Seanán Oliver, Manfred Kerr, Fiach Mac Hale,
Ferdia Mag Lochlainn and Jane McGovern

This will be the first time these four young artists have exhibited together since recently graduating from the National College of Art and Design in Dublin. The exhibition is intended to provide the viewers with some thoughts to mull over through the impending mental hibernation brought on by the winter months.

Seanán Oliver Manfred Kerr, media artist and director of the Dublin Biennale, investigates notions of place and presence in his work. An expert filmmaker, he has recently become enamored with the idea of creating media art whilst avoiding the use of the screen.

Toward this he is interested in creating “location sculptures,” with sound accompaniments, and his work for the show will be an example of this.

www.seananolivermanfredkerr.com

Fiach Mac Hale’s (graduated NCAD 2005) work focuses on how our minds work in everyday life, on contradiction and confusion and how these things are overcome. Mac Hale works in a variety of media including sculpture, video, photography and drawing. His new work for this show is concerned specifically with the mental processes involved in decision-making and the eternal search for meaning, factual or otherwise.

www.machalefiach.blogspot.com

For this show Ferdia Mag Lochlainn (graduated NCAD 2005) has made new photographic works concerned with alternative ways one may portray a person or ones self. Mag Lochlainn is interested in the paradox of making a
more complete portrait through an incomplete photographic image. The work is broken down into two groups, “In their own words” and “Drawn out”. The work draws inspiration from ideas of optical blending, Guillaume Apollinaire’s Calligrammes and William S. Burroughs cut-ins.

Jane McGovern ..”There are infinite amounts of ways to interpret art and to argue what is best or most important, but in my eyes no one discipline of art or no one way of perceiving it is superior.” McGovern’s most recent work centres around when the process of becoming an artist began for her and a strong belief that art is in essence play, that it began in childhood.
“I think most humans will spend their adult years trying to revert back to the freedom from self-conciousness and the simplicity of childhood. To be frank if I’m not having fun then in my eyes there is little point to what I am creating.” In the words of Marcel Duchamp “there is a great dignity in humour”..

Ewoud Van Rijn (NL) illustrates lurid scenes of life sex and death in fairyland. The vast sheet of white paper is for him a theatrical space. As such it is the re-creation of a mental space; everything that takes place within is an enactment of mental processes and the impulses that trigger them. A few schematic props set the stage. Van Rijn’s protagonists, wide eyed, svelte nymphets, lounge around seductively. We are beguiled – until we realize that they are munching nonchalantly on a cannibal kill, or mutilating themselves, or drinking each other’s blood.

For further information:

Fiach Mac Hale

fiachmachale@gmail.com

Ph. 0876162352

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TONY CROSBIE

Crosbie’s internal struggle, splashed across large canvasses and drawings in this warehouse space, demand that the viewer engage with the work, a deeply personal exploration bearing witness to universal themes. These images represent an individual journey, reflecting the darker side of Ireland, an Ireland which many are unwilling to acknowledge, perhaps now more than ever. But it also represents the power of art to be redemptive and to heal.

If this was all that Crosbie’s work was to represent then it would be powerfully affecting but the artist moves past this personal statement to more universal themes: social injustice, human rights violations, the brutality of wars, and religious and political oppression, all come to mind as the viewer enters this exhibition.

The Wasteland paintings and drawings imply that the intrusion into our lives of these issues seem to either be viewed from a distance or be accepted as “normal“. As Crosbie states in the Wasteland catalogue, “It is almost as if keeping our eyes shielded and our mouths tightly shut, we have created a coping mechanism for life. By not facing reality, and the responsibility that brings, we become accomplices to every human rights violation and atrocity that is perpetrated around the world and in our own neighbourhoods.”

Sean Love, Director of Amnesty International in Ireland, who will be speaking at
the opening of Wasteland, states; “Tony Crosbie’s art is deeply disturbing. He bears witness to the suffering of people, ensuring we will see, no matter how much we prefer to avert our eyes. Tony’s Wasteland theme covers terrible realities, illustrating the horrors that human beings inflict on their fellow human beings.”

Tony Crosbie is one of those rare artists who chooses to play a role in change. For the past 10 years, he has exhibited works with similar messages in Ireland, Germany and the Caribbean. Artists like Crosbie, who take on political confrontation through their creativity, help us become aware of our own inability to pierce the dark observation of the decay all around us.

