Lucian Freud Project at IMMA

I went to the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) recently to see the Lucian Freud work, which will be exhibited in the Garden Galleries for the next five years. While at the moment all the work is being exhibited as a large collection, I got the impression that over this period that the work may be exhibited in different curatorial permutations, so now was the time to see the work before there was any personal "agenda" attached to it! This etching is Self Portrait: Reflection, 1996. 

I have to admit that I was never particularly interested in Freud's (what seemed to me) hyper realistic painting before, but there is something compelling about seeing a collection of works together. And that I have long been interested in psychoanalysis. And that there is an unmistakable psychological element in his work that definitely is reflective of the work of his grandfather. So the name becomes part of the intrigue, and part of my reason for going to the exhibition. This etching is Bella in Her Pluto T Shirt, 1995.

The basement gallery was devoted to works on paper, mostly etchings. Given my relatively recent interest in printmaking, I was delighted to find the room full of work that was unfamiliar to me. This etching is Girl with Fuzzy Hair, 2004. I thought this print was especially interesting as I thought at first the white highlights in the hair were were created manually when wiping off the plate before going to the press. However, there was another print with similarities and the display included the metal etching plate; the highlighted areas were actually burnished on the plate itself! These burnished highlights in curly hair are a major feat of burnishing brilliance!

There were quite a lot of etching portraits in this exhibition, which had incredible detail and certainly did not speak of flattery; as I said above, something about psychology and the artist's name... This etching is The New Yorker, 2006.

Although most of the basement gallery exhibition displayed images of people, there were several landscapes, which also indicate Freud's meticulous translation of observation. This gorgeously detailed etching is Painter's Garden, 2003-2004.

Keeping Busy!

I have had a very busy few weeks, getting out and about! A few weeks ago, while my daughter was on mid-term break we made our way in to Dublin The National Museum at Collins Barracks. We thought it would be an awful shame if we didn't get to the special exhibition Proclaiming a Republic in the centenary year! Before going in to that exhibition, however, we noticed a small building dedicated to the yacht "Asgard". This private boat was used for gun-running in the early part of last century, prior to the 1916 Uprising. It was a fairly nice display, the yacht being the centrepiece with smaller historical artefacts, photographs and didactics in display cases and the surrounding walls.

Proclaiming a Republic is quite a huge exhibition, which is incredibly wide-ranging as it takes in both sides of the conflict, social and family issues, the suffragette movement and cultural aspects. I could easily have spent longer than I did (nearly two hours) at the exhibition but my teenage daughter does not have the stamina for museums... Amazingly, the republican flag that was raised at the GPO (General Post Office on O'Connell St (formerly Sackville St) is relatively intact. It was taken down by the British in 1916 but returned by the Crown for the 50th anniversary of the Rising.

At Collins Barracks we bumped into some friends we hadn't seen in awhile, which prompted us to go back into Dublin a few days later to see the VUE art fair that my last blog post talked about. A week later I found myself in Dublin again, at the National Print Museum for the launch of Theo Honohan's book Mechanicsville. The book is an "essay in 11 parts on the character of engineering", which I am finding fascinating and somewhat surreal (though I am not sure if this was the author's intention...). The Print Museum was the perfect setting for the launch, as it was a setting of machines - old printing presses, typesetting machines, paper ruling machines, etc. There were also some artefacts relevant to the centenary celebrations. I thought perhaps this was a draft of The Proclamation.

This was the third occasion I had to see a print of The Proclamation in as many weeks. First, on the day I was dropping off my books to be considered for the Dublin Art Book Fair, I had dropped in to see the Book of Kells at Trinity College, and a copy of The Proclamation was on display in Long Room. The second time was at The Proclaiming a Republic exhibition (above) and now here at The Print Museum.

I was in Dublin again a few days later, at the launch of the Dublin Art Books Fair at Temple Bar Gallery & Studios. My Good Morning books had been accepted into the curated artists' books section of the fair. The launch was pretty packed and there were a lot of art books and artist-made books. The atmosphere was fairly casual with people very interested in picking up and looking through the books. Here is a view of one of the large round tables.

And a close up of a set of my books (all three languages) on the table.

The following day I was back in Dublin, at IMMA for a lunchtime talk. The topic of Wounded Cities was fascinating and led by Professor Karen Till. There were two artists also involved in the talk, including my friend Susan Gogan who discussed her in-progress fictional film set in Berlin.

Though not in Dublin, the launch of the third (re-booted) issue of the Bray Arts Journal, took place at The Mermaid Arts Centre in Bray a few days later. A few of my images were included in the journal, but I was glad that the image of this 2012 painting, Together, was included alongside my poem Waking Dream, written shortly after the death of my Mum at the end of the summer.

