Rather than depicting nature, Borowa seeks to collaborate with it, exploring her relationship with the natural world. The process is central to her inquiry, seen as lessons in humility, openness, attentiveness, mindfulness, patience, determination, and forgiveness. Dorota works with water as an active collaborator in the creation of an image. Mixing it with oil paint, watercolour, or ink, she allows the materials to interact organically on paper or board. At times, she sets up physical conditions that allow water to shape the work – such as filling a pool, or building a raft and installing it along the shore. Different states of water – rain, ice, seawater, and recently glacier water – collected from various places form a unique vocabulary in her work.

Liminal Landscapes is a two-person exhibition featuring painter Gabhann Dunne and sculptor/writer Theo Hynan-Ratcliffe. Exploring transitions from ecological change to the boundaries of sculpture and writing, Dunne’s paintings respond to the Burren’s ecological narratives and the resilience of the Burren Pines. Hynan-Ratcliffe’s sculptural and written works engage with materiality, feminist perspectives, and cycles of grief and renewal. Together, their practices create a dialogue across nature, identity, and time, inviting reflection on our impact and connection to the earth

Exhibition Launch:
6 – 8pm with special live performance at 6:30pm
Friday 19th September 2025

The landscape swallows our histories is a joint exhibition by artists Amanda Riceand Jo Pester showcasing a new collaborative 8mm analogue film, alongside their radio play Magical Body, which will be activated as a performance during Culture Night.

The film explores the geological, technological, human and more-than-human traces left behind at Knock Iveagh — a neolithic burial site in Northern Ireland. Comprising burial cairn and green energy solutions, multiple points of time collide within this ritual landscape: ancient pollen particles, cremated bone fragments, charcoal dating back to 3060 BC, local residents, green capitalism, techno hubris. A shared terrain, haunted by both the past and pressing possibilities of imagined futures.

Let’s Not Talk About This Now is a solo exhibition of drawings, sculptures, and prints by Peter Nash at Cork Printmakers Studio Gallery which opens on Culture Night. 

Taking the form of an exploded encyclopedia, or chaotic museum exhibit, his visual explorations are open-ended and inherently human; a continuous search for understanding in a rapidly evolving digital age.

Whilst the exhibition aesthetic is influenced by museums and reference books, there are no claims to authority being made. There are deliberately more questions posed than answers presented.

Artist Talk 8 October 1pm

A screening, conversation and Q&A event of visual artist Marie Brett’s YES, BUT DO YOU CARE? audio-visual art work is at Source Arts Centre in Thurles, Co Tipperary, on Friday 19 Sept at 2.30pm
Yes, But Do You Care? is in IMMA’s collection and the artwork explores the politics of autonomy, dementia care and capacity legislation; based on real-life family carer stories, and some which are hard to hear, combined with Ireland’s new Capacity Act legislation.

“An evocative artistic abstraction”.
FREE / All welcome

Join us to celebrate Culture Night on Friday 19th of September from 5–10pm with a range of free events for art and culture lovers!

5–10pm Gallery Late Opening: Deirdre Frost

5–6pm Children’s Drawing Workshop with Deirdre Frost

6.30–8pm Tetrapak Print Workshop for Adults and Teens with Anne McDonnell

8–10pm Cumbia and The Gang DJ set

No booking required and all events are free!

Join us at the Grilse Gallery for a sparkling evening of conversation between eminent broadcaster and art critic Cristín Leach and the innovative visual artist Dorota Borowa, focussing on Dorota’s unique practice and introducing Dorota’s site-specific installation and exhibition ‘In Search of Presence’ which runs from 19 September – 12 October.

Dorota creates site-specific installations that both intervene in and harmonise with their surroundings, combining large-scale works on paper with charcoal drawings on the walls. Rather than simply depicting nature, Borowa collaborates with it. She ‘assists’ the movement of water in painting an image, be it rain, ice, seawater or glacier water, rather than exerting exclusive control over the image.

087 604 7559
www.grilse.ie
Instagram/grilsegallery

Gallery open Wednesday – Sunday 12–5pm
Free entry, all welcome. Wheelchair accessible.

Join artist Deirdre Frost and curator Katie O’Grady on 17th September 1–2pm at GOMA Gallery Waterford for a lunchtime Q&A about Deirdre’s practice and her most recent body of work, 𝘉𝘭𝘶𝘦 𝘚𝘬𝘪𝘦𝘴, 𝘉𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘌𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘩: a solo exhibition running until 27 September 2025 at GOMA Waterford.

𝗪𝗲𝗱𝗻𝗲𝘀𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝟭𝟳𝘁𝗵 𝗦𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 | 𝟭-𝟮𝗽𝗺 | 𝗚𝗢𝗠𝗔 𝗚𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗿𝘆, 𝟲/𝟳 𝗟𝗼𝗺𝗯𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗲𝘁, 𝗪𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗱

All welcome! Free event, no booking required.

Join us at the Grilse Gallery for a sparkling evening of conversation between eminent broadcaster and art critic Cristín Leach and the innovative visual artist Dorota Borowa, focussing on Dorota’s unique practice and introducing Dorota’s site-specific installation and exhibition ‘In Search of Presence’ which runs from 19 September – 12 October.

Dorota creates site-specific installations that both intervene in and harmonise with their surroundings, combining large-scale works on paper with charcoal drawings on the walls. Rather than simply depicting nature, Borowa collaborates with it. She ‘assists’ the movement of water in painting an image, be it rain, ice, seawater or glacier water, rather than exerting exclusive control over the image.

087 604 7559
www.grilse.ie
Instagram/grilsegallery

Gallery open Wednesday – Sunday 12–5pm
Free entry, all welcome. Wheelchair accessible.

Join us to celebrate Culture Night on Friday 19th of September from 5–10pm with a range of free events for art and culture lovers!

5–10pm Gallery Late Opening: Deirdre Frost

5–6pm Children’s Drawing Workshop with Deirdre Frost

6.30–8pm Tetrapak Print Workshop for Adults and Teens with Anne McDonnell

8–10pm Cumbia and The Gang DJ set

No booking required and all events are free!

A screening, conversation and Q&A event of visual artist Marie Brett’s YES, BUT DO YOU CARE? audio-visual art work is at Source Arts Centre in Thurles, Co Tipperary, on Friday 19 Sept at 2.30pm
Yes, But Do You Care? is in IMMA’s collection and the artwork explores the politics of autonomy, dementia care and capacity legislation; based on real-life family carer stories, and some which are hard to hear, combined with Ireland’s new Capacity Act legislation.

“An evocative artistic abstraction”.
FREE / All welcome

An exhibition from Crawford Art Gallery Collection selected by Salt & Pepper LGBTQI+ Art Collective with Toma McCullim

Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre – alongside the Salt & Pepper group (West Cork’s elder LGBTQI+ arts collective) – has partnered with artist Toma McCullim to curate an invigorating exhibition for summer 2025. Titled Grá, this exhibition celebrates love in all its forms and draws from the collection of Crawford Art Gallery. Accompanying this curated selection are responses to individual artworks in the exhibition made by artists from the Salt & Pepper Collective.

While this National Cultural Institution is closed for its major redevelopment – Transforming Crawford Art Gallery – the opportunity arose to share parts of its collection with other organisations across the island of Ireland to create meaningful encounters for the public. With the guidance of Dr. Michael Waldron Curator of Collections and Special Projects at Crawford Art Gallery, Salt & Pepper has explored the collection to shape a diverse, inclusive showcase for Uillinn, accompanied by a rich programme of talks, tours, workshops, and events.

Grá features key works from the 20th and 21st centuries, including the iconic Portrait of Fiona Shaw (2002) by Victoria Russell, The Red Rose (1923) by John Lavery, and Patrick Hennessy’s Self Portrait and Cat (1978), as well as Paul La Rocque’s In Her Own Garden (1998) and the photographic series Hi, Vis (2020-21) by Dragana Jurišić. The exhibition also includes works by, among others, Sara Baume, Margaret Clarke, Tom Climent, Gerard Dillon, Stephen Doyle, Mainie Jellett, Harry Kernoff, Janet Mullarney, Isabel Nolan, John Rainey, Patrick Scott, Edith Somerville, Niamh Swanton, and Mary Swanzy.

A highlight of the exhibition is the formation of the Grá Choir led by singer-songwriter Liz Clark in collaboration with Salt & Pepper. The choir will perform Beloved, a choral piece and a moving tribute to enduring love, composed by Carol Nelson for her wife Deborah, at the opening of the Grá exhibition. A further performance will take place in St. Barrahane’s Church, Castletownshend later in the summer.

Developed through a series of workshops by West Cork Rainbow Families in collaboration with Toma McCullim, the Grá Discovery Box will be available throughout the exhibition. It invites families to explore the exhibition together, encouraging interaction with the artwork and offering insights into the artists’ creative processes. It’s free to use, and no booking is required.

Developed and facilitated by artist Toma McCullim and health professional Sarah Cairns, In the Picture, le Grá is a dementia-friendly gallery programme thoughtfully designed for small groups. Participants are given time to explore the space and artwork at their own pace, with light refreshments included to support a relaxed and welcoming atmosphere.

Film screenings include a short film programme curated by Kai Fiáin reflecting the exhibition’s themes of intimacy, resistance and renewal on Saturday 23 August at 7.00pm; Aideen Barry’s Not to be Known (single channel film, 5.5 mins, Crawford Collection) on Friday 1 August from 10.00am to 4.30pm and Clare Langan’s The Heart of a Tree (HD digital film, 12 mins, Crawford Collection) on Saturday 23 August, 10.00am to 3.30pm.

Grá Gallery Talk and Tours with Dr. Michael Waldron will take place on Thursday 24 July at 1.00pm and Thursday 18 September at 1.00pm, free event, no booking necessary.

For further information on these and other events please see our web and social media channels.

Image: Paul La Rocque, In Her Own Garden. Collection Crawford Art Gallery, Cork. © the artist

Clare Arts Office in conjunction with Clare Museum is delighted to present “The return of wonder” by Marijke Jordens and Simon Ratcliffe.

Marijke Jordens is a Belgian artist and singer living in Ennis. She studied life drawing in the Fine Art Academy in Ghent and studied Archaeology at the University.
Marijke’s work reflects a balance between being and doing, between the intuitive and the craft. In The return of wonder Marijke shows her message from within about the dawn of a new way of being, rooted in the celebration of joy and wonder.

Exhibitions:
“Trio: Flow, Texture, Light” with Ronan McMahon and Ingrid Lotter, Sweeney Memorial Library, Kilkee – September 2023;
“Let the light come in”, Steele’s Terrace – December 2022, Scarriff Library – June 2024;
Portrait Exhibition, Mountshannon – December 2024;
Barna Art Fair – December 2024;
“Holding it together” – Solo exhibition, Sweeney Memorial Library, Kilkee – February 2025

Simon Ratcliffe has continued to practice painting and drawing since attending art school in 1993, while working full-time in education. He moved to County Clare 20 years ago, and from that moment, the Burren has been his constant artistic companion, providing a rich source of inspiration. These abstract and figurative pen and ink drawings were created in response to the surrealism of the landscape – the weathered stone itself becomes an allegory of time and spirituality.

Walking the limestone and noticing the music of nature has been the pleasure of his life. Perhaps it is only there where his soul feels free to meditate on the mysteries of lie and to experience the unity of physical and ethereal perception. It is on the ancient seabed of Burren that the past and the present embrace.

Image attached: The return of wonder featuring:
She hears us by Marijke Jordens
The land within by Simon Ratcliffe

In December 2017, artist and filmmaker Steve McQueen (b. 1969, London, UK) made an artwork in response to the fire that took place earlier that year on 14 June at Grenfell Tower, North Kensington, West London. 72 people died in the tragedy. Filming the tower before it was covered with hoarding, McQueen sought to make a record.

Following the fire, a Government Inquiry ran from September 2017 until September 2024. The resulting recommendations are yet to be implemented, meaning a similar tragedy could happen again. There is an ongoing criminal investigation, with potential charges including corporate manslaughter. No trials are expected until 2027 at the earliest, over a decade since the fire.

Grenfell was first presented in 2023 at Serpentine in London’s Kensington Gardens, following a period of private viewings, prioritising bereaved families and survivors. Following its presentation at Serpentine the work was placed in the care of Tate and the London Museum’s collections.

Please note screenings of Grenfell will take place at set times. Doors open fifteen minutes before the screening time and the screening will commence promptly. This work is intended to be seen from the start, so unfortunately latecomers cannot be admitted. The film is 24 minutes long.

The film contains close-up imagery of the tower six months after the fire. Please let a member of our team know if you need space to pause, rest and reflect afterwards.

Filming or photography is not permitted in the gallery space. Please ensure your phone is on silent.

This national tour is being coordinated by Tate in collaboration with the partner venues and is made possible thanks to public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England and from Art Fund.

This summer marks a transformative moment for Kilmacthomas as the historic Old Woollen Mill reopens its doors, with the first floor of the mill reimagined as the 8 Arch Gallery—a new cultural space in the heart of the town. To celebrate this reopening, the gallery proudly presents its inaugural exhibition, featuring work by seven of Ireland’s most significant living artists.
Charles Tyrell
Bernadette Kiely
Gerda Teljeur
Paul Mosse
Eilis O’Connell
Eamon Colman
Pat Harris
This landmark show brings together an exciting collection of drawings, paintings and sculptures. Each artist has been carefully selected for their contribution to the visual arts, and the unique voice they bring to Ireland’s evolving cultural narrative.

Blue Skies, Black Earth: A solo exhibition by Deirdre Frost at GOMA Gallery of Modern Art Waterford | Running from 30 August – 27 September 2025

Official launch: Saturday 30 August 4–6pm at GOMA Waterford. All are welcome!

The Earth, locus of growth and renewal, is the inspiration behind this new body of oil paintings on canvas and on wood by Deirdre Frost.

The works consider rootedness and displacement, alongside the innate instinct in all living things to grow, to thrive, to flourish, to reach upward. The paintings attempt to capture the experience of living in this world – a fragmented, complicated place of growth and collapse, influenced by a multitude of opaque and complex human agendas. Buildings, split open under construction or under dereliction, reverberate of our time of great need for safe homes globally. A space to thrive; a world where the plants and soil itself is under pressure due to excess human activity.

Vignettes depict scenes of captured beauty and simplicity, much like an endeavour to simplify and structure our lives and desires, while the box like structures that contain these snapshots split and crack. Oil painting on canvas rooted on the floor draws the viewer in to its dark vortex as prickly plants reach from the depths, a visceral reminder of what is beneath our feet. Sea thrift drifting through a triptych give a sense a floating free, uprooted, adrift and floating like seeds through the air while soft bog cotton blows above collapsed slabs on a shore.

In line with works such as Samantha Harvey’s novel Orbital, which presents our blue world spinning serenely through black space as we live out our small and larger dramas, this body of work flips our perspective. Created from the ground, and drawing on local imagery of the natural and built environments, these paintings unfold against the constant bombardment and diversion of news and social media. Within them are traces of global fracturing and collapse, through which plants continue to reach toward the air.

Deirdre Frost is a Cork-based visual artist, working from Backwater Artist Studios, and is represented by Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin.

Her solo exhibitions include Tumbling Earth (2025) at Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin; Big Crush (2023) at Kilkenny Arts Festival; In Habitat, In Transition (2021) at Studio 12, Backwater Artists Group, and St Luke’s Crypt, Sample Studios; Claochló (2021) at Joan Clancy Gallery, Waterford; and Biophilia (2021), part of the Lavit Gallery Student of the Year Exhibition, Cork.

Clare Arts Office in conjunction with the Edna O’Brien Library in Scariff is delighted to present “Stereo” by the Artist Sabrina Heinrichs.
Sabrina Heinrichs is a self-taught visual artist born in 1980 in Germany. She lives in Ireland since 2007. She writes and found a passion in photography and interior design.

Through music, nature, the love of diversity of colours and magic, things initially progressed in shy and gentle nuances. 2023, the first piece of art in powerful lively colours was created and a symbiosis between vision and matter, black and white and the entire colour spectrum, a scintillation of magic was born to form a lyrical painting “Stereo“.
Her artworks are modern/abstract expressionism. Sabrina mainly paints with acrylic and watercolours on artpaper or canvas, sometimes she includes nature materials to complete a piece.

Sabrina’s aim is to conjure up confidence, imagination, compassion, to offer a contrast and inspire people to show one’s true colours.
Sabrina has exhibited in galleries in Germany and was part of the Mountshannon arts festival.

Example of work attached: Leaves in the Wind

Exhibition continues from the 4th of September to the 27th of September 2025

In Autumn 2025 Lavit Gallery launches a new group exhibition format focusing on a selection of new work by artists working across the Island of Ireland.
John Behan, Tom Climent, Cecilia Danell, Nuala O’Donovan, Deirdre Frost, Kaye Maahs, Samir Mahmood, Louise Neiland, Martha Quinn, Jennifer Trouton, Dominic Turner, Amna Walayat, Conor Walton. Curated by Brian Mac Domhnaill.
Exhibition Tours: Collecting Art, Saturday 13 September, 12pm | Culture Night, Friday 19 September

Maitiú Mac Cárthaigh is a visual artist, researcher and MTU Crawford Graduate. Their current research grows from their connection to rural queer existence in Ireland. This project examines (de)colonial queer loneliness / identity performativity in contemporary culture and how it is informed by our history. Over the last forty years, we have seen a rapid shift in queer positionality in Ireland arriving at a point of queerness being synonymous with words like “new” and “radical”. With this project, Maitiú looks back at Irish history and questions how colonial occupation and persistent Roman Catholic hegemony has purged, burned and shipped off so many queer stories and histories. How can you fully know your identity when you are denied its lineage and how is heteronormative culture able to utilise this against us? This research fits into the wider context of their practice which looks at mechanisms of group assimilation, self-annihilation, and ascension within isolated queer, white and Irish communities. Maitiú’s work is formalised through bio-installation, print, sound and video.

Since completing their MA in Artistic Research in 2023, they have been awarded a residency in Casino Display (LUX), been shortlisted for the RDS Visual Arts Awards 2023 and selected to exhibit as part of “Person, Presence, Perception”, an all island of Ireland travelling exhibition with the OPW and NI Department of Finance. Recently, they presented their work as a part of Radio Solstice in Cork Midsummer Festival 2024 and have been awarded the Agility Award 2024.

This residency and subsequent solo exhibition will build upon the artist’s current focus on rural queerness and agricultural processes in Ireland. During this residency, they will focus on the history and effects of loneliness on rural queer experience and how it is connected to ideas of sterility, community monoculturalism, homogeneity, White guilt and queer assimilation into dominant heteronormative culture. This work is an extension of Maitiú’s research into Irish agri-policy and how it is informed by the histories of colonisation, globalisation and western superiority.

This project aims to reclaim queer Irish presence and identity performativity through the voice and tradition of na coainte (nomative plural of coaineadh). Growing from their existing material practice, there are three elements to this research. The first is an ongoing research publication commissioned by Bad Penny Publishing (Den Haag, NL). As material research for this, Maitiú is continuing exploration of bioplastics made with lubricant and working with Dr. Declan Tuite to create a queer motet or polyvocal monastic choral piece.

The residency will coincide with the Cork Pride Festival.

Triskel Sample Project Space is a new partnership between Triskel and Sample-Studios that will provide a visual arts project space for artists, especially emerging and mid-career artists, to test ideas and to develop new work that can be seen by the public. This offers tangible career development and audience engagement opportunities to artists on their ‘home turf’ where they have a safe space to develop new ideas, within which risk-taking is possible.

Elsewhere, Here

Arddangosfa o artistiaid stiwdio oriel elysium o Abertawe, Cymru
An exhibition of Elysium Gallery studio artists from Swansea, Wales

Reception: 5.30-7.30pm, Wednesday 3rd September
Opening Remarks by the Lord Mayor of Cork, Cllr. Fergal Dennehy

Lleoliad / Venue: Lord Mayors Pavilion, Cork
Rahgolwg / Preview: Dydd Mercher 3ydd Mawrth, 5.30-7.30YP
Oriel ar agor Dydd Mawrth – Dydd Sadwrn 11yb – 5yh, Sul 12yb – 5yh
Gallery open Tuesday – Saturday 11am – 5pm, Sunday 12pm – 5pm

Leila Bebb | Kate Bell | Luke Cotter | Ewan Coombs | Tim Davies | Angela Dickens | Lucy Donald | Gemma Ellen | Daniel Gower | Stephen Hammett | Rory Hancock | Sophie Hancock | Tim Kelly | Bonita James | Demian Johnston | Hannah Jones | Lucia Jones | Ann Jordan | Sheree Murphy | Heidi Lucce-Redcliffe | Holly Slingsby | Tracey McMaster | Paul Munn | Graham Parker | Jonathan Powell | Euros Rowlands | Claire Staveley | Daniel Staveley | Hollie Wilkins | Dylan Williams | Melanie Wotton

Sample-Studios, one of Ireland’s largest artist studios, is delighted to continue our partnership with Elysium Gallery+Studios, Wales’ largest artist studios. Elsewhere, Here is a cross-border showcase presenting painting, sculpture, and installation, that explore the shifting meanings of place, belonging, and identity by Elysium Gallery+Studios’ artist community. This exhibition marks the first time a group of Elysium artists have exhibited in Cork, creating a platform for dialogue between artist-led communities in Wales and Ireland. The exhibition is also part of an ongoing creative exchange programme between Sample-Studios and Elysium Gallery+Studios, following on from a major exhibition of works by artists from both studio communities in Swansea in 2024.

“’Elsewhere, Here’ is about the ways we carry our sense of place with us, It’s an exchange of perspectives, a meeting point between the familiar and the unknown. We believe in building bridges between creative communities. Cork has a thriving independent art scene, and this exhibition is a chance to share, learn, and spark new connections.”

Founded in 2007, Elysium has become a cornerstone of Wales’ artist-led scene, providing studio spaces, exhibitions, and community engagement. This exhibition showcases 30 contemporary Welsh artists in Cork, Ireland, aimed at fostering cross-cultural dialogue and creative exchange. Hosted in partnership with Sample-Studios in The Lord Mayor’s Pavilion, the exhibition will highlight diverse Welsh artistic practices across mediums. A central aspect of the exchange this year will be a networking event in UCC uniting Welsh and Irish artists, encouraging collaboration, knowledge-sharing, and future joint projects. This initiative seeks to strengthen cultural ties between Swansea and Cork, promoting Welsh artists, and create lasting connections between the two cities.

Sample-Studios is one of Ireland’s largest artist studios, founded in 2011 and based in Churchfield, Cork City. As Sample-Studios Artistic Director Aoibhie McCarthy reflects “In Elysium, we have found like-minded partners who share our dedication to launching, supporting and sustaining creative careers and practices in our respective cities studios and gallery exhibitions provision. Our organisations share many commonalities, namely our focus on collaboration and community but also, the extent to which we have had to evolve nomadically. Both Sample-Studios and Elysium have survived and thrived because of our adaptability and ability to be responsive to the needs of artists and our cities- this exhibition is a celebration of that.”

Elysium is Wales largest artist studio provider looking after over 100 artists across Swansea City centre including two art galleries, live music/performance venue, community education space as well as instigating offsite international opportunities for Welsh artists. Find out more about Elysium: www.elysiumgallery.com

This exhibition is supported by The Arts Council of Ireland, Cork City Council Twinned Cities Scheme, Wales Arts International, Wales Arts Council, Wales Government and The National Lottery Fund Wales.

In 2025 Lismore Castle Arts will celebrate 20 years by presenting an exhibition dedicated to the theme of Kunstkammer, curated by art historian & writer, Robert O’Byrne.

Kunstkammer is a form of museum in which strange or rare objects are exhibited together, also known as a Cabinet of Curiosities. Once widespread throughout Europe, these private museums were renowned for featuring a broad range of objects, including Arteficialia (products of man) and Naturalia (products of nature) together with scientific instruments, clocks and automaton.

Priceless works of art were shown alongside strange curiosities, antiquities next to the latest inventions. They were united in their diversity, and their beauty. Kunstkammer at Lismore Castle is both a re-creation and a reinvention of the genre. Through a series of rooms, each one different in size and form, historical objects from private and public collections will share space with works by leading Irish and international contemporary artists.

The exhibition creates new encounters with the familiar and uncanny, inviting timely conversations about display, collections, and contemporary practice as the artefact of the future. Drawing on themes of display the work invites audiences to engage with contemporary art in an accessible way, referring to one of the original ambitions of the Cabinet of Curiosity to foster learning through encounter.

Robert O’Byrne is one of Ireland’s best known writers and lecturers specializing in the fine and decorative arts. A former Vice-President of the Irish Georgian Society, he is the author of more than a dozen books, a former columnist for Apollo magazine, and a contributor to both The Burlington Magazine and the Irish Arts Review. Robert has curated many exhibitions, including Ireland’s Fashion Radicals for The Little Museum in Dublin, and In Harmony with Nature: The Irish Country House Garden for the Irish Georgian Society, both of which drew record attendances. For the past twelve years, he has written an award-winning blog The Irish Aesthete.

The exhibition will be accompanied by an extensive programme of events, talks, screenings, and a far-reaching learning programme. A catalogue will be published in Summer 2025 to accompany the exhibition.

‘Art in Motion’ Exhibition to Open at Baile Mhuire Day Centre.

Tralee Art Group is delighted to announce their latest collaborative exhibition, ‘Art in Motion’, which will be officially opened on Tuesday, June 17th at 2.30pm at Baile Mhuire Day Centre, Balloonagh, Tralee. The opening will be led by special guest Paddy Garvey, Chairperson of Baile Mhuire, and all are welcome to attend. Guests can enjoy an afternoon of art, music and refreshments in a warm and inclusive setting.

This special exhibition is the result of a unique collaboration between members of Tralee Art Group and the clients of Baile Mhuire Day Centre, showcasing the creative energy and expression of both groups. Featuring a variety of works in different media, styles and subjects, Art in Motion celebrates movement, creativity, and community spirit.

TAG is committed to enriching the cultural life of Tralee and surrounding areas. The group regularly holds exhibitions, workshops, and community projects, and has built strong relationships with local organisations—including an ongoing volunteering partnership with Baile Mhuire.

This exhibition reflects that partnership, with art created not only by TAG members but also by clients of the Day Centre who engage weekly in creative workshops facilitated by the group volunteers from Tralee Art Group. The result is a joyful and inspiring collection of artworks, each piece telling its own story of imagination, connection, and collaboration.

All are welcome to attend the opening and celebrate this uplifting display of artistic expression in our community. The exhibition will run for a year and be available to the public weekdays between 4pm and 5pm.

An exhibition from Crawford Art Gallery Collection selected by Salt & Pepper LGBTQI+ Art Collective with Toma McCullim

Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre – alongside the Salt & Pepper group (West Cork’s elder LGBTQI+ arts collective) – has partnered with artist Toma McCullim to curate an invigorating exhibition for summer 2025. Titled Grá, this exhibition celebrates love in all its forms and draws from the collection of Crawford Art Gallery. Accompanying this curated selection are responses to individual artworks in the exhibition made by artists from the Salt & Pepper Collective.

While this National Cultural Institution is closed for its major redevelopment – Transforming Crawford Art Gallery – the opportunity arose to share parts of its collection with other organisations across the island of Ireland to create meaningful encounters for the public. With the guidance of Dr. Michael Waldron Curator of Collections and Special Projects at Crawford Art Gallery, Salt & Pepper has explored the collection to shape a diverse, inclusive showcase for Uillinn, accompanied by a rich programme of talks, tours, workshops, and events.

Grá features key works from the 20th and 21st centuries, including the iconic Portrait of Fiona Shaw (2002) by Victoria Russell, The Red Rose (1923) by John Lavery, and Patrick Hennessy’s Self Portrait and Cat (1978), as well as Paul La Rocque’s In Her Own Garden (1998) and the photographic series Hi, Vis (2020-21) by Dragana Jurišić. The exhibition also includes works by, among others, Sara Baume, Margaret Clarke, Tom Climent, Gerard Dillon, Stephen Doyle, Mainie Jellett, Harry Kernoff, Janet Mullarney, Isabel Nolan, John Rainey, Patrick Scott, Edith Somerville, Niamh Swanton, and Mary Swanzy.

A highlight of the exhibition is the formation of the Grá Choir led by singer-songwriter Liz Clark in collaboration with Salt & Pepper. The choir will perform Beloved, a choral piece and a moving tribute to enduring love, composed by Carol Nelson for her wife Deborah, at the opening of the Grá exhibition. A further performance will take place in St. Barrahane’s Church, Castletownshend later in the summer.

Developed through a series of workshops by West Cork Rainbow Families in collaboration with Toma McCullim, the Grá Discovery Box will be available throughout the exhibition. It invites families to explore the exhibition together, encouraging interaction with the artwork and offering insights into the artists’ creative processes. It’s free to use, and no booking is required.

Developed and facilitated by artist Toma McCullim and health professional Sarah Cairns, In the Picture, le Grá is a dementia-friendly gallery programme thoughtfully designed for small groups. Participants are given time to explore the space and artwork at their own pace, with light refreshments included to support a relaxed and welcoming atmosphere.

Film screenings include a short film programme curated by Kai Fiáin reflecting the exhibition’s themes of intimacy, resistance and renewal on Saturday 23 August at 7.00pm; Aideen Barry’s Not to be Known (single channel film, 5.5 mins, Crawford Collection) on Friday 1 August from 10.00am to 4.30pm and Clare Langan’s The Heart of a Tree (HD digital film, 12 mins, Crawford Collection) on Saturday 23 August, 10.00am to 3.30pm.

Grá Gallery Talk and Tours with Dr. Michael Waldron will take place on Thursday 24 July at 1.00pm and Thursday 18 September at 1.00pm, free event, no booking necessary.

For further information on these and other events please see our web and social media channels.

Image: Paul La Rocque, In Her Own Garden. Collection Crawford Art Gallery, Cork. © the artist

This summer marks a transformative moment for Kilmacthomas as the historic Old Woollen Mill reopens its doors, with the first floor of the mill reimagined as the 8 Arch Gallery—a new cultural space in the heart of the town. To celebrate this reopening, the gallery proudly presents its inaugural exhibition, featuring work by seven of Ireland’s most significant living artists.
Charles Tyrell
Bernadette Kiely
Gerda Teljeur
Paul Mosse
Eilis O’Connell
Eamon Colman
Pat Harris
This landmark show brings together an exciting collection of drawings, paintings and sculptures. Each artist has been carefully selected for their contribution to the visual arts, and the unique voice they bring to Ireland’s evolving cultural narrative.

