What’s on in Connaught

A trembling hold, a solo exhibition by visual artist Neva Elliott, opens at Custom House Studios + Gallery on Thursday, 28 May at 6 pm.
The exhibition explores themes of death, grief, and absence, examining how experiences of loss are carried and negotiated over time. Elliott’s practice responds to the transient and often unstable nature of existence — the finiteness of life, and the unpredictability of the world.
Neva Elliott is an artist and writer based in Dublin and holds an MA from Central Saint Martins.
Image: Neva Elliott, From your body II, 2023, Archival print.

The official launch of the Mayo College of Further Education Level 6 end of year exhibition will be officially launched in our upstairs Gallery. The students will present an enriching exhibition of various media created for their final end of year exhibition. The exhibition will feature the work of Klym Bohatyrov, Ella Conway, Laura Coughlin, Luca Doran, Liudmila Haidukova, Áine McFadden, Lily McGