Exhibition Roundup

Dublin

Atelier Now ‘Remnants’, Domino Whisker’s first solo show, refers to what is left behind after experiencing great loss – moments, memories, tangled threads of what was before. These works are the result of the artist piecing together fragments to make something whole again, for the sake of self-preservation. Depicting her dreams and nightmares, the work moves through darkness into light. Picking up the threads of what was left behind, Whisker stitches them into a story that ripples and thunders according to the ebb and flow of her emotions, on from 18 November to 4 December. ateliernow.ie

Hang Tough Gallery The group show, ‘11/11’, at Hang Tough Contemporary featured four Irish artists: Sarah Wren Wilson, an Irish artist based between Dublin and the West of Ireland; Shea Dalton, a practicing artist based in Dublin; Lee Welch (IRL/USA) who completed an MFA at the Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam and gained his BFA from the National College of Art and Design, Dublin; and Fergal Styles, an artist living and working in Dublin. The exhibition was on display from 11 to 28 November.

Hugh Lane Gallery Cecil King (1921–1986) had a close association with the Hugh Lane Gallery. His first retrospective was held there in 1981, and he was Vice Chairman of the ROSC exhibition’s Executive Committee when the gallery hosted ROSC ’77. The gallery presented King’s work to mark the 100th anniversary of his birth, and to celebrate his achievements as one of Ireland’s most significant modern artists. The Hugh Lane Gallery’s collection of Cecil King’s work ranges from the 1960s to the 1980s and includes paintings, prints and tapestry. The exhibition ran from 11 May to 28 November 2021.

Kerlin Gallery Currently showing at Kerlin Gallery until 12 January is ‘Spaced Out’, a solo exhibition of new paintings and rugs by Irish artist, Isabel Nolan. Nolan’s expansive practice probes cosmological phenomena, religious reliquaries, Greco-Roman sculptures and literary/historical figures, examining the behaviour of humans and animals alike. Driven by “the calamity, the weirdness, horror, brevity and wonder of existing alongside billions of other preoccupied humans”, her works give generous form to fundamental questions about the ways in which the chaos of the world is made beautiful or given meaning through human activity. kerlingallery.com

MART ‘FRAGMENT MOUTH’ was an exhibition of performance documentation, video and drawing selected from a substantial body of work developed over the past number of years by Dominic Thorpe. The work in ‘FRAGMENT MOUTH’ comes from an ongoing exploration of empathic embodied and contextual responses to collective memory, related to Ireland’s history of institutional abuses and conflict. This includes work that explores the complex reality of perpetrator trauma that occurs within contexts of atrocity and gets passed through generations. The exhibition was on display from 17 to 27 November. mart.ie

Pallas Projects/Studios Pallas Projects/Studios presented Katherine Sankey’s ‘Hydrozomes // water bodies’ as the tenth and final exhibition of the PP/S 2020/21 Artist-Initiated Projects programme. Sankey’s sculpture uses living plant tissue and human supply lines to engage in the geo-feminist conversation about what we gouge and suck from the planet. Her practice examines mutation and the human extractive machine of supply and power in a multi-species context. Her artworks engage with how we as people adapt and colonise as well as inhabit territories. The exhibition was on display from 11 to 27 November. pallasprojects.org

Belfast

ArtisAnn Gallery The ‘Christmas Showcase’ featured over 50 artists showing over 100 artworks in total. Dr Ann, of ArtisAnn, said: “We love Christmas and it can’t come early enough for us, so we want to share the anticipations and our excitement with our customers old and new. The most you’ll pay for anything in the upstairs gallery is £300.” Other artworks were added to the show over the course of the exhibition as items were sold and taken away. The Christmas Showcase ran from 3 November to 18 December.

Belfast Exposed Belfast Exposed presented a solo photographic exhibition ‘Beasts of Burden’ of new works by Paul Seawright. This insightful exhibition was showcased as part of the Belfast International Arts Festival 2021. The Exhibition Opening Night took place during Late Night Art on the evening of 7 October. In ‘Beasts of Burden’, Paul Seawright turns his attention to the Rwandan genocide of 1994. 25 years later a project, “Cows for Peace”, pairs perpetrators with their victims, who raise a cow together to reconcile and develop a sustainable future. belfastexposed.org

Naughton Gallery ‘SLIP TANK’ is part laboratory, part playground. In this major new solo exhibition by Belfast-based artist John Rainey, the sculptures and installations are concerned with things not being as they seem. Exploring portals, post-internet worlds, and sculptural glitches, Rainey makes reinterpretations and remakes of familiar forms using both old and new methods of object making; a combination of traditional casting processes (using materials like porcelain) and digital fabrication technologies such as 3D printing. The exhibition runs from 21 October to 23 January.

Gallery 545 Gallery 545 presented its annual group exhibition featuring and celebrating several accomplished artists based in Northern Ireland. This exhibition showcased a curated selection of diverse original artworks, on display both at the gallery and online. All the exhibiting artists are represented by Gallery 545, a gallery specialising in contemporary art of Northern Ireland. They are emerging or more established artists who have encountered recognition here and beyond. The variety in the selection reflects the diversity and originality of their practice, as they have created works drawing upon different themes and ideas. Displayed from 13 November to 5 December. gallery545.com

QSS Artist Studios The 2019 MFA group from Belfast School of Art, UU began their degree pre-Covid. Their first year was cut short, studios were packed-up and practices moved to alternative, makeshift spaces. In Year 2, further disruptions ensued with many live shows cancelled or transferred online; as was the case for the Degree Show. The November show at QSS provided an opportunity for this cohort of emerging artists to exhibit physically alongside one another. The title of the show ‘The Presence of Absence’, reflects this sentiment by exploring the experienced effects of the pandemic. Displayed from 4 to 25 November. queenstreetstudios.net

Re-Vision Performing Arts Festival Tidal, is a five-part immersive audio-visual project by David Bickley, made in collaboration with Seattle poet, Shin Yu Pai. Tidal explores ideas of Buddhist karma and the possibilities for transformation. Using images of ocean tides and the metaphor of waves as unrelenting karmic forces, the lyric sequence moves through the human experience of birth, ignorance, awakening, and rebirth, using a narrative in which the film’s speaker emerges to reclaim her karmic destiny. The film was screened on 26 November at Accidental Theatre.

Isabel Nolan, When the sky above will not be named, 2021, hand-tufted 100% New Zealand Wool, 12 mm pile, 292 x 538.5 cm / 115 x 212 in; image courtesy of the Kerlin Gallery.

John Rainey, ‘SLIP TANK’, installation view, 2021; image courtesy of the artist and Naughton Gallery.