Last Friday I went to Dublin for a morning catching up with the shows at IMMA. I specifically wanted to see the Patrick Scott exhibition before it closed. It has happily been extended to June 22! In the main museum building there were a couple of other exhibitions which were interesting and thought provoking.
Haroon Mirza's "Are Jee Bee?" filled a series of rooms with sound, video and sound-proofing sponges. The installation recalled club dance scene with it's thumping electronic rythm reverberating through the rooms and re-edited videos. The whole installation overlaid the previous Eileen Gray exhibition didactics which provided a historical layering.
In the other West Wing galleries, the large hallway and adjoining rooms provided lots of space for Sheela Gowda's "Open Eye Policy" retrospective exhibition. A lot of her installations use found objects, such as tarpaulins, oil drums, and dried cow patties.
The exhibition was extensive and also included smaller, intimate drawings and paintings, as well as manipulated photographs.
The Garden Galleries, the IMMA name for the coach house beside the main building, was the last stop before going home, but the main reason for making the trip into Dublin. Patrick Scott's "Image Space Light" exhibition is a major survey of his work from the 1940s to 1970s. The exhibition is set up so that the little hallways between the gallery rooms have display cases of archival ephemera, which are great to see in conjunction with the work.
Scott worked a lot on unprimed canvas, using thin tempera layers. He was adept at reconciling hard lines with soft ephemeral colouring.
His work was always elgant. Sadly, he passed away this past Feb, the day before this exhibition opened. He was a Saoi in Aosdana, the highest honour for an artist in Ireland, and has left an amazing legacy of work.
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