Amharcealaín | Visual Art
BALLINA ARTS CENTRE
Barrett St, Ballina, Co. Mayo.
T: 096 73593
The Opera / Untouched: Varvara Shavrova
Official Opening: Thursday 3rd May, 8pm
During the month of May, Ballina Arts Centre will present two exhibitions by renowned multimedia artist Varvara Shavrova.
Using the Ballina Civic Offices exhibition space and the Arts Centre’s own gallery space, the two exhibitions will run simultaneously throughout the month, with The Opera at Ballina Arts Centre and Untouched at Ballina Civic Offices
The Opera is Shavrova’s spellbinding insight into the fragile world of the Peking Opera, one ofChina’s most revered artforms. The famous Peking Opera, when first encountered in a dilapidated tea house inBeijing, was to prove an epiphany for artist Varvara Shavrova. Fascinated by the high-pitched singing, the music, the dancing and the costumes, the artist set about documenting this ‘world of pure art’ in the video piece entitled ‘Opera’, including the archaic costumes (hand-embroidered silk); the two hour make-up application sittings, all shot at various Peking Opera performances, theatres, dressing rooms, and private meetings. ‘Opera’ is scored by Benoit Granieb (formerly Professor of Music atTrinityCollege,Dublin), combining traditional Irish and Chinese music.
Untouched is a photographic and multimedia show in which artist Shavrova juxtaposes the small farming community of Ballycastle in Co. Mayo, with one particularBeijingneighbourhood (pre-Olympics) that is currently undergoing a major redevelopment.
Using both visual and audiovisual frameworks, she juxtaposes and compares the lives of these two communities, and highlights the fascinating similarities in what determines how lives are led in two very different cultural and social environments.
Presented as a large-scale photographic installation, we see the stark black and white images of old Hutong neighbourhoods inBeijingset against photographs of abandoned cottages in ruralCountyMayoinIreland.
Varvara Shavrova was born inMoscow,Russia. She lived and worked inLondonfor over 15 years, with intensive periods of work also spent inIreland. In 2005 she moved toBeijing,China, where now lives and works with her Irish engineer husband and their two young sons.
Shavrova’s solo exhibitions span the globe includingLondon,Dublin, Frankfurt,Moscow,St. Petersburg,ShanghaiandBeijing.
Admission free. All welcome. Runs until 26th May.
Gallery Tours
Sean Walsh will lead Gallery Tours of the two exhibitions by Varvara Shavrova, presented by Ballina Arts Centre in May.
Friday 4th May, 11am (The Opera). Adm: Free
Friday 25th May, 11am (Untouched). Adm: Free
For further details about the artist, please visit www.varvarashavrova.com
CUSTOM HOUSE STUDIOS
The Quay,Westport, Mayo
T: 098-28735.
Islands
Custom House Studios are pleased to invite you to IslandsThursday May 3rd at 6.00 pm at Westport Quay. Guest speaker Dr Gisela Holfter Senior Lecturer inGermanUniversity ofLimerick Exhibition runs every day until 27th May 2012.
‘Islands’
Perhaps those who inhabit islands have a particular kind of spatial awareness, aware as they always are that sooner or later the land stops and the sea begins.
(‘Islands, Literature, and Cultural Translatability’, Stephanos Stephanides et Susan Bassnett)
An international group of artists: Pierre Bourgault (Canada), Mike Byrne (Ireland), Mels Dees (theNetherlands), David Lilburn (Ireland) and Marielle van den Bergh (theNetherlands), have begun the process of collaborating on a joint artistic project on the subject of islands. The artistic vision, practice and media used by these individual artists vary widely, but their work is linked by a fascination with the sea and coastline in their respective countries. Their involvement and engagement with the project, coming as they do from widely contrasting backgounds and experience will, we hope, lead to the creation of a facinating body of work, which will form the
basis of an exhibition, designed to travel to galleries inIrelandand theNetherlands.
The Exhibition will be launched at the Custom House Gallery,Westport,County Mayo,Ireland, on Thursday, 3rd May 2012 to Sunday 27th, May 2012.
The Artists
Pierre Bourgault
As Canadian critic Louise Déry writes “Pierre Burgault speaks to me of the sea, of his boats, his voyages..of art...” The sea, the oceans, islands, nautical charts, sailing, sea salt, voyages, all play a vital part in the artistic oevre of French Canadian artist Pierre Bourgault. Bourgault’s proposal for the exhibition includes what he calls ‘water drawings’; drawings made on water with a fast boat and variously recorded e.g. relayed to a remote screen as it is created or printed onto large scale nautical charts.
Mike Byrne
Printmaker and cermacist Mike Byrne has undertaken a number of voyages off the south and west coast ofIreland. Drawings made on a boat trip around theBlasketIslandsare the origin of the current series of relief prints which he is making for the exhibition.