In December 2017, artist and filmmaker Steve McQueen (b. 1969, London, UK) made an artwork in response to the fire that took place earlier that year on 14 June at Grenfell Tower, North Kensington, West London. 72 people died in the tragedy. Filming the tower before it was covered with hoarding, McQueen sought to make a record.

Following the fire, a Government Inquiry ran from September 2017 until September 2024. The resulting recommendations are yet to be implemented, meaning a similar tragedy could happen again. There is an ongoing criminal investigation, with potential charges including corporate manslaughter. No trials are expected until 2027 at the earliest, over a decade since the fire.

Grenfell was first presented in 2023 at Serpentine in London’s Kensington Gardens, following a period of private viewings, prioritising bereaved families and survivors. Following its presentation at Serpentine the work was placed in the care of Tate and the London Museum’s collections.

Please note screenings of Grenfell will take place at set times. Doors open fifteen minutes before the screening time and the screening will commence promptly. This work is intended to be seen from the start, so unfortunately latecomers cannot be admitted. The film is 24 minutes long.

The film contains close-up imagery of the tower six months after the fire. Please let a member of our team know if you need space to pause, rest and reflect afterwards.

Filming or photography is not permitted in the gallery space. Please ensure your phone is on silent.

This national tour is being coordinated by Tate in collaboration with the partner venues and is made possible thanks to public funding from the National Lottery through Arts Council England and from Art Fund.

The Great Book of Ireland is an extraordinary vellum manuscript which contains the original work of 120 artists, 140 poets and nine composers.

All of the contributors were asked one thing – please convey your hopes, joys, fears, loves in being an Irish person at the turn of the second millennium. Described by former president, Mary Robinson, as “the Book of Kells of the second millennium”, artists and writers who contributed include Samuel Beckett, Eavan Boland, Cecily Brennan, Louis le Brocquy, Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, Barrie Cooke, Dorothy Cross, Daniel Day-Lewis, Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill, Seamus Heaney, Eithne Jordan, Michael Longley, John Montague, Tony O’Malley, Kathy Prendergast, and Patrick Scott.

Visitors will have the opportunity to view the original manuscript as well as to use a digital touchscreen to turn the pages and explore the exceptional range of artistic practices brought together in this unique cultural artefact.

Visitors will have the opportunity to view the original manuscript as well as to use a digital touchscreen to turn the pages and explore the exceptional range of artistic practices brought together in this unique cultural artefact.

The Great Book of Ireland is supported by The Arts Council Ireland, University College Cork, and private philanthropy through Cork University Foundation.

Sara Flynn, Sueharu Fukami, Shihoko Fukumoto, Joe Hogan, Eiko Kishi, Frances Lambe, Deirdre McLoughlin, O’Donnell + Tuomey, Satoru Ozaki, Sean Scully, Joseph Walsh, Kan Yasuda, Osamu Yokoyama.

Curated by Wahei Aoyama and Joseph Walsh.

RINN explores the culture of making and its relationship to place and time through the work of Irish and Japanese artists and architects. While each piece is a personal expression of form, their works are united by an immersion in the culture of making. Whether drawing on craft heritage – the materials and skills associated with place – or challenging new techniques and pursing new materials, they all share an intimate relationship with the handmade.

Rinn in Gaelic means place or a point – and in Japanese, the same word means circle, ring or circularity. Joseph Walsh has observed that the meaning in both languages strongly represents ideas inherent in his practice, of place and this moment in time, within a continuous cycle of time.

Presented by Making In by Joseph Walsh Studio as part of the Ireland Japan 2025 programme in partnership with the Government of Ireland, the exhibition premiered in April at both Ireland House and A Lighthouse called Kanata, Tokyo.

The Glucksman is proud to host the show on its return to Ireland.

RINN is supported by The Arts Council Ireland, University College Cork, Government of Ireland, Ireland Japan 2025, A Lighthouse Called Kanata, and private philanthropy through Cork University Foundation.

Maitiú Mac Cárthaigh is a visual artist, researcher and MTU Crawford Graduate. Their current research grows from their connection to rural queer existence in Ireland. This project examines (de)colonial queer loneliness / identity performativity in contemporary culture and how it is informed by our history. Over the last forty years, we have seen a rapid shift in queer positionality in Ireland arriving at a point of queerness being synonymous with words like “new” and “radical”. With this project, Maitiú looks back at Irish history and questions how colonial occupation and persistent Roman Catholic hegemony has purged, burned and shipped off so many queer stories and histories. How can you fully know your identity when you are denied its lineage and how is heteronormative culture able to utilise this against us? This research fits into the wider context of their practice which looks at mechanisms of group assimilation, self-annihilation, and ascension within isolated queer, white and Irish communities. Maitiú’s work is formalised through bio-installation, print, sound and video.

Since completing their MA in Artistic Research in 2023, they have been awarded a residency in Casino Display (LUX), been shortlisted for the RDS Visual Arts Awards 2023 and selected to exhibit as part of “Person, Presence, Perception”, an all island of Ireland travelling exhibition with the OPW and NI Department of Finance. Recently, they presented their work as a part of Radio Solstice in Cork Midsummer Festival 2024 and have been awarded the Agility Award 2024.

This residency and subsequent solo exhibition will build upon the artist’s current focus on rural queerness and agricultural processes in Ireland. During this residency, they will focus on the history and effects of loneliness on rural queer experience and how it is connected to ideas of sterility, community monoculturalism, homogeneity, White guilt and queer assimilation into dominant heteronormative culture. This work is an extension of Maitiú’s research into Irish agri-policy and how it is informed by the histories of colonisation, globalisation and western superiority.

This project aims to reclaim queer Irish presence and identity performativity through the voice and tradition of na coainte (nomative plural of coaineadh). Growing from their existing material practice, there are three elements to this research. The first is an ongoing research publication commissioned by Bad Penny Publishing (Den Haag, NL). As material research for this, Maitiú is continuing exploration of bioplastics made with lubricant and working with Dr. Declan Tuite to create a queer motet or polyvocal monastic choral piece.

The residency will coincide with the Cork Pride Festival.

Triskel Sample Project Space is a new partnership between Triskel and Sample-Studios that will provide a visual arts project space for artists, especially emerging and mid-career artists, to test ideas and to develop new work that can be seen by the public. This offers tangible career development and audience engagement opportunities to artists on their ‘home turf’ where they have a safe space to develop new ideas, within which risk-taking is possible.

Clare Arts Office in conjunction with the Edna O’Brien Library in Scariff is delighted to present “Stereo” by the Artist Sabrina Heinrichs.
Sabrina Heinrichs is a self-taught visual artist born in 1980 in Germany. She lives in Ireland since 2007. She writes and found a passion in photography and interior design.

Through music, nature, the love of diversity of colours and magic, things initially progressed in shy and gentle nuances. 2023, the first piece of art in powerful lively colours was created and a symbiosis between vision and matter, black and white and the entire colour spectrum, a scintillation of magic was born to form a lyrical painting “Stereo“.
Her artworks are modern/abstract expressionism. Sabrina mainly paints with acrylic and watercolours on artpaper or canvas, sometimes she includes nature materials to complete a piece.

Sabrina’s aim is to conjure up confidence, imagination, compassion, to offer a contrast and inspire people to show one’s true colours.
Sabrina has exhibited in galleries in Germany and was part of the Mountshannon arts festival.

Example of work attached: Leaves in the Wind

Clare Arts Office in conjunction with Clare Museum is delighted to present “The return of wonder” by Marijke Jordens and Simon Ratcliffe.

Marijke Jordens is a Belgian artist and singer living in Ennis. She studied life drawing in the Fine Art Academy in Ghent and studied Archaeology at the University.
Marijke’s work reflects a balance between being and doing, between the intuitive and the craft. In The return of wonder Marijke shows her message from within about the dawn of a new way of being, rooted in the celebration of joy and wonder.

Exhibitions:
“Trio: Flow, Texture, Light” with Ronan McMahon and Ingrid Lotter, Sweeney Memorial Library, Kilkee – September 2023;
“Let the light come in”, Steele’s Terrace – December 2022, Scarriff Library – June 2024;
Portrait Exhibition, Mountshannon – December 2024;
Barna Art Fair – December 2024;
“Holding it together” – Solo exhibition, Sweeney Memorial Library, Kilkee – February 2025

Simon Ratcliffe has continued to practice painting and drawing since attending art school in 1993, while working full-time in education. He moved to County Clare 20 years ago, and from that moment, the Burren has been his constant artistic companion, providing a rich source of inspiration. These abstract and figurative pen and ink drawings were created in response to the surrealism of the landscape – the weathered stone itself becomes an allegory of time and spirituality.

Walking the limestone and noticing the music of nature has been the pleasure of his life. Perhaps it is only there where his soul feels free to meditate on the mysteries of lie and to experience the unity of physical and ethereal perception. It is on the ancient seabed of Burren that the past and the present embrace.

Image attached: The return of wonder featuring:
She hears us by Marijke Jordens
The land within by Simon Ratcliffe

Ormston House in collaboration with EVA International presents Bíodh Orm Anocht. The exhibition will run from 29 August to 26 October.

Bíodh Orm Anocht, roughly translating to ‘be with me tonight’, is a group exhibition featuring new and existing artworks by four artists – Seán Hannan, Laura Ní Fhlaibhín, Ciarán Ó Dochartaigh, and Kiera O’Toole – presented at Ormston House and off-site locations. While the contributors work across media and processes, they are unified by a preoccupation with customs and practices that can broadly be described as folk knowledge. These methods and intuitive systems challenge technorational systems of thought.

These four artists convey knowledge that transcends language and which is all the more potent because it remains unwritten and unspoken. Each artist is concerned with the metaphorical qualities of materials. They draw from disciplines outside the visual arts (including mythology, zoology, and cartography), infusing them with personal meaning. Inherent in these works is the possibility that atavistic wisdom may be sourced from the natural world.

Seán Hannan‘s work explores how forgotten voices and rituals can echo into the future, both through unstable technologies and systems of collaboration. Using archival fragments from autobiographical memories referring to Irish traditions, Hannan’s artworks reflect obsolescence and poetic instability. Received at the Graveyard is a sonic installation revolving around an evolving voice AI (artificial intelligence). At its core lies a handful of field recordings made in Ireland in the 1950s that captured the final traces of a near-extinct tradition, keening (caoineadh). Another work featured in this exhibition is LUCK (2022), a sculpture in the form of a piseóg (pish-ohg): folk witchcraft. Mainly a phenomenon of rural Ireland, piseógs were cast as an act of malice, often using a chicken egg onto which a curse had been placed.

In contrast, Laura Ní Fhlaibhín employs materials which have traditionally been connected with healing and nourishment. Sifting stories and traces associated with site, memory, and the casting of spells, Ní Fhlaibhín creates complex but delicate sculptural scenarios. She frequently introduces living beings into white cube environments that are typically purposed for the display of inanimate objects. While previous artworks have involved earthworms, leopard slugs, and willow trees, the family of sculptural assemblages presented here are made from chunks of mineral salt and ash wood. The creation of these sculptures has involved the co-authorship of horses, who have licked the salt crystals into biomorphic forms. The ash tree is sacred in Irish mythology and is seen as possessing talismanic power.

The equine kingdom is also referred to in the cosmological work of Ciarán Ó Dochartaigh. His Speculative massage tools for a family of Donkeys (2022) incorporates massage tools for these domesticated creatures. Other works by Ó Dochartaigh presented at Ormston House include a rendering in glazed ceramics of the artist’s late father’s stomach. A stacked edition of printed drawings link the ecological decline of fish species with medical modifications of the human body, Irish history, and the legacies of British colonialism.

Preparation for this project has entailed site visits and open-ended fieldwork across graveyards, the River Shannon, fish shops, and city streets. This is best exemplified in the work of Kiera O’Toole, whose practice involves derivés of everyday public spaces, in this case Limerick city centre. Through drawing in-situ, O’Toole records the subtle energies of these locations (which she describes as spatialised emotions) and translates her pre-reflective, sensory encounters into topographical maps and charts that she describes as ‘affective cartographies’.

The exhibition takes its name from a traditional Irish song first transcribed by the Irish Folklore Commission in 1936. The song is essentially a piece of mouth music or lilting in which melody and rhythm take precedence over lyrical content. Before being preserved via the written word, ‘Bíodh Orm Anocht’ was conveyed orally down through generations and was therefore altered over time. In the few recordings that are available (such as Mick Hanly and Micheál O Domhnaill’s 1974 album Celtic Folkweave), the singer’s words hover between possibilities of lyrical meaning, pitch, and rhythm. In this way, the song is a vehicle for forms of expression that transcend time and language and which are an outcome of communal rather than individual authorship.

This exhibition is accompanied by a programme of events:

-On Saturday, 30 August from 12–1pm, Seán Hannan will join us for an artist talk and a wireless broadcast of Received at the Graveyeard. Meet at Ormston House, followed by a five-minute walk to St. Michael’s Graveyard. This event will have limited accessibility due to steps and uneven ground.
-On Friday, 19 September, we will be joined from 5–6pm by Historian-in-Residence Sharon Slater for a talk and walk about the history of St. Michael’s Graveyard. This talk will have limited accessibility due to steps and uneven ground. The exhibition will also remain open until 9pm as part of Culture Night 2025.
-On Friday, 26 September, 6–8pm, we will be joined for an artist talk with Laura NíFhlaibhín and tactile workshop with equine therapist Muriel Foxton. Free tickets can be booked here.
-On Saturday, 27 September from 2–4pm, artist Kiera O’Toole will lead a participatory drawing workshop. Through gestural drawing exercises, participants will map the energies and atmospheres of Limerick city. Meet at Ormston House, followed by a walk to city centre sites. Materials will be provided. Capacity is limited, so book here to avoid disappointment.

Artist biographies:

Seán Hannan lives and works in Amsterdam and graduated from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie Amsterdam in 2009. His work has been shown in numerous art venues such as the RU exhibition space, New York; Upstream gallery, Amsterdam; and Hotel Maria Kapel in Hoorn. Hannan participated in Unfair16. He has also received numerous project grants from the Amsterdam fund for the arts (AFK).

Laura Ní Fhlaibhín is an artist from Wexford. She completed her MFA at Goldsmiths, University of London in 2019 with Distinction and her BA at National College of Art and Design, Dublin in 2013. She is the recipient of the National College of Art and Design, Dublin Staff Prize Bursary; the Goldsmiths Graduate Almacantar Bursary 2019; the Arts Council of Ireland Next Generation Award 2020; the Arts Council England Developing Creative Practice Award 2021; and Arts Council of Ireland Bursaries.

Ciarán Ó Dochartaigh is an artist, researcher, and Gaeilgeoir from Derry, living and working with chronic illness. His mixed-media practice explores complexities inherent within the embodiment of personal loss with the legacy of political violence and lived experience. He is interested in combining industrial manufacturing processes with the materialities of artisanal craft objects to create a specific language of sculptural works.