Stable IMMAGES - Studios 9 & 10

It seems like ages, but it was only two weeks ago that I went to IMMA to see the exhibition of first year IADT art students. The exhibition was the culmination of research and work they had been creating in response to being based at the Irish Museum of Modern Art since January.  In my previous post I had a look at some of the work that required darkness for exhibition (in Studio 5) and some of the work that was sited outside. As I said in that post, I was very impressed with the cohesiveness of the exhibition and maturity of the work. 

On entering these exhibition spaces, via Studio 9 the variety and scope of the work was immediately apparent.

There were two short animated videos on one monitor. This one used the images of a red hand and a red face to interact with specific surfaces in the architecture of IMMA.

There was quite a lot of research into IMMA's architecture in this series of drawings & photographs, but because there were no labels for individual works, I could only wonder if this was the research behind the blue scale model of IMMA hung on the wall in Studio 5 (I posted a picture of it last week).

I spoke to the artist who took these photographs of colourful, temporary interventions she had made on various IMMA walls.

This photographic installation referred to the Greek myth of Narcissus.

The works are self-portraits of the artist, distorted by photographing through smoke, water and other materials.

Apparently this artist intensively examined architectural spaces around IMMA before creating detailed temporary chalk on black board drawings.

This series of photo documentation of mirror and light experiments was intriguing.

And I wondered if these experiments were the background for this installation of plastic sheeting and blue threads? However, this I will not know as I only met a couple of the students, and hadn't asked about this piece at the time.

So my gripe about the show is regarding non-labelling and attibution. Although the artists involved were named at the entrance to the studios, a floor plan should have been available to answer simple questions of authorship. Otherwise, I was greatly impressed by the exhibition and look forward to seeing more work by these developing artists.

Stable IMMAGES 1 - Studio 5 & Grounds

On the weekend I went to the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) to check out the exhibition of work by the first year IADT Dún Laoghaire art students. These students had been based in IMMA studios since January and this final exhibition was a culmination of their research work in responding to that experience. The exhibition was spread over three studios and the grounds, so I will do another post to cover some more of the work. Studio 5 was darkened to accommodate all the works that needed to have a dark room for display. One of the first years, who was invigilating the studio, was very enthusiastic in discussing the work, the makers, and their inspirations so I got some great insight into the work. This first visible projection was created jointly by two women who were inspired by the statuary on the grounds of IMMA. It was a moving projection, so the image was constantly changing (so impossible to capture in a still image). 

I had met her previously, so I know this next moving projection was by Joanne Harold and she was inspired by the garden balustrades.

Another female art student created this sculptural video piece in response to the arches in the basement of IMMA.

 Unfortunately the pieces were not labelled, so the artists cannot be acknowledged by me, but this piece was in response to being aware of light reactions through the coloured acetate lettering in the main reception foyer of IMMA.

This piece is a carefully measured model of the IMMA building itself and treating the building as the artwork.

The artist here was creating a design for lighting in the extensive gardens at IMMA. 

I was struck by the maturity of the work and the coherency of the exhibition, though I was disappointed that there was no labelling of works or accompanying floor plan in order to acknowledge attribution (just a page of names and general location on the wall at the entrance).

 Though I did not see all the outdoor pieces, it was a gorgeous day and this woven branch work was unmissable!

Also, as I was leaving I saw this graffiti piece - painted plastic stretched between two trees.

IMMA - Nick Miller & Edward Maguire Archive

 On Saturday I was at IMMA to have another look at a few of the shows there. There were three shows featured in the Garden Galleries, but I followed my daughter to the top floor to the Nick Miller & Edward Maguire Archive exhibition. There was jazz playing in the final room of the show (the sound had drawn my daughter to it), so we started at that and went backwards through the rooms.

While it's always great to see a painting show, as a painter I am always even more interested in the artist's tools, studio environment and method of working. So this final room was for me the best way to begin looking at Miller's reponse to Maguire's work.

There was even a key to the objects from the archive.

It was interesting to see the wizard costume hanging on the wall and later see it in a portrait. Theoretically one would see the painting first and then the costume, if one had followed the room chronology, but I think it works in either direction.

 Both Nick Miller and Edward Maguire are (and were, respectively) portrait painters -- Miller's work very expressionist and loose, and Maguire's almost hyper-real and controlled. In Edward Maguire's portrait of Paul Durcan (I think from the late 1970s) I could easily recognise the poet whom I had had the pleasure of hearing speak and read on several occasions in the 1980s.

I love Miller's portrait painting style. This is obviously a more recent portrait of Durcan; at least his aging wasn't a complete shock to me as I had already been made aware of the passage of time (with regard to someone else) when I saw Durcan more recently in a documentary about the Edward Maguire archive.