Mels Dees
Mels Dees grew up on the DutchislandofWalcheren, where, he writes, in “the medieval harbours of Veere and Middelburg, following centuries of war, remnants of the past - from pottery shards to machine-gun bullets – were all around and constituted the most treasured toys for children like me.” Dees is currently working on a residency with the European Ceramic Work Centre in theNetherlands, exploring among other ideas, ‘pottery shards’ which will form the basis of his work for the exhibition.
David Lilburn
The graphic artist David Lilburn, as Aidan Dunne writes.. ‘habitually alludes to map-making in his informal, highly personal accounts of place. His works are repositories of all sorts of information, topographical and anecdotal, in the form of representations, notes, calculations, collage and asides,
compendious attempts to remember lost time’. Lilburn will exhibit some of his large-scale drypoint prints on the theme of islands.AchillIsland, Inish Boffin and theBlasketIslandsfeature in his recent graphic work.
Marielle van den Bergh
Islands have also long held a special attraction for Dutch sculptor Marielle van den Bergh “from the moment”, she writes, “I set foot on one of the Wadden islands in the north ofHolland”. Van den Bergh’s work uses a wide variety of materials and processes in her work from cast bronze torice paper, blown glass to found organic material. She is currently working on large scale tapestries, some of which will be included in the exhibition.
Atlantic Trees - Emma Barone
Custom House Studios are pleased to invite you to Atlantic Trees by Emma Barone on Thursday May 3rd at 6.00pm at Westport Quay. Exhibition runs every day until 27th May 2012.
‘Atlantic Trees’ is a project which aims to deliver a series of site specific tree paintings. Emma has long been fascinated by the shape trees adopt on the West Coast of Ireland. This shape, or form, presents as a distinctive windblown profile, one that is sculpted by the elements. The proximity of the Atlantic Oceanis a major determining factor in terms of influencing and moulding the shape of the trees.
She sees this physical manifestation of ‘shape’ as having spiritual, psychological, elemental and socio-historical dimensions.
Trees have an energy which absorbs, responds and emits in a cyclical, generational, manner.
It is her intention to capture these layers, through the medium of art and to share her vision in a way that the observer can connect to and re-establish an already existing relationship with past, present and future.
‘Atlantic Trees’ promises to be as diverse (due to the many layers it will explore) as it will be unique. The ultimate intention will be to provoke and challenge while at the same time, providing spiritual comfort.
LINENHALL ARTS CENTRE
Linenhall St, Castlebar, Mayo.
T: 094 9023733
E: linenhall@anu.ie
W: www.thelinenhall.com
Friday 4th - Saturday 26th May
Sinéad Ní Maonaigh
Sinead Ni Mhaonaigh's paintings are, according to art critic Aidan Dunne, “poised between austerity and luxuriance. Structurally they are often spare and concise, featuring simplified geometric motifs, but their surfaces are luscious, consisting of thick coats of rich oil pigment, beautifully textured.” Her practice explores the liminal space between object and form, and within their expressive eloquence they also explores the very act of painting itself. Sinéad is based in Dublin. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, and is included in many public collections, including Contemporary Irish Arts Society, Arts Council of Ireland and the OPW. In 2009 she was shortlisted for the AIB Art Prize and was selected for Futures exhibition at the RHA Gallagher Gallery, while in 2010 she won the Hennessy Craig Scholarship at the RHA. Imbued with “a strong emotive charge”, art critic Catherine Leen has described Sinéad’s as “an artistic practice as profound as it is prolific.” A fine show in prospect.
Adm. free
Official opening on Friday 4th May at 7.30pm. All welcome.
The Ballinglen Arts Foundation
Main Street, Ballycastle, Co Mayo.
Tel/Fax 096 43184
E: baf@iol.ie
W: www.ballinglenartsfoundation.org
Images from North Mayo
"Images from North Mayo" a diverse range of work, curated from The Ballinglen Archive includes work by Irish & International artists Richard Gorman, Barbara Rae, Arno Kramer, Janet Pierce, Joe Dunne & Colin Martin to name a few. Although the work evolves from the relationship of each artist with the landscape of the West Coast of Ireland all have a distinctive style which is very exciting.
"Barbara Rae's work reveal her skill at manipulating form and colour and portray specific features in the landscape, which she uses as departure points for a flight of colour and sweeping primordial shapes. These rich, vibrant images reflect the unparalleled technique of one of Scotland's most gifted painters and finest printmakers, a recognised master of colour."
An extract by Aidan Dunne typifies Arno's work from the collection which includes a hare as described below.
"Arno Kramer's drawings don't give up all their secrets at first glance. They are built up in layers, and in a sense they must also be broken down layer by layer, patiently. Sometimes an image - typically a fragment of or a whole human body, or perhaps a hare - will magically coalesce out of an arrangement of colour and pattern, and then quietly merge into the background again. The effect is of a series of ghostly presences drifting through a dreamlike, meditative space."