of luxury apartments.

On the closing day of Tuned City, the relaxed atmosphere of Haren provided a refuge from the previous days spent in the city. Lectures included Aesthetic of Atmospheres (Gernot Böhme), Earworm (Timothy Morton) and Urban Ambiances as Sensory Lifeforms (Jean-Paul Thibaud), who concluded the seminar sessions with a confident block reflecting on listening and the ephemeral qualities of space.

The day’s walks explored the region’s rural history and future trajectories, passing through several off-site sound installations. Martin Howse's intervention in an abandoned warehouse explored micro-voltages generated by biological structures as sound and light – the system hanging in a state of suspended balance tied to the interior's minute dynamics.

As the sun went down, the audience converged on the festival's closing performances, including the epic ma-ta-ta-bi by Akio Suzuki and Aki Onda, which saw the experienced duo shifting between the interior and exterior of yet another crumbling building, weaving together a nuanced array of sonic textures ranging from dense architectural drones to the sparse clatter of found objects and percussion.

Two meta-events took place over the course of the weekend: Udo Noll's mobile broadcasts via the ambitious Radio Apogee framework and Felicity Ford and Valeria Merlini's collaboration Listening to Tuned City from Within and Without – replaying echoes of the previous days’ events in different contexts.

Overall, Tuned City Brussels demonstrated a mature stance as a meeting-point for the community of artists, architects, and theorists working with sound in the urban context, reinforcing the core investigations that provide the foundation for this interdisciplinary field while confidently exploring new territory through both practical and theoretical experimentation.

Sven Anderson is an artist based in Dublin. He is currently working an a public art commission with DCC, acting in the experimental role of Dublin City Acoustic Planner & Urban Sound Designer. www.svenanderson.net

Fergus Kelly is a sound artist from Dublin who has exhibited internationally and won many Arts Council awards. His work is published via his Room Temperature label. www.issta.ie www.naisa.ca

Franziska Windisch, Sonata for Four Cardinal Points (performance, photo by Carsten Stabenow

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

31

Project profile

Joan Sugrue, Stories for Jam, '5 ways to say your prayers', The Shed, Galway

Anne-Marie Dillon, Monza Plex 3000, '5 ways to say your prayers', The Shed, Galway

Ruth Morrow, Departures&Arrivals, '5 ways to say your prayers', photo by Carol Anne Connelly

Relics, Scenarios & Props PETER MUTSCHLER AND RUTH MORROW OF PS2 PROFILE ‘5 WAYS TO SAY YOUR PRAYERS’, WHICH RE-PRESENTED A SELECTION OF THE BELFAST BASED ORGANISATION’S PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT PROJECTS, FACILITATED BY ENGAGE STUDIOS AT THE SHED, GALWAY (26 JUNE – 21 JULY 2013).

Altruism, generosity and kindness are not usually virtues of the commercial art market, but certainly on the producer’s side, ie the artists, there is a long history of these ideas forming the foundation of actions, performances and participatory projects. In 1990s in particular – with reference to Rirkrit Tiravanija’s cooking events and Group Material’s collective work – these terms were used to describe the key elements of socially and politically motivated art. This was especially the case with relational and / or participatory work processes, all of which were widely theorised and critiqued by Nicolas Bourriaud and Claire Bishop, among others. In light of this, Engage Studios Galway invited Belfast-based PS2 to work at their space, The Shed (26 June – 21 July 2013), in an act of curatorial generosity.

The Shed is located in a large former storage hall on the middle pier of Galway harbour. Besides hosting our projects, Engage and The Shed worked simultaneously with two other initiatives by Economic Thought Projects, Galway and Paul Hallahan, both of whom presented their works at 126 Gallery, on Flood Street, Galway (www.126.ie). The three organisers of this Engage / The Shed project were Carol Anne Connelly, Shelly McDonnnell and Vicky Smith. The projects were collectively titled ‘Too Many Dinner Parties’.1 PS2 was called upon to contribute work with a “focus specifically on participatory art and collaborative engagements” in an exhibition that combined “diverse curatorial and artistic approaches that consider new forms of engagement in everyday life”.

PS2 has realised many projects in Belfast – in our own space, in the city centre or in other urban and rural communities – but this was the first opportunity we had to present our rationale outside the closed environment and political context of Northern Ireland. From the beginning, our aim was to include artists who had worked with PS2 before – on both gallery based and public projects – as a means to represent our curatorial approach and our understanding of participatory working processes. We saw The Shed event as chance to consider what would happen if we ‘re-staged’ some recent project in a different locale.

It was clear to us that a shift in the physical and social context of projects – which have been staged mainly in public squares and streets – would alter the reception of the work. This raised questions around how well installations and staged set-ups ‘travel’. Would there be a necessity to change how they were displayed? Would the work require additional explanation? And would it be possible to find local volunteers and audiences to activate these otherwise ‘depopulated’ and un-animated situations?

An important aspect of PS2’s approach is mutuality and collaboration, so it was crucial to us that this re-view of past projects should be supplemented by new and site-specific local contributions

by Galway based artists, selected through an open call. Our project title, ‘5 ways to say your prayers’, was an allusion to our experience of working in a Northern Irish context, where communities are still segregated for the most part by religion. Mary Jane Jacob’s text Reciprocal Generosity was also an influence; here she describes art projects in which “generosity became the medium, or methodology, and the subject, or product”.2 The five situations we re-presented in the hanger-like space all shared a common focus on social engagement and interaction. Monza Plex 3000 by Anne-Marie Dillon and PS2 was originally presented as part of the ‘UP-Down project’ for Ballykinler, Co Down, 2011. It comprised a caravan, converted into a mobile cinema by local young people.3 Anne-Marie Dillon’s 2009 project Coffee Mornings, conducted by the artist in an open-air living room, also originally took place in Ballykinler. This work facilitated community meetings once a week.

In re-showing the PS2 project Urban sports, play for free, the work was scaled down. It consisted of a ping-pong table and other outdoor sports equipment, which were initially installed during February – March 2013 in public places in Belfast. Julie Miller’s Come let me lighten your (ironing) load was originally shown at PS2’s Belfast premises in 2011. The artist offered a free ironing service, and in exchange the participants allowed themselves to be documented by Miller holding

their ironed clothes. Departures & Arrivals comprised a new researchbased work by Ruth Morrow, based on analysis of past PS2 projects displayed on large posters in a classroom context.4 Additionally, we also staged two projects selected from Galway based artists. For Stories for Jam, Joan Sugrue set up a market stall where she bartered conversation and recipe ideas in exchange for jars of her own home made preserves. Marks of Modellers and Turners, but with clothes by Vicky Smith comprised a sculpture workshop set up, where she washed donated clothes with plaster and then returned them as ‘objects’ to the owners. The Engage Studios team ran talks over each weekend during the show, which featured the participating artists, along with a programme of screenings showing work by local artists in the Monza Plex.

The Arts Council of Ireland, under the Visual Arts Project Award, supported the project. More than half of the budget was allocated for transport and travel, with the remainder assigned for modest artist fees. The budget also covered the materials build costs for the staged set-ups.

The communication process between ourselves and the Engage Studios team was easy and supportive. From our very first visit to Galway, Engage helped us get a grasp of the context and facilitated meetings with the participating local artists. The transport process for the project was more like a household removal from Belfast to Galway than a conventional art shipping and installation. The elements that we moved included ironing boards, clothes baskets, a couch, a children’s table, a caravan, chairs, lights, washing lines, table tennis tables, TVs and photographs. In a way, this underlined the kind of merging of art life at the core of engaged and participatory projects – where audiences are invited to become participants and distil art out of everyday situations.

To quote Mary Jane Jacobs again, our ethos for ‘5 ways to say your prayers’ is aptly summarised by her words “… these generous acts might not look like art, or in fact be art, but become art-like moments”.5 How effective was this re-staging and re-contextualising of our projects? Did it create new forms of art-like moments? Did anyone hear the ‘prayers’ – our call for generosity and exchange?

Visually, the projects ‘worked’. The Shed’s large space easily accommodated all of our performative situations, located in various self-contained spaces. Each of seven projects was ‘staged’ to different degrees – installed to resemble theatre sets. Within The Shed space, the individual projects occupied raised platforms or carpeted areas – spatial configurations that ironically resembled Ikea showrooms.

Outside, the roofline of The Shed was bedecked with 120 metres of homemade bunting, which gave this industrial and utilitarian building a more ‘festive’ air. Monza Plex 3000, the Ballykinler cinema caravan, was parked incongruously on a carpeted area outside the building’s entrance..

Galway visitors utilised Anne-Marie Dillon’s Coffee Morning installation, now transferred indoors, and played ping-pong on the tables we had originally installed on the streets of Belfast. Viewers could read some of the stories collected via Joan Sugrue’s Stories for Jam work and add new ones – which many did – as well as studying Ruth Morrow’s posters analysing previous PS2 works hanging from a washing line.

The situations where readers could ‘read’ something – text, photographs or films – actually seemed to work best. Whereas the represented projects that had originally involved audience interaction with artists / performers were less successful; in the new space, they consisted of empty ‘stage sets’, and the context and history of these works proved more difficult to appreciate. Miller and Dillon’s works, for example, which in their original forms had been animated by the artists respectively offering an ironing service and serving teas and coffees to create a welcoming living room atmosphere, were now literally ‘empty’ scenarios. But these minor production ‘failures’ were buffered and compensated for by the series of talks that the artists gave about their projects – delivered with their props and settings at hand. Miller mentioned in her talk that she would have preferred to install a ‘delegated’ performance, to undertake her act of unpaid ironing, but this wasn’t possible, as funds weren’t available to recruit or pay for such ‘re-activators’.

Overall, the project generated questions around authentically re-presenting engaged art beyond its original context – whether the work is in written form, reviews, or in our case the installation of the relics, scenarios and props. ‘5 ways to say your prayers’ left things unresolved, open for answers. But perhaps this is how it should be, for all the best ‘prayers’.

Peter Mutschler artist & curator PS2. Ruth Morrow architect / urban researcher & co-curator PS2’ urban projects.