At IMMA, there was a display vitrine near Maguire's portrait of Anthony Cronin that contained the objects (ancient iron, pot & plate) that are included in the portrait. The exhibition was a joy -- seeing the studio artefacts in their own space, props displayed alongside paintings, jazz music (Bill Evans) permeating the space and the work of a completely different artist displayed in respectful response to Maguire's work.  I really enjoyed this exhibition of art and artefact.

fresh ginger tea mix

As part of a collaboration project in my college course I somehow got appointed "hospitality manager" (among a number of other things). Last week people involved with Grizedale Artist Residency in the UK were at IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art) and we hosted them in the Statecraft project spaces, letting them know about our project and giving them some mint-lemon-honey-ginger herbal tea as refreshment. It was a little bit hairy grating fresh ginger on site, so at the weekend I decided to do a bit of advance prep work for the hospitality station. I found out there is less wastage if ginger is peeled with a spoon!

I grated the ginger by machine. But the machine always leaves some end lumps when grating.

So I switched to the chopper blades and added a bit of honey.

This is a standard honey jar, almost half full with the ginger honey mix. I brought it in to class at IMMA and made some tea. Per cup I used about a third of a tsp, a little bit of lemon juice and a mint leaf. I didn't add extra honey, as I don't like things too sweet. The tea was just right!

What We Call Love Part 2

The "What We Call Love" exhibition at IMMA in Dublin is so large, and there is much to remember about it. I particularly liked this delicate piece by Louise Bourgeois. As I said previously, I am more familiar with her large-scale works, but the small works are just as powerful in their expression of intimacy. The embracing figures are hand sewn soft sculptures and this looks to be a hand blown glass enclosure, reminding one of a bell jar.

 Again in another small piece by Bourgeois, the embracing figures are surrounded by another material. This soft gauze can be seen as a cocoon-like protective enclosure.

I personally don't think any discussion of love can take place without a mention of John & Yoko, so I was pleased to see a few photos of them in a political section of the exhibition -- from the Montreal bed-in, their wedding at Gibraltar and a picture from The Acorn Project.

 There were Irish artists also included in the show. I have long admired the work of sculptor Dorothy Walker, so was delighted to see some of her work that I hadn't seen before. The Passion Bed, 1993, is a delicate piece made of steel wire and sandblasted wine glasses.

Here is a detail of it:

Garrett Phelan is another Irish artist whose work I am familiar with. I first met Garrett when he was working in Temple Bar Gallery & Studios at the time of my first solo exhibition, and have bumped into him a few times over the past 20 or so years. It was delightful to meet him again at the IMMA launch. Below is one of his pieces that were included in the show, New Faith Love Song. Unfortunately the other other piece, a gorgeous gold reliquary specially commissioned for this show is too new to find its image on the web, and the launch was too crowded for me to get a good photo of it!

I can't remember when or where I saw a whole exhibition of Rebecca Horn's complex machine installations (The Tate Modern or IMMA?) but I enjoyed seeing her work again. The photo of course cannot show the sound and movement in the piece -- the steel "arrow" tapping against one of the glass funnels, the guns moving until they randomly face each other perfectly and shoot liquid at each other.

IMMA touts this as its "most ambitious exhibition to date" and it most definitely is. I am only skimming the top of the barrel with my blog. The exhibition includes nearly 200 works of national and international importance and interest. In addition to the artists that I have highlighted there is also work by Andy Warhol, Damien Hirst, Nan Goldin, Marina Abramovich, Meret Oppenheim, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Jean Genet -- the list goes on. The exhibition continues to Feb 7 2016, see it if you can! Further information at imma.ie.

What We Call Love Part 1

The exhibition "What We Call Love" opened recently at IMMA in Dublin. I braved monsoon-like weather and had to leave my house at 4.30 to catch a bus that took two hours to get into the city during rush hour. But it was worth it. The show was huge and encompassed all media with work by modern masters and contemporary international and Irish artists. Certainly love provides a wide topic for interpretation and exposition. In the first room of the exhibition it was love at first sight -- this tiny carving on lime wood, "Couple" is by Picasso.

Also in the first room, it was my pleasure to walk around this bronze construction by Alberto Giacometti. It's a complicated piece with clues to its original molding, but impossible to see welds (could it have been cast in one piece?). There is a lovely painting by Max Ernst on the wall behind the sculpture.

I was surprised by this Dali diptych, as I have never seen images of it before. Other Dali paintings that I've seen live have always surprised me by being a lot smaller than I expect; in this respect I was quite surprised at how comparatively large this piece is!

In one of the rooms there were quite a number of works by Marcel Duchamp with which I was unfamiliar. There were four small-scale bronze and mixed media sculptures in enclosed plinth cases, but there were also a series of etchings on Japanese vellum that were exquisite. The etchings were all "drawings" that referenced old master works. The picture here unfortunately does no justice to the work, but I didn't want to exclude Duchamp from the vicarious experience of the exhibition.

Brancusi's "Kiss" is iconic to me -- I am sure an image of this appears in every art history book I have ever seen, so it was great to see the real sculpture.

I am more familiar with Louise Bourgeois' large scale works so it was lovely to see the intimate pieces that were included in this exhibition. The embracing figures in the middle of this beaded mandala are soft sculptures. I will include more images of her work in another post about this exhibition.