Bea Last - Amorphous
VISUAL ART: GALLERY Friday 3rd - Saturday 25th May
An exhibition of recent paintings by Scottish-based artist Bea Last in which the artist explores her relationship to paint, its applications and dynamics. She works with the processes of addition and subtraction, movement, memory and energy, while evolving a series of paintings concurrently. Sketch books are a vital part of her creative process, “allowing freedom of mark making without self-consciousness. The fluid energy created through these drawings are crucial to my practice and help me stay connected to the paintings that I am working on, helping to move them forward in their development. By focusing on the abstract and eliminating the figurative or narrative I am trying to capture the beauty in not necessarily the unseen but that which perhaps sometimes we are too busy to see.” She continues, “I feel one of the many roles of an artist is to challenge people’s points of perception and to present different ways of seeing things in order for one to assume responsibility for one’s own thoughts and actions. If we are constantly drip fed images which are ’comfortable’, we eventually stop seeing and therefore stop thinking. In that sense, although my practice is working on a very subtle level, my paintings can be considered political. They allow freedom of expression and in some senses appear confrontational and challenge one’s perceptions.”Bea Last has exhibited in Scotland, England, Lebanon, France, Italy and the US.
Adm. free
Official opening on Friday 3rd May at 7.30pm. All welcome.
Bea Last's website.
Drawing on the Back of an Envelope
VISUAL ART: FOYER Saturday 18th - Saturday 25th May
We’ve all heard the expression ‘drawn up on the back of an envelope’ to describe the act of pinning down the spark of an idea. The act of drawing itself is generally seen as a first step in the process of making visual art, whether it’s for painting, sculpture, installation, animation or many other forms - it’s how we can start the creative process. And as well as being a step-off point, for visual artists it can also be an end in itself. Drawing on the Back of an Envelope is an exhibition devised by visual artist and curator Ian Wieczorek that invites people to literally make a drawing on the back of an envelope. Something inspiring, something playful, something inventive… the results of this invitation are on show for you to enjoy in this celebration of the act of drawing as a source of creative inspiration.Adm. Free
Presented in association with the Linenhall’s National Drawing Day programme.
John McNulty – Tractors and Barns
VISUAL ART: GALLERY Friday 31st May - Saturday 29th June
An exhibition of rural imagery by award-winning Mayo-based artist John McNulty. “This exhibition is a selection of my paintings and etchings from the last four or five years. The themes are rural with images of barns, farms and tractors. The source of the work is South Mayo where I live, and the Midlands where I spent some of my youth. The approach varies from realistic to more abstracted pieces.” He continues, “My work explores images of rural life and the changing circumstances of the West of Ireland. I would hope that the images would evoke echoes in people’s minds of a quality in rural life that has changed almost imperceptibly. The intention is not to approach the theme in a nostalgic way but to search for strong, evocative, sometimes playful ideas.” John's work has been exhibited internationally since 1979 and is in numerous public and private collections. He has won the O'Sullivan Graphics Prize at the RHA, the Norman Ackroyd Etching Prize and the McNamara Print Award at Impressions, Galway.Adm. free
Official opening on Friday 31st May at 7.30pm. All welcome.
John McNulty's website.
GMIT Fine Art Graduates 2013 - Threshold
VISUAL ART: FOYER Thursday 20th June - Friday 5th July
Threshold features paintings from the eight graduates who recently completed the degree in Art & Design at GMIT Castlebar. The artists, who studied part-time over six years, are Gabrielle Bishop, Bernie Bohan, Tina Burke, Maggi Geraghty, Jo Killalea, Kevin O’Donnell, Barbara Trawinski and Carol Wood. Coming from diverse backgrounds, these artists bring together their distinctive interpretation and creativity in this show, which is their threshold or point of entering into the wider art world.The paintings explore a broad range of personal concerns, experiences and viewpoints. These include historical and cultural themes, and issues relating to nature and the environment and aspects of the human condition such as the mind, memory and identity.
Adm: free
Sarah Lundy - HABIT
VISUAL ART: GALLERY Friday 5th - Saturday 27th July
“HABIT is a multi-media exhibition of works exploring the repeated action and recurring result. The exhibition looks through cumulative arrangement of quotidian elements at Lundy’s ongoing inquiry into individual autonomy and collective homogeneity, society and self; formally it explores the binary significance of the single and plural, presence and absence, positive and negative.” Sarah Lundy is a visual artist and curator based in Co Clare. She has exhibited in selected group exhibitions in 126 Gallery (Galway), Catalyst Arts (Belfast), Mad Art Gallery (Dublin), Carnegie Arts Centre (Kerry), Galway Arts Centre and Tactic (Cork) amongst others. Curatorial projects include Void: Volume international group exhibition at Galway Arts Centre and TELEVISION group exhibition in Tactic in association with MART. She has recently had a solo exhibition =±EQUATION±= at the Courthouse Gallery, Clare and was selected for a group screening at Riverbank Arts Centre, London at the Irish Film Festival in London.Adm. free
Sarah Lundy's website.
Official opening on Friday 5th July at 7.30pm. All welcome.
Ruth Pettus – To Market, To Market
VISUAL ART: GALLERY Friday 2nd - Saturday 31st August
An unusual, engaging and evocative exhibition of shoe sculptures by New Zealand-born artist Ruth Pettus, inspired by the Linenhall’s former existence as the original marketing area for the sale of flax grown in Mayo during the 18th and 19th centuries. As Ruth explains, “The shoes can be seen to represent the individuals and groups of people jostling, conversing and travelling within the market area. The different textures and directions of the shoes reflects a commercial hubbub of sorting, selling and buying that would have most likely been enjoyed as a break from the daily routine. Most of these shoes were made at my brother’s house in County Galway from 2009-2012.” She continues, “I have been working in this medium for 20 years. The ‘shoes’ are reminiscent of unearthed objects, damaged leftovers, fossils, narratives, the buried. They become an amalgamation of past and present.” Ruth Pettus is an Anglo-American artist living in Baltimore, Maryland. She has exhibited widely in the US, ans also in Spain and Russia.Adm. free
Ruth Pettus' website.
Official opening on Friday 2nd August at 7.30pm. All welcome.