Notes 1. www.engageartstudios.com 2. Mary Jane Jacob, Reciprocal Generosity in What we want is free: generosity and exchange in recent art, Ted Purves (ed), New York, 2004 3. www.pssquared.org 4 www. villageworks.org.uk 5. Another re-staging of ‘Departures&Arrivals’ took place at Darc Space, Dublin 20 September – 24 October 20136. Mary Jane Jacob, Reciprocal Generosity, 2004

32

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

Project profile

Colin Darke, Apples at the Foot of a Tree, billboard work for Newtownards Road, Belfast

Lesley Cherry, Saddle Back Mare with Soliders, billboard work for Newtownards Road, Belfast

Gerry Gleason, Titanic Boatmen, billboard work for Upper Newtownards Road, Belfast

Art for the People DEIRDRE ROBB OF CREATIVE EXCHANGE PROFILES ‘ART IN THE EASTSIDE’ – AN ANNUAL A TWO-WEEK EXHIBITION of contemporary art presented on BILLBOARD SITES ACROSS EAST BELFAST ‘Art in the Eastside’ is a billboard based public art project, founded four years ago by Creative Exchange Artist Studios, the first of its kind to be delivered in Ireland. Through the use of contemporary visual art, ‘Art in the Eastside’ celebrates the creativity of the East Belfast community, where the Creative Exchange members have lived and worked for the past 18 years. This socially engaged project is delivered from mid August through to the end of September each year, via billboards, posters and installations. This, year the project programme was augmented by a showcase exhibition in the Engine Room Gallery, Belfast.

Creative Exchange was formed in 1996 when a group of artists based in East Belfast identified a need for additional provision of visual arts facilities and a desire for the exchange of creative ideas. At the time, East Belfast was widely recognised as an area with a particularly weak arts and culture infrastructure, with high levels of social and economic deprivation. In recent years, it has become important to the collective that the project should fit with the wider regeneration of the area and in a small way help the community to move forward into a new shared society. People residing in the local neighbourhood knew little or nothing about us as a collective and considered political mural painters the only local artists; we wanted to help change that notion.

We now manage an annual programme of activity, with one main showcase event per year. Up until 2009, the collective were largely focused on exchange programmes and collaborative projects, engaging artists in long, drawn out projects that were challenging and interesting but also time consuming. Some artists felt that this distracted them from their own practice, so we reviewed the programme of activity to create something that didn’t take up as much of our studio time. Instead of exhibiting in a gallery, we thought, why not bring art to the people on the street? That way, members of the public could experience contemporary visual art right on their own doorstep. Artwork placed on billboards is not a new concept, but was new to this area and, if well crafted, we felt it could bring us the kind of attention we wanted as a visual art collective.

The project started out relatively small in 2010, representing the Creative Exchange studio artists on nine billboards. We asked each of the

artists to create a new artwork that celebrated an aspect of the area. The theme was broad and could include people, places or things. Funding was tight, but we had annual support for programming from Belfast City Council and the Arts Council of Northern Ireland (ACNI), with a small discount from the billboard company. This first year was a learning process for us, and there were a number of issues and constraints that needed to be addressed.

To advise artists on how to develop their work, we looked at the principles of billboard advertising, as there are certain rules and considerations when producing work on that scale. As this was public art, we also had to be careful not to show work that could have been deemed offensive. It was a steep learning curve, with deadlines and artistic personalities to deal with, and it took us a long time to decide on the name of the project. In the end, a consensus was reached on every aspect of the project and ‘Art in the Eastside’ was born. The artists loved seeing their work exhibited on billboards. It’s really something else to see your artwork on such a large scale in a public setting – ample reward for all the hard work.

At this stage, it was still intended as a one-off project. However, when we started to plan for the 2011 showcase event, it became clear that the collective wanted to run the project again. Despite it’s success, we were conscious that funders often don’t like to fund exactly the same thing twice, so we reviewed our plans and decided to increase the number of participating artists and billboards. We also included a smallscale run of posters, which Creative Exchange would sell on behalf of the participating artists, taking a small commission. Several artists that we had worked with before were approached to participate, and the project began to develop in that way. We also linked in with the Ulster Bank Festival at Queen’s University, Belfast, in the hope of raising the profile of the project and the collective.

At this stage, the project was growing both in scale and cost.

Manageability became an issue, with demands on volunteers exceeding what we originally anticipated. So we nominated lead coordinators to manage the project and act as the first point of contact. At the same

Derick Hegarty, Afterglow, billboard work for Albertbridge Road, Belfast

time, we expanded and diversified our funding pool, looking to local businesses for sponsorship. This came first from our landlord and the local undertakers, James Brown Funeral Parlour. Belfast City Council and ACNI, along with the billboard company and printers, offered continued support.

In 2011, we doubled the project in size to 26 billboards and worked with even more local business, each of which helped to create an image for the billboard. This proved to be a lot of extra work for us and, while it was good for them to be creatively engaged, it took a lot of effort and time keeping everyone happy.