Crosbie, who has led creative workshops in Dublin and abroad for people in prison and with youth and adults at-risk, will be offering on-site workshops for any groups interested in viewing the exhibition and participating in visual and verbal dialogue based on what they see.

For further information, please contact Sandy Fitzgerald at: sandyfitzgerald@eircom.net

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Whacking Off

“After dessert – which I finish because I happen to like jello, even if I detest them – after dessert I am back in the bathroom again. I burrow through the weeks laundry until I uncover one of my sister’s soiled brassieres. I string one shoulder strap over the knob of the bathroom door and the other on the knob of the linen closet: a scarecrow to bring more dreams. “Oh beat it Big Boy, beat it to a red-hot pulp-” so I am being urged by the little cups of Hannah’s brassiere…Then Hannah’s brassiere begins to move. To swing to and fro! I veil my eyes, and behold! – Lenore Lapidus! who has the biggest pair in my class, running for the bus after school, her great untouchable load shifting weightily inside her blouse, oh I urge them up from their cups and over, LENORE LAPIDUS’S ACTUAL TITS, and realise in the same second that my mother is vigorously shaking the doorknob. Of the door that I have finally forgotten to lock! I knew it would happen one day! Caught! As good as dead!”

Adolescence as a realm of richly intense personal imaginaries is here observed as well as the potential for the frustrated and dissatisfied but creative individual to summon an imaginary space as remedy for an unsatisfactory world. Adolescence also plays itself out as a series of attempts at control, of examining boundaries, of pushing at authority. In fact, if we were not certain (as we are largely certain) that this period was something other than a necessary prelude to a life of conformity, then perhaps the period would have a different effect upon those who experience it and observe it: anything from fearful awe to subversive appeal. However, perhaps it is less the antagonism towards authority and more the potential for subverting the status quo with absolute individualism which is the most alarming aspect of an adolescent sensibility. What cannot be overlooked though is the implicit charge in beating a withdrawal from society when that withdrawal persists beyond the excusable period of adolescence – and what becomes informative is the mode that that withdrawal might take.

This exhibition is bringing together of a number of visual artists whose practices exhibit the tendency to establish complex systems of knowledge or belief in preference to the questionable myths which characterise contemporary life. The artists Robert Bidder (UK), David Buckley (Ireland), Tania Pérez Córdova (Mexico) David MacDermott (USA & Ireland) and Tobias Sjöberg (Sweden) engage in materially disparate practices, ranging from performance, to sculpture to video to research based practices, and each offer the evidence of exploration into personal imaginaries. The work is not moralizing; the purpose of the creation of this work is not to take up a position of antagonism towards society, although that is often the effect - a judgment of society seems implicit in the creation of such isolated systems.

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Gavin Delahunty, Rhona Byrne, Seamus Harahan and Michael Warren

For ‘Here, There & Otherwise’ three artists have been selected to produce new work following conversations with the curator around their ideas of time. The work, which includes installation, sculpture and film, will be exhibited in Broadstone Gallery and Studios. The title of the exhibition ‘Here, There & Otherwise’ is linked to these discussions by way of the following: ‘Here’ - present time or state, ‘There’ - places or points and ‘Otherwise’ - unexpected and unbelievable instances.

‘Here, There & Otherwise’ is curated by Gavin Delahunty and sponsored by PSP™ (PlayStation®Portable). A color booklet will accompany the exhibition including contributions by all the artists and an essay by the curator. ‘Here, There & Otherwise’ will be launched with a Tiger beer drinks reception at Broadstone Gallery and Studios, Hendron’s Building, Upper Dominick St. Dublin 2 Thursday, February 2nd at 6.00pm

Artists Projects

Michael Warren’s installation will employ sculpture from a series of work entitled Stele’s combining them with symbolic colour encountered while visiting Taoist temples. These sculptures are also accompanied by a photograph of the artist as a child beneath his bedroom window. This window acted as a gateway, through which he passed during his dreams in his youth.

Rhona Byrne’s playful sculpture consists of a ‘roundabout’ located between Warren and Harahan. The sculpture offers those who wish to go on a ride while visiting the exhibition, individually or as part of a group

Kelly Eginton (USA) hopes to discover something otherworldly by building up from the crudest and most basic elements until a presence is nearly or just barely perceptible. She considers true creative endeavour to be a humble and dangerous pursuit. One must be ever mindful of the perils of inviting the devil into ones house. Her stage like mine shaft sculpture conceals a hidden narrative of what lies beneath, or inside, her obsession with mountains.

Seamus Harahan’s film Tessies was shot in a cottage ‘Shebeen’ in east Tyrone during Christmas 2000. Tessie Dorman lived there with her son Mansy until her death, after which her nephew took over. No one seems to know how long it has been there. The film is an attempt to mediate and document the social space and the experience of a generation of people disenfranchised or marginalised by prevailing political and social temperatures. The film shows clips of a variety of characters in an ambiguous time, exchanging stories, song and chat that are arguably, legends, mantras and rumour

Seamus Harahan’s film Tessies was shot in a cottage ‘Shebeen’ in east Tyrone during Christmas 2000. Tessie Dorman lived there with her son Mansy until her death, after which her nephew took over. No one seems to know how long it has been there. The film is an attempt to mediate and document the social space and the experience of a generation of people disenfranchised or marginalised by prevailing political and social temperatures. The film shows clips of a variety of characters in an ambiguous time, exchanging stories, song and chat that are arguably, legends, mantras and rumour

Gavin Delahunty (1977) lives and works in Ireland. Having studied Fine Art he completed the MA in Visual Arts Practices (criticism) at Dun Laoghaire’s Institute of Art Design and Technology. He has worked for over five years in various cultural institutions and has curated several exhibitions including Obscured by Clouds, Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore, Here Comes Everybody and Warsaw He is currently employed as Project Coordinator: Exhibitions, The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Assistant Curator of Visual Arts, The Project Arts Centre, Consultant Curator, The Goethe Institut, and was Project Coordinator for Ireland at Venice ‘05 / as well as co-editor of the Biennale catalogue.

PlayStation Portable™ is a new handheld entertainment system that allows users to enjoy 3D games, with high-quality full-motion video, and high-fidelity stereo audio. With graphics rendering capability comparable to that of PlayStation®2, PlayStation Portable features a 4.3 inch widescreen, high-resolution TFT display. PlayStation Portable also adopts a newly developed compact but high-capacity (1.8GB) optical disc, Universal Media Disc (UMD), as its storage medium. With a wide range of accessories and connectivity options, including Memory Stick Duo™, USB 2.0, IR port and Wireless

Biographies

Rhona Byrne was born and lives in Dublin, she graduated with a BFA in sculpture from the National College of Art and Design, Dublin. She is currently an artist in residence at the Fire Station Artists studios in Dublin.
Recent exhibitions include: 2005; Superbia 2 Cork; Offside Hugh lane Dublin City Gallery, Dublin; Kliniczna, Gdansk; Vehicle, Cork; Transformation, Serbia Montenegro; Workroom press, The Workroom, Dublin; 2004; Transit, Dublin Fringe Festival; 2nd annual exhibition Billboart Gallery Europe, billboard sites in 13 European capital cities, book of ideas, Art scene warehouse, Shanghai; Home, Rhona Byrne and Ballymun pigeon club, Axis Arts Centre, Ballymun, Dublin, Book-show, Model Arts and Niland Gallery, Sligo; Room 106, la Stampa hotel, Dublin; 2003 Artists/Groups, Mongrel Foundation Collective, Project Arts Centre, Dublin

Michael Warren. Born in county Wexford in 1950, Michael Warren, attended Bath Academy of Art, Wiltshire, Trinity College, Dublin, completing his studies at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan, Italy. Over the past two decades he has produced large scale, site-responsive sculptures in the Far and Middle East, Europe, the French West Indies, the United States and South America. His work has been exhibited extensively both at home and abroad, and has received numerous awards including the Utsukushi-ga-hara Open Air Museum Award in Japan, 1989. He is represented in prestigious public and private collections worldwide. www.michaelwarren.ie

Seamus Harahan lives and works in Belfast. He completed an MFA, fine art at the University of Ulster in 2001. In 2005 Seamus film Holylands was selected as part of Northern Ireland’s participation at the 51st Venice Biennale after previously been screened to critical acclaim at Gimpel Fils Gallery, London; Transmission gallery, Glasgow; Project Arts Centre, Dublin. Amongst other distinctions Seamus undertook the Nordic institute for contemporary art (NIFCA) north network residency in Helsinki, 2002 has exhibited at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, 2002 and Ormeau Baths, 2001 and has featured in the Irish Times, The Sunday Times and Time Out London.

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JEANETTE DOYLE

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