Kiera O’Toole is a research-based visual artist and lecturer at ATU Sligo. Her practice explores drawing as a method of registering the spatialised emotions of place, blending phenomenology and atmospheric theory. O’Toole exhibits internationally and publishes widely on contemporary drawing. She is a professional member of Visual Artists Ireland and the Drawing Research Network (UK), and she is a co-founder of Drawing deCentered. She currently lives and works in Sligo, Ireland.

The exhibition is supported by the Arts Council of Ireland and Limerick Arts Office. The events programme is funded by Creative Ireland and Limerick City and County Council through Limerick Creative Communities Small Grants Scheme 2025. Seán Hannan’s participation in this exhibition is partly made possible by the Mondriaan Fund, the public fund for visual art and cultural heritage in the Netherlands.

Blue Skies, Black Earth: A solo exhibition by Deirdre Frost at GOMA Gallery of Modern Art Waterford | Running from 30 August – 27 September 2025

Official launch: Saturday 30 August 4–6pm at GOMA Waterford. All are welcome!

The Earth, locus of growth and renewal, is the inspiration behind this new body of oil paintings on canvas and on wood by Deirdre Frost.

The works consider rootedness and displacement, alongside the innate instinct in all living things to grow, to thrive, to flourish, to reach upward. The paintings attempt to capture the experience of living in this world – a fragmented, complicated place of growth and collapse, influenced by a multitude of opaque and complex human agendas. Buildings, split open under construction or under dereliction, reverberate of our time of great need for safe homes globally. A space to thrive; a world where the plants and soil itself is under pressure due to excess human activity.

Vignettes depict scenes of captured beauty and simplicity, much like an endeavour to simplify and structure our lives and desires, while the box like structures that contain these snapshots split and crack. Oil painting on canvas rooted on the floor draws the viewer in to its dark vortex as prickly plants reach from the depths, a visceral reminder of what is beneath our feet. Sea thrift drifting through a triptych give a sense a floating free, uprooted, adrift and floating like seeds through the air while soft bog cotton blows above collapsed slabs on a shore.

In line with works such as Samantha Harvey’s novel Orbital, which presents our blue world spinning serenely through black space as we live out our small and larger dramas, this body of work flips our perspective. Created from the ground, and drawing on local imagery of the natural and built environments, these paintings unfold against the constant bombardment and diversion of news and social media. Within them are traces of global fracturing and collapse, through which plants continue to reach toward the air.

Deirdre Frost is a Cork-based visual artist, working from Backwater Artist Studios, and is represented by Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin.

Her solo exhibitions include Tumbling Earth (2025) at Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin; Big Crush (2023) at Kilkenny Arts Festival; In Habitat, In Transition (2021) at Studio 12, Backwater Artists Group, and St Luke’s Crypt, Sample Studios; Claochló (2021) at Joan Clancy Gallery, Waterford; and Biophilia (2021), part of the Lavit Gallery Student of the Year Exhibition, Cork.

Page Turners is an exhibition of artists’ books which launches in St Fin Barre’s Cathedral at 5:30pm on Thursday, September 4th.
This autumn exhibition in the cathedral ambulatory invites visitors to linger and spend time exploring selected artists’ books from across Ireland, the UK and France.
Selected national and international book artists include Ambeck Design, Coracle Press, Helen Douglas, Paul Gaffney, Helena Grimes, ottoGraphic Books, Road Books, and Tom Sowden. Editions will be for sale through the cathedral shop.

Page-turners is co-curated with MTU Crawford College of Art & Design and is an important moment at the cathedral as we pioneer a rolling arts programme.

There will also be a panel discussion at the cathedral at 12:30pm on Thursday, September 18th.
The exhibition runs until October 31st, 2025

There no charge to see this exhibition: email arts@stfinbarres.ie to receive your ticket.

Elsewhere, Here

Arddangosfa o artistiaid stiwdio oriel elysium o Abertawe, Cymru
An exhibition of Elysium Gallery studio artists from Swansea, Wales

Reception: 5.30-7.30pm, Wednesday 3rd September
Opening Remarks by the Lord Mayor of Cork, Cllr. Fergal Dennehy

Lleoliad / Venue: Lord Mayors Pavilion, Cork
Rahgolwg / Preview: Dydd Mercher 3ydd Mawrth, 5.30-7.30YP
Oriel ar agor Dydd Mawrth – Dydd Sadwrn 11yb – 5yh, Sul 12yb – 5yh
Gallery open Tuesday – Saturday 11am – 5pm, Sunday 12pm – 5pm

Leila Bebb | Kate Bell | Luke Cotter | Ewan Coombs | Tim Davies | Angela Dickens | Lucy Donald | Gemma Ellen | Daniel Gower | Stephen Hammett | Rory Hancock | Sophie Hancock | Tim Kelly | Bonita James | Demian Johnston | Hannah Jones | Lucia Jones | Ann Jordan | Sheree Murphy | Heidi Lucce-Redcliffe | Holly Slingsby | Tracey McMaster | Paul Munn | Graham Parker | Jonathan Powell | Euros Rowlands | Claire Staveley | Daniel Staveley | Hollie Wilkins | Dylan Williams | Melanie Wotton

Sample-Studios, one of Ireland’s largest artist studios, is delighted to continue our partnership with Elysium Gallery+Studios, Wales’ largest artist studios. Elsewhere, Here is a cross-border showcase presenting painting, sculpture, and installation, that explore the shifting meanings of place, belonging, and identity by Elysium Gallery+Studios’ artist community. This exhibition marks the first time a group of Elysium artists have exhibited in Cork, creating a platform for dialogue between artist-led communities in Wales and Ireland. The exhibition is also part of an ongoing creative exchange programme between Sample-Studios and Elysium Gallery+Studios, following on from a major exhibition of works by artists from both studio communities in Swansea in 2024.

“’Elsewhere, Here’ is about the ways we carry our sense of place with us, It’s an exchange of perspectives, a meeting point between the familiar and the unknown. We believe in building bridges between creative communities. Cork has a thriving independent art scene, and this exhibition is a chance to share, learn, and spark new connections.”

Founded in 2007, Elysium has become a cornerstone of Wales’ artist-led scene, providing studio spaces, exhibitions, and community engagement. This exhibition showcases 30 contemporary Welsh artists in Cork, Ireland, aimed at fostering cross-cultural dialogue and creative exchange. Hosted in partnership with Sample-Studios in The Lord Mayor’s Pavilion, the exhibition will highlight diverse Welsh artistic practices across mediums. A central aspect of the exchange this year will be a networking event in UCC uniting Welsh and Irish artists, encouraging collaboration, knowledge-sharing, and future joint projects. This initiative seeks to strengthen cultural ties between Swansea and Cork, promoting Welsh artists, and create lasting connections between the two cities.

Sample-Studios is one of Ireland’s largest artist studios, founded in 2011 and based in Churchfield, Cork City. As Sample-Studios Artistic Director Aoibhie McCarthy reflects “In Elysium, we have found like-minded partners who share our dedication to launching, supporting and sustaining creative careers and practices in our respective cities studios and gallery exhibitions provision. Our organisations share many commonalities, namely our focus on collaboration and community but also, the extent to which we have had to evolve nomadically. Both Sample-Studios and Elysium have survived and thrived because of our adaptability and ability to be responsive to the needs of artists and our cities- this exhibition is a celebration of that.”

Elysium is Wales largest artist studio provider looking after over 100 artists across Swansea City centre including two art galleries, live music/performance venue, community education space as well as instigating offsite international opportunities for Welsh artists. Find out more about Elysium: www.elysiumgallery.com

This exhibition is supported by The Arts Council of Ireland, Cork City Council Twinned Cities Scheme, Wales Arts International, Wales Arts Council, Wales Government and The National Lottery Fund Wales.