For 2012, we decided not to do this again. Instead, we undertook an open submission for artists who were working at a local level to see if we could manage a competition process. This took the project to a whole new level, as we needed to fundraise, manage our sponsor development, look after a wide range of artists’ needs and manage a dedicated marketing campaign that went beyond the initial concept.

All work the work had been done on a voluntary basis, which began to put a real strain on the organisation as the initiative grew. The decision was made that if the project continued to develop professionally, we would need to pay staff to look after the technical, marketing and fundraising aspects. We also needed support from a range of volunteers.

This year, we dropped the thematic requirements and again doubled the size of the project – producing 50 billboards and posters.

We developed new elements including a walking tour, a community outreach project titled ‘Art Flag Bunting’, a literary project in association with the Seamus Heaney Centre and a showcase exhibition in the Engine Room Gallery, Belfast. The cost of the project was over £40,000, with 12 funders and sponsors, a team of volunteers and paid staff.

The highlight of the project was once again the billboards, which featured artwork from selected local, national and International artists.

Through an open submission process, we selected 20 artists who came from as near as West Belfast and as far away as Australia. Renowned local artists were invited to contribute: Susan MacWilliam, Victor Sloan, Alice Maher, Colin Darke, Rita Duffy, Aisling O’Beirn, Brendan Jamison, Breandán Clarke and Colin McGookin. They not only bought into the concept, but also supported what we were trying to achieve.

In addition, we developed the ‘Art Flag Bunting’ project, which focused on the creation of temporary, participatory public artworks by school children and local community groups. The aim of the project was to create a celebratory reflection of the many iconic features, nationalities and personalities that make up the community of East Belfast. Each artwork said something about the participant’s thoughts and wishes. We made a collage of the artwork and pieced it together to create large-scale outdoor temporary installations, which hung on the railings and buildings of the participating groups and schools.

The installations brought a burst of colour to daily life in the area and provided a platform for community expression.

Original artwork was exhibited in the Engine Room Gallery in a month-long exhibition, which proved to be a great success. One of our volunteers who had just finished her degree in English suggested asking writers to make comments on some of the billboard images. In Northern Ireland, there is an absence of critical reviews – which has been detrimental to the visual arts over the years – so we supported this idea. We managed to blend paint and ink, creating a small publication of works from students of the Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen’s, published authors and poetry slam winners.

It is estimated that 402,000 people will have seen each billboard 15 times over the 2-week run of the project. Each billboard will have been viewed 60,500 times.1 It is fair to say that the artworks, through quality and sheer number, definitely made an impact in the area. The project has just been completed and we are already making preparations for next year. We will take into consideration the feedback received so far and see what can we learn. We are confident that we have all the right ingredients, but there’s always potential for baking a better cake.

Deirdre Robb, www.creativeexchange.org.uk Notes 1. Market research was provided JNOR CAFAS database v15

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

33

Art in Public

Art in Public Public art commissions, site-specific works, socially engaged practice and various other forms of art outside the gallery.

Louise Ward @ Granby Park

Henrietta’s Dance

Louise Ward Find your voice 2013, Granby Park.

Titles: A Conversation on Radio Al Cabira (24 August 2013); Find your voice Sunday (1 September) ; Shifting Subjectivities (18 September).

Artist: Louise Ward Commissioner: Annie Lynott, Upstart Granby Park.

Date advertised: 15 August 2013 Description: For A Conversation on Radio Al Cabira.

Ward invited members the Upstart collective, volunteers and other members of the public to engage with the artists in an open conversation about the Granby Park project. The resulting conversation was broadcast live on Radio Al Cabira, a New York based internet radio programme ( www. radioalcabira.com).

UpStart Collaborative Ltd is a non-profit voluntary arts collective, who have transformed a vacant Dublin site on Dominick street lower into ‘Granby Park’, which they describe as “a place of creativity, nature, imagination, play and beauty for everyone”.

Ward invited the public to participate in the performative work activity Find your voice, as a means to "occupy public space with the sound of voices, and investigate tensions between voices within a group and explore the language of the voice itself".

Ward also presented an outdoor screening event at Granby Park, entitled Shifting Subjectivities featuring a number of filmsworks sharing similar concerns. All events were free and open to anyone who wished to participate.

Title: Henrietta’s Dance Artist: Deirdre Glenfield Curator: Siobhan Mooney Sited: Aug 20 – Sep 6 2013 Location: deAppendix, Amaranta Family Practice, Dublin, ran by artist / GP Ciara McMahon (http:// deappendix.wordpress.com/) Description: Installation and video projection inspired by the story of Henrietta Lacks. In 1951 Lacks presented to Sir John Hopkins Memorial Hospital, Baltimore MD with cervical cancer. Cancer cell samples taken without her knowledge or consent during examination and were stored for later scientific experimentation. These cells were the first cancer cells to be grown in culture. Henrietta died 8 months later but her cells still live today. A Screening of The Way of All Flesh, Adam Curtis’s BBC documentary about Henrietta Lacks, was followed by a talk between artist Deirdre Glenfield and curator Siobhan Mooney took place in the Lab, Dublin.

Body Conscious III

White Form Passing Through

Hilary Williams White Form Passing Through

Title: White Form Passing Through Artist: Hilary Williams Commissioner: Mill Theatre DundrumCurator: Aoife O’Toole Date Advertised: August 30 2013 Date sited: 20 September 2013 Project Partners: Dundrum Town Centre Description: 50 minute outdoor live performance.

The work took place in the main square and around the Mill Pond outside the main entrance to the shopping centre. Dressed in white, draped in over 20 metres of white chiffon, Williams ‘passed through’ diners and shoppers. Williams has previously performed this work in Temple Bar, Dublin; Bray town Centre and Belfast.

Vera Klute wWiederkaeuer

Title: 'Body Conscious III' Artist: Vera Klute Dates: 25 Oct – 28 Nov 2013 Description: 'Body Conscious III' was the third and final exhibition in the series ‘Body Conscious’ on the theme of the body, and featured artworks by Vera Klute installed at Waterford Regional Hospital.

Vera Klute’s work explored the internal functions and processes of the body. As the press release noted, Klute's "interest does not lie in anatomical accuracy but in creating a sense of inventiveness and adventure in imagining what might be occurring within us".

Waterford Healing Arts Trust also launched a catalogue featuring the work of other artists participating in the programme, Dorothy Ann Daly, Lucia Barnes, Susan O’Brien Duffy and The project was generously supported by the Arts Council and the combined Credit Unions of Waterford City.

33

34

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

opportunities

November – December 2013

coUrSeS / WorKSHoPS

multiculturAl Arts

gallery space for a fee outside of the

Centre for Creative Practices present an

programme of scheduled exhibitions.

ration / partnership between networks,

open call for local and international art-

Further information from:

consortia or other collective groupings

ists of various genres and backgrounds to

email

ART ThERApy

of presenters are encouraged, particu-

present their art at our yearly Multicul-

info@talbotgallery.com

A series of CPD certified workshops will

larly where these indicate a high degree

tural Winter Arts Exhibition. Interested

Website

take place in Dublin city centre from

of engagement with audiences and col-

applicants can submit their artist CV and

www.talbotgallery.com/events.php

November. Foundation in Art Therapy:

loNgforD

laboration with the producing entity or

images to:

deadline

Nov 29 / 30 – Jan 18 / 19, 10 weekends

Cluid Housing Association wishes to

artists.

email

16 November

/ 120hrs. Price: ˆ 890. Facilitator: Klaus

coMMiSSioNS

commission a commemorative art piece,

Applications must be submitted

to celebrate the renovation and rejuve-

Klier (plus outside tutors). Application

sarah.bracken@cfcp.ie

using the Arts Council’s online services

deadline

SOURcE MAGAzINE

closes 30 Nov. Science, Art and Therapy

nation of the St. Michael’s Road area of

website. Further details:

15 November

Source Magazine will be arranging a

Taster. 16 Nov, 10.30 – 16.30, contribu-

Longford town. The site-specific piece

Closing date

Web

series of meetings with photographers

tion towards cost €15. Facilitator: Klaus

should be designed following a full con-

14 Nov 2013

www.cfcp.ie

and artists at our upcoming Research

Klier. Three Steps Into Art Therapy in-

sultation process between the artist and

Contact

Trip at the Gallery of Photography on 30

troductory evening course (eight work-

November after an initial pre-selection

shops). Nov 6 – Dec 18, 18.30 – 21.30.

the local community and as with all site

Regina OShea

NEw BEGINNINGS, BIRR ARTS

specific designs, full cognisance will be

t telephone

Birr Theatre & Arts Centre are calling

process. Further information

Price: € 195. Facilitator: Klaus Klier.

given to the physical, environmental,

01 6180260

for submissions for the 6th Annual

email

Contact

social and cultural nature of the site. Bud-

email

Common Ground – an exhibition of

john@source.ie

Klaus Klier

regina.oshea@artscouncil.ie

work by artists living in the Midlands

Web

Website

deadline

to be held from December 2013 – Janu-

www.source.ie

www.arttherapy-psychodrama-gestalt.ie

1.00pm Tuesday December 10th 2013

ary 2014. This year the theme for Com-

deadline

email

email

mon Ground (referring to a group of

5pm10 November

info@arttherapy-psychodrama-gestalt.

get: ˆ 38,000

fkennedy@longfordcoco.ie

eXHiBiTioNS / cAll oUTS

Web www.longfordcoco.ie/artsoffice

be “New Beginnings” (all mediums con-

AxIS BAllyMUN

t telephone

sidered).

Arts & Disability Ireland and axis: Bal-

086 373 4662

The exhibition will be profession-

lymun are delighted to announce their

Submissions now open for the 4th Alli-

ally curated and it is intended that the

new performing arts residency, 'Play-

DIy phOTOGRAphy wORkShOp

ance Française Photography Award in

resulting exhibition will showcase the

ground For Artists With Disabilities'.

DIY Photography 2 day Workshop

collaboration with the Fondation Alli-

exceptional talent and diversity of Visu-

This residency is designed to support

conducted by Sally Timmons will take

ance Française, Paris. The theme of the

al Artists in the Midlands today. Further

the professional development of, and

place at Commonplace Studios 10

competition is ‘Play’. Submissions are be-

guidelines and info:

the creation of new work by performing

Burgh Quay, Dublin 2. 16 – 17 Novem-

ing sought from artists of all nationalities

Deadline

artists with disabilities.

ber, 10am to 3pm both days. Cost: €90

AlliANce PHotogrAPHy y Aw AwArD

fUNDiNG

TOURING & DISSEMINATION The Arts Council invites applications for

living in Ireland and Northern Ireland, to

19 November (between 1pm and 5pm).

the Touring and Dissemination of Work

enter a national and international pho-

Scheme – for proposals seeking funding

tography competition. The national ex-

in support of initiatives that are of high artistic quality and that generally have a

ie

artists coming together to exhibit) will

The chosen artist will receive an

(inc) for two days (workshops are lim-

Contact

artists’ fee of ˆ 5000 and an access bud-

ited to five participants) ˆ 65 for one day

Emma Barone

get of up to ˆ 2000, along with studio

(Saturday only)

hibition will run from the 5 December

address

and performance space, (axis is home

Over two days participants will be

2013 – 31 January 2014.

Birr Theatre & Arts Centre, Oxmantown

to a dance studio, a recording studio,

given an insight into DIY photography and portable darkroom construction.

strong audience focus.

Hall, Birr, Co. Offaly

an art studio and a theatre.) ADI and

Tours must begin between July

comprises: a ˆ 500 grant, sponsored by the

Telephone

axis: Ballymun will also communicate

Workshops are restricted to small

2014 and December 2014. Applications

Ireland Fund of France; A French course

057 9122893

information about the artist’s work and

numbers allowing participants to con-

are also accepted for advance planning -

at the Alliance Française Dublin, worth

email

progress during the residency period

struct a pinhole camera from scratch,

ie for tours beginning January 2015 and

€350, together with complimentary ac-

emma.birrtheatre@gmail.com

via their websites, social networks and

take pictures, develop paper negatives

December 2015.

cess to our Library for one year; The win-

Web

other platforms. Duration: six months

using homemade ‘coffee’ developer

Applications will be accepted for

ner will also receive return flights to Paris

www.birrtheatre.com

(Jan – Jun 2014). Eligibility: performing

(Cafenol C) and to scan and print the

the following artforms: Artform & prac-

for the launch of his/her exhibition in a

artists with disabilities or companies of

resulting photographs. This workshop

all disciplines aged 18. Further details:

is open to anyone with an interest in photography and no experience is re-

The Alliance Française Dublin Prize

tices: Architecture, Arts participation,

Parisian Gallery with the publication of

T lBOT GAllERy TA ERy & STUDIOS ER

Circus, Dance, Festivals and events, Film,

an official catalogue (distributed world-

Talbot Gallery & Studios is currently

email

Literature (English language), Literature

wide)

welcoming submissions for its 2014

amie@adiarts.ie,

(Irish language), Music, Spectacle, Street

deadline

exhibition programme. Applicants can

axisballymun.ie

Wear suitable clothing for possible wet

arts, Theatre, Traditional arts, Venues,

23 November 2013

submit proposals for the following: Solo

t telephone

weather conditions

Visual arts, Young people children and

email

Exhibition – an opportunity for indi-

018509002 / 018832100

t telephone

the arts.

programming@alliance-francaise.ie

viduals wishing to present a cohesive

deadline

086 3963845

Web

body of work, which enables the artist

14 November

email

www.alliance-francaise.ie

to push the boundaries of their practice.

commonplaceprojects@gmail.com

from organisations and individuals. Ap-

Artist Initiative Project – this allows an

Website

plications which demonstrate collabo-

artist or group of artists to utilise the

www.commonplace.ie/news

The Touring and Dissemination of Work Scheme is open to applications

irish bronze Dedicated to the faithful reproduction of the sculptor’s vision

niamh.nic@

quired. All materials will be provided.

meeting room@vai Visual Artists ireland’s reland’s meeting room is available to hire for workshops, meetings, presentations, discussions groups etc.

T: 01 454 2032 E: irishbronze@eircom.net W: www.irishbronze.ie

for more information visit www.visualartists.ie CaPaCity Boardroom style:14 people; Theatre style: 20 people rAtes Members Visual Arts organisations other organisations and Professionals

Willie Malone: casting sculpture for over two decades Kilmainham Art Foundry Ltd. t/a Irish Bronze, Inchicore Rd and Griffith College, Dublin 8

ˆ 60 full day, ˆ 80 full day ˆ 120 full day

ˆ 30 half day ˆ 40 half day ˆ 60 half day

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

35

oPPorTUNiTieS

! caution We strongly advise readers to verify all details to their own satisfaction before forwarding art work, money etc.

VAi ProfeSSioNAl DeVeloPMeNT in the College of Science; Access to UCD

dents; provide technical support to both

library; An opportunity to develop your

students and staff in the use of all the

practice through collaboration with sci-

equipment; assist, support and facilitate

entists and researchers at UCD College of

lecturing staff in the delivery of practice-

Science; Opportunity to apply for further

based film and screen media teaching;

funding towards exhibition/performance

demonstrate the use of all equipment to

of work at the end of the residency. Fur-

students and supervise practical work/

ther details from:

projects; develop the Discipline’s online

Web

presence and oversee its website and au-

www.ucdartinscience.com

diovisual channels.

deadline

Closing date

17:00 hrs 20 November

12 November

VAI professIonAl deVelopment dublin, Galway, ennistymon, Belfast information / register NortherN IrelaNd www.visualartists.org.uk/services/professionaldevelopment/current republIc of IrelaNd www.visualartists.ie/education/register-for-our-events/

Contact TBG&S

Dr Gwenda Young, Codirector of Film

In addition to the nine studios awarded

and Screen Media

to artists earlier in 2013, five studios

email

will become available for occupancy in

g.young@ucc.ie

January 2014. TBG+S is now inviting ap-

t telephone

plications from artists to for occupancy

(021) 4902776.

of these studios, for periods of one year (project studio) or three years (member-

ThE hUNT MUSEUM

ship studio). Guidelines on how to apply

The Hunt Museum is currently seeking a

for the studios and an application form

Community Access Officer. Part-Time –

is available to download on the website.

22.5 hours per week, temporary contract

Fees for the studios are considerably

until Dec 2014. Department: Education,

subsidised and are inclusive of heating,

Outreach and Public Programmes. Salary:

electricity and Wifi.

ˆ 19,900 pro rata

deadline

As part of Limerick City of Culture 2014,

5.30pm 11 November

The Hunt Museum will design, develop

Website

and deliver Communities of Culture

www.templebargallery.com

(CC), a programme exploring the dif different unique cultural experiences and

RESIDENcy GlENS Of ANTRIM

heritages of each of Limerick’s regen-

DRAw RA ING & p RAw pAINTING

Residency / Retreat Opportunity in the

eration areas – Southill, Ballinacurra

Course 1: Figure Drawing and Painting

Glens of Antrim. The residency offers

Weston, Moyross and St Mary’s Park.

Course 2: Object Drawing

a self contained cottage in a beautiful

The Community Access Officer

With Artists Paddy McCann and Sharon

stress free location in the scenic Glens of

(CAO) will be an integral part of the

Kelly runs on Saturday 30 November

Antrim. It is a place for artists to think,

team developing and delivering Com-

and Sunday1 December from10.30am to

plan, work, walk, and be inspired. There

munities of Culture across these areas.

4.30pm daily. Classes will be held in the

are limited opportunities to engage

The CAO will be line-managed by The

Main Hall, Holy Trinity National School,

with the local community. The venue

Hunt Museum Curator of Education

Westport. Cost is ˆ 95 (participants need

is operated by an established artist, Ray-

and Outreach Dr Dominique Bouchard

to bring their own materials). 2 courses

mond Watson. The residency venue

and work closely with partner organisa-

will run simultaneously, participants

is recently established and is happy to

tions in the delivery of the programme.

may choose either Figure drawing and

receive ideas from artists as to how the

Through a series of targeted communi-

painting or Object drawing. Booking is

residency can be improved.

ty- and museum-based multi-workshop

essential by Monday 4th November

Contact

projects, the CAO will contribute to the

Contact

Raymond Watson

development and delivery of commu-

Cas McCarthy

Website

nity-based groups in expressing their

t telephone

www.irishartworld.com

unique stories and contribution to the

087 293 4772

email

cultural landscape of Limerick.

email

raymie.watson@gmail.com

Closing date 5pm 22 November

casmccarthy@gmail.com

Website

joBS / VAcANcieS reSiDeNcieS / STUDioS

www.huntmuseum.com

126 GAllerY, GAlWAY

VAi officeS, DUBliN

Development & Proposals for Artist-led groups and individual Artists; with rosie lynch & marianne o’Kane-Boal In partnership with 126 Galway Wed 6 Nov (10.30 – 16.30) @ ROOM SC 200B, The Concourse, NUI, Galway.

Cost: ˆ 40 / ˆ 20 (VAI/ 126 Members) Places: 20

Public Art case study – a talk with artist John Byrne Thurs 7 Nov (15.00 – 17.00) @Visual Artists Ireland, Dublin Cost: ˆ 20 / ˆ 10 (VAI Members) Places: 15 – 20

eNNiSTYMoN Developing Proposals with marianne o'Kane Boal Tues 5 Nov (10.30 – 16.30) @Ennistymon Courthouse Studios Cost: ˆ 80/ ˆ 40 (VAI Members) Places: 12 (places prioritised for Ennistymon Courthouse Studio artists) working with Public galleries with Helen carey Fri 8 Nov (15.30 – 17.30) @Ennistymon Courthouse Studios Cost: ˆ 20 / ˆ 10 (VAI Members) Places: 20+ (places prioritised for Ennistymon Courthouse Studio artists) writing the Artists' statement cV with Áine Philips Thurs 5 Dec (10.30 – 16.30) @Ennistymon Courthouse Studios Cost: ˆ 80 / ˆ 40 (VAI Members) Places: 10 (places prioritised for Ennistymon Courthouse Studio artists)

email education@huntmuseum.com

THe WorKerS cAfe,TBG&S Ucc SEEkS TEchNIcAl OffIcER

ucD scieNce

Film and Screen Media is a newly estab-

UCD College of Science invites applica-

lished discipline in the College of Arts,

tions for a one-year artist in residence

Celtic Studies and Social Sciences at

scheme. This year the residency will be

University College Cork. Based in both

offered to three artists. The aim of the

the Schools of English and of Languages,

residency is to facilitate collaborative

Literatures and Cultures, the Discipline

work between artists and scientists from

has recently introduced a Major BA de-

all areas of research within UCD College

gree in Film and Screen Media with a

of Science. The 2014 residency will be of of-

yearly intake of 35 students.

