I drew some maps recently for a new book by Raymond Barrett called ‘Dubai Dreams: Inside the Kingdom of Bling‘, it got great reviews, was The Irish Times book of the day upon it’s release and is available to buy on Amazon. The maps are nothing fancy, just clear and concise, illustrating how the UAE fits into the Gulf region, and it’s proximity to it’s neighbours, especially Saudi-Arabia and Iran.
Raymond is a journalist who has lived in Kuwait for ten years and writes on Middle Eastern affairs for The Sunday Business Post, Foreign Policy and The Guardian amongst others.
This is one of a series of images I made recently called ‘Consequences of Love’, after the beautiful novel by Sulaiman Addonia.
The image arose from my observation of the early evening ritual of the men and women of the Moroccan town of Essaouira, many of whom take a stroll about the battlements of it’s sea wall before nightfall. The men are typically alone, the women in small groups, I thought there was something poetic and melancholy about it. It certainly ads a palpable atmosphere or frisson.
It reminded me very much of Addonia’s book, which is set in Riyadh, Saudi-Arabia, a place where contact between men and women outside the home is all but impossible (but especially for the poor), and all public contact between the sexes is controlled by Sharia.
I loved this show in the RHA recently, an inspired and generous effort, and a great use of the large upstairs space at the RHA. Everyone I spoke to about it was hugely impressed.
Nevan’s work has had a strong popular following, and despite an overall positive critical reception for the show, the reviews while positive in tone, were with a few exceptions somewhat less generous in spirit than the exhibition itself. On the evidence of the overall response to this show though, I think even his critics may be starting to warm to him.
This model for a series of sculptural forms inspired by packing palettes, the paintings of Mondrian and the De Stihl art movement, and the current trend for modularity in culture, politics and design was shown in Temple Bar Gallery & Studios as part of ‘The BiG Store’ show curated by Alan Butler and Lola Rayne Booth.
Custom made palettes are stacked or arranged, separated by planes or panels derived from Mondrian’s palette, these can be re-arranged, wall mounted or extented in multiple ways to meet the requirements of the space available.
These pieces continue my fascination with the modernist aesthetic as it re-appears in systems, spaces and forms in our society, and employs the concepts of scalability, and redundancy to reveal the characteristics of current critical dilemmas.
A busload of artists from Ranelagh, and their friends- painters, photographers, video artists and scribes – descended on Leap Castle in Co. Offaly, home of Tin-Whistle ‘Maestro’ Sean Ryan, his wife Ann Callanan and their daughter (step dancing champion and musician extraordinaire) Ciara Ryan, in July of this year.
The artists photographed, sketched and recorded their memories, lunch was served and strong drink imbibed. Sean and Ciara were joined by their friend, De Dannan’s Alec Finn, stopping in on his way to the Willie Clancy Week in Milltown Malbay and a music session ensued. The resulting exhibition records their impressions of a haunting and magical place.
Artists include Charles Crockatt, Felicity Finlay, Niall Flaherty, Gerhardt Gallagher, Brian Henderson, Eamon Gogarty, Angel Luis Gonzalez Imelda Healy, Kate Horgan, Ann Murphy, Katy Simpson, Darragh Owens, Robin Price, Rory Pierce and Heather Finn.
NEU! New Emerging Undergraduates Ella Bertilsson, Cormac Browne, Cristina Bunello, AJ Doyle, Helen Horgan, Sam Keogh & Serena Teehan
Selected by the Monster Truck Curators: Michelle Considine, Lola Rayne Booth, Peter Prendergast Niall Flaherty, Jonathan Mayhew, Sharon Phelan & Davey Moor
at Monster Truck Gallery & Studios 16 July 2009- 27 July 2009 Launch: Thurs 16 July, 6-8pm Also launching: Multiples Cabinet series 1, True + False
Monster Truck Gallery and Studios presents NEU! – New Emerging Undergraduateds, an exhibition of seven young artists carefully selected from this years graduating classes at NCAD, DIT and IADT by the seven members of Monster Truck’s Curatorial Team. Each of these artists were selected by a different person for very different reasons, and all of the artists in this show demonstrate individual and distinct practices, reflecting the different tastes and interests of our curators. We hope that this show will provide a comprehensive overview of some of the highlights of the graduating class of 2009.
Serena Teehan’s work has stemmed from inquiries into belief structures and she is particularly interested in the complex symbolic relationship which individuals have with objects. Serena produces tactile, puzzle-like hybrids, using materials brought beyond their recognizable forms, such as hula hoop’s and coated polystyrene. The arrangement of the objects in space is intended to arouse curiosity and to explore how we ascribe meaning to things based on our own beliefs.
I chose Serena’s work for NEU! because it represents the difficulty of reading meaning from form. Her apparently universal shapes, seemingly derived from a library of forms and cosmological spaces are purposefully shaped but refuse to be fixed in meaning.
Opening reception:
6–8pm Wednesday, 17th June 2009
Exhibition continues:
12–6pm, 18th–20th June 2009
Plotting a course… following a path… pursuing their own process… 10 to 12 artists set out together to trace a new route. With a lightness of touch, embracing models of production and activity from artists they admire, they develop for themselves new practices to describe their world.
Trace is the inaugural show of a new artists’ collective called ’10to12artists’, formed by graduates of IADT in 2008. The show features new works in a variety of media including drawing, painting, photography, video and installation.
10to12artists are: Lorraine Byrne, Gráinne Brady, Pamela de Brí, Charles Henihan, Jacinta Hughes, Denise Kevany, John Murray, Joe Nagle, Roma Przedpelska, Ann Turpin and Mary Quinn.
The works for Trace have been selected by Niall Flaherty, who is a practicing artist and educator, a founder member of Blackletter Artists Group and currently a member of Monster Truck Gallery’s curatorial team.
This is an artist-initiated project, as part of the independent summer programme of exhibitons at the Pallas Contemporary Projects
My curated show in Monster Truck opened last Thursday, hope you get along to have a look before it closes on the 16th of June. It features the work of 3 painters I really like: Séamus O’Rourke, Emma Roche and Adam Bohanna.
Did you ever wonder where the actors from The Famous Five TV series are now? While looking it up I found this site… and the unfolding of a 7 year mystery for some. It’s not exactly a mystery in the style of one of The Five’s adventures, and it ended up on Ray D’arcy’s Fix-it Friday apparently, so you may have known about it already 🙂
It starts in 2002 when someone asks whatever happened to the actress who played ‘George’ from The Famous Five, and when the answer comes in that she has died, these on-line sleuths don’t take it too well. Nostalgic, touching, and weirdly obsessional people mulling over the death (maybe?) of someone they don’t know, relying on sources they don’t fully trust or don’t want to believe.
I’m curating a show for Monstertruck which opens on June 4th. It’s a painting show featuring the work of Emma Roche, Adam Bohanna and Seamus O’Rourke. Each of the artists produces work which somehow touches off the notion of process painting, but each has their own twist that I hope will bring something very special to the mix.
I’ve just finished doing up the invite for the show so I thought I’d include it here.
Cliona Harmey and myself made this piece representing Blackletter’s working methods, the show took place in the IMOCA space on Jamestown Road. It was curated by Sally Timmons and Paul Murnahan, who invited art groups to create work together to represent their idea of who they are. Our idea was to show that Blackletter exists to provide others with spaces for expression, so we painted the floor black, and made a trolley for chalks and chalk-duster shoes!
The slideshow includes a few pics of some other great pieces made for the show by The Good Hatchery, MART, Monstertruck and Art / Not Art.
I drew some maps recently for a new book by Raymond Barrett called ‘Dubai Dreams: Inside the Kingdom of Bling‘, it got great reviews, was The Irish Times book of the day upon it’s release and is available to buy on Amazon. The maps are nothing fancy, just clear and concise, illustrating how the UAE fits into the Gulf region, and it’s proximity to it’s neighbours, especially Saudi-Arabia and Iran.
NEU! New Emerging Undergraduates Ella Bertilsson, Cormac Browne, Cristina Bunello, AJ Doyle, Helen Horgan, Sam Keogh & Serena Teehan 