SIÚNTA by Niamh Coffey

In 1937-39, the Irish Folklore Commission asked primary school children to collect local history from their relatives and neighbours. Nestled in exercise copies, between thousands of stories detailed in meticulous handwriting, lie tales of metamorphosis and binary-blurring. Hares become milk-hungry witches, needy children are turned to stone, gooseberries transform sore eyes, tadpoles swirl in boggy bellies.

Siúnta, taking its name from the Irish for a seam or joint, uses these instances of metamorphosis as departure points to wriggle further into absurd and imaginary realms. These archives show that in an earlier Irish imaginary world, the boundaries that separate us from nature and other entities were not so separate and fixed, but porous and blurred.

Everyone is welcome to join us at the launch of Siúnta on Saturday 13th September at 2pm!

‘first-person’ a solo exhibition by Isabel English opens at LHQ Gallery, 5th of September 6pm.

Isabel English, from Ballyhea in County Cork, is a visual artist and educator based in Dublin. Isabel’s work utilises the mediums of photography, textile and sculpture, to extend from the literary genre of autofiction, which combines autobiographical truths with fictionalised renderings, to create contextually sensitive installations.
In ‘first-person’, Isabel uses images of bodily anatomy, taken from A Manual of Artistic Anatomy by John C.L. Sparkes (London: Bailliere, Tindall and Cox, 1888) as a source for the work. These images have been spliced and rendered beyond recognition and presented to the viewer as enlarged scans on assorted sheets of acetate. These actions are reflected in a number of wall based sculptural pieces made from disposable patterned aluminium plating, replicating the composition of honeycomb cardboard, generally used as protective packaging in the shipment and transportation of goods. These processes of repetition, which underline much of English’s practice, refers to the psychological concept of Repetition Compulsion, as underlined by Freud in his essay ‘Beyond the Pleasure Principle’ first published in German in 1920, as an unconscious tendency to repeat patterns of behaviour.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a publication produced by Isabel in which Cork based arts writer Sarah Long, and poet Julie Morrisey have written about Isabel’s work.
Isabel was awarded the inaugural Emerging Visual Artist Award from Cork County Council in 2024. Isabel was awarded the inaugural Emerging Visual Artist Award from Cork County Council in 2024. This award provides a bursary and the opportunity to have a solo exhibition at LHQ Gallery.

The exhibition runs from Friday 5th of September to Friday 24th of October.
Opening Hours: LHQ Gallery is open Monday to Friday 9.00am to 5.30pm, and closes on bank holidays.
Location: LHQ Gallery is in the County Library building on Carrigrohane Road, Cork, T12K335.

Grief’s Current Shape – a new thread based exhibition by Ciara O’Connor
“If I do leave you, I will have passed on to you something of myself; you will be a different person because of knowing me; it’s inescapable.”
-Edna O’Brien

Grief has seeped into my bones and I suspect it will never leave. But it is so much more than sorrow and despair. It is an ever changing expression of love. We loved them and they loved us. For me, sometimes that love is a rush of warmth when I look down at my hands and see hers.

Sometimes it’s a stab of regret for the hurtful thing I said to him. Sometimes it’s a crumble to the floor when I am overcome by the loss and cruelty of it all. But sometimes now, as the waves of sadness move further and further apart, it is bountiful gratitude for everything it has taught me.

Grief’s Current Shape is an exploration of the various stages of grief, and a personal attempt to lean into it all.

About Ciara
Ciara O’Connor is a Kerry based visual artist who works primarily with textiles and free motion embroidery. Her work is figurative and deals with themes of identity, feminism, trauma and recovery. She is interested in pushing the boundaries of traditional techniques to tell contemporary stories.

Since returning to her practice in 2019 she has been selected for 15 group shows, including Following Threads in Crawford Art Gallery, and RUA and RSA Annuals. She had her first solo show in Garter Lane Arts Centre, 2022, and has featured in FAIRE, Image Magazine, The Irish Examiner, The Kerryman, and VAN Jan/Feb 2024. Her second solo show opens from Sept 6 in Garter Lane Arts Centre.

Clare Arts Office in conjunction with Cultúrlann Sweeney Library Gallery is delighted to present “All The Things”, Art Exhibition by Julie O’Gorman.

Julie is a self-taught artist from Kilkee who loves working with all kinds of mediums — whatever feels right in the moment.

From paint to shells to anything in between, she sees each piece as an opportunity to experiment and play.

“All the Things” is a reflection of that spirit: a mix of concepts, colours and textures that come together simply because she loves creating.

This exhibition has something for everyone…

Exhibition continues from the 4th of September to the 27th of September 2025

In Autumn 2025 Lavit Gallery launches a new group exhibition format focusing on a selection of new work by artists working across the Island of Ireland.
John Behan, Tom Climent, Cecilia Danell, Nuala O’Donovan, Deirdre Frost, Kaye Maahs, Samir Mahmood, Louise Neiland, Martha Quinn, Jennifer Trouton, Dominic Turner, Amna Walayat, Conor Walton. Curated by Brian Mac Domhnaill.
Exhibition Tours: Collecting Art, Saturday 13 September, 12pm | Culture Night, Friday 19 September

New Life, Old Buildings is IAF’s national programme about the future of buildings that are already built.

11 Sept, 12:30-8pm, Wickham Way, Limerick
– Walking tour | Never Look Back
– Open table discussion | Places for Arts and Culture
– Site visits
– Panel | From Rubble to Regret: The Consequences of Demolition

18 Sept, 12:30-8pm, Wickham Way, Limerick
– Walking tour
– Open table discussion | Places for Social Inclusion and Community Development
– Site visits
– Panel | Storeys Retold: Heritage for the Future

23 Oct, 1pm
– Webinar | Look at the City

24 Oct, 1pm
– Webinar | Creating Space

Join us for the opening of ‘Sonorous Tones’ by Geometric Hardedged Colourist Painter Francis Tansey’. The Exhibition will be opened by Mr. John Cunningham, Board Member and Chair of Collections and Acquisitions for The Irish Museum of Modern Art.

“I believe colour is a universal language common to all people, I have dedicated my time over the past forty years to understanding it’s principals and properties.” Francis Tansey.

Francis Tansey was born in Dublin in 1959 and has been one of the most popular Irish artists over the last four decades. He studied at the National College of Art and Design in (1978-1983) specializing in abstract art and in 1985 he became the first Artist in Residence, at The Butler Gallery, Co. Kilkenny, where his brightly coloured geometric acrylic painting’s caused great interest.

Tansey’s unique distillation and interpretation of Colourism gained him immediate recognition worldwide and particularly in Ireland. He first rose to prominence with his inclusion in R.O.S.C. in 1988 as the youngest artist ever to have exhibited in this prestigious International Exhibition. Tansey employs a hard-edged geometric style, using acrylic paint in a glazing technique reminiscent of a renaissance master with many layers of glazes to create vibrant colour field paintings in a modern abstract geometric colour language, that is his own.

Join artist Deirdre Frost and curator Katie O’Grady on 17th September 1–2pm at GOMA Gallery Waterford for a lunchtime Q&A about Deirdre’s practice and her most recent body of work, 𝘉𝘭𝘶𝘦 𝘚𝘬𝘪𝘦𝘴, 𝘉𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘌𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘩: a solo exhibition running until 27 September 2025 at GOMA Waterford.

𝗪𝗲𝗱𝗻𝗲𝘀𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝟭𝟳𝘁𝗵 𝗦𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 | 𝟭-𝟮𝗽𝗺 | 𝗚𝗢𝗠𝗔 𝗚𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝗿𝘆, 𝟲/𝟳 𝗟𝗼𝗺𝗯𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗲𝗲𝘁, 𝗪𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗱

All welcome! Free event, no booking required.