fered to a performance artist, a visual art-

Applications are invited for this

ist and a sound artist/composer and will

part-time permanent position. The suc-

begin in January 2014. We’re particularly

cessful candidate will be expected to

interested in artists who have a track re-

oversee, maintain and restore all hard-

cord in collaborative work and/or expe-

ware and software of the Discipline’s

rience in making science related work.

video and sound equipment, Mac

What we offer: Studio space; Artists fee

computer student lab, and individual

of €6,000; Access to lectures and courses

computers provided for staff and stu-

the container and the contained – Artists’ Publishing workshop with lynn Harris Sat 9 Nov (10.30 – 16.30) @Temple Bar Gallery and Studios Cost:ˆ 60 / ˆ 30 (VAI Members) Places: 10 mechanical inventions – A talk about Print on Demand with lynn Harris Sun 10 Nov (13.00 – 14.00) @Temple Bar Gallery and Studios Cost: ˆ 10 / ˆ 5 (VAI Members) Places: 25

Peer critique Painting with Vicky wright Thurs 27 March (10.30 – 16.30) @Visual Artists Ireland, Dublin Cost: ˆ 80 / ˆ 40 (VAI Members) Places: 6

BelfAST eXPoSeD Visual Artists Ireland training in partnership with Belfast Exposed self-publishing for Artists and Artist-led groups with lynn Harris Fri 8 Nov. (10.30 – 16.30) @Belfast Exposed Gallery Cost: £40/ £20 (VAI BX Members) Places:10 Documenting your work with John m lynch Wed 13 Nov (10.30 – 16.30) @Belfast Exposed Gallery Cost: £40/ £20 (VAI BX Members) Places:10 your trAiNiNg NeeDs If you are interested in suggesting training topics or want to request we repeat particular sessions please do get in touch.

Artist & tutors PANel Visual Artists Ireland has an ongoing open submission process for artists and arts professionals interested in being part of an available panel of tutors contributing to the VAI Professional Development Training Programme. For details go to our training registration page and click on Register for the PDT Artists Panel: http://visualartists.ie/ education-2/current-programme/

36

The Visual Artists’ News Sheet

November – December 2013

Pablo Helgeura's Artoons

return 2013 Claim Your Share Visual artists and beneficiaries whose work has appeared in Irish books or magazines can claim a share of royalties via our RETURN 2013 service, by Thursday 21 November 2013.

Apply online today : www.ivaro.ie/return T: 01 6729488

Anthologies of Artoons – Artoons 1,2 & 3 – are available from Jorge Pinto Books www.pintobooks.com Further information on author and artist Pablo Helguera can be found at www. pablohelguera.net

E: info@ivaro.ie

The Work of Micheal farrell November 9 - January 4

Micheal Farrell (1940-2000) | Miss O’Murphy d’après Boucher, 1976 | © The Artist’s Estate | Photo © National Gallery of Ireland

NASSIEM VALAMANESH Distant WorDs HASSAN HAJJAJ My rock stars ExpEriMEntal, VoluME 1 Curated by Rose Issa

Image © Nassiem Valamanesh, courtesy of Rose Issa Projects, London

November 15 - January 25

crawfordartgallery.ie

Behaviour Setting Michael Hanna Opening 6 December 2013, 7pm Exhibition continues until 25 January 2014 Artist’s Talk Saturday 14 December, 2pm A new publication accompanies the exhibition

This exhibition has been made possible through the Arts Council of Northern Ireland’s Artist Career Enhancement Programme (ACES)

The LAB, brought to you by Dublin City Council, is pleased to present

Culturefox.ie is the definitive online guide to Irish cultural events, giving you complete information about cultural activities both here and abroad.

Mark Durkan, Rombico, No Matter Where You Go, There You Are, Solstice Arts Centre, 2013, courtesy of the artist

To find out what’s on near you right now, visit Culturefox.ie on your computer or mobile phone.

Download the FREE App available now for:

iPhone | Android | Blackberry

Mark Durkan

I’m astonished, wall, that you haven’t collapsed into ruins Ground and First Floor Galleries

Séamus McCormack Spike, an overlay The Cube 15th November 2013 – 25th January 2014 (Mon – Fri 10am – 6pm, Sat 10am – 5pm) Preview: 6 – 8pm, 14th November The LAB T: Foley Street, Dublin 1 T: 01 222 5455 E: artsoffice@dublincity.ie W: www.thelab.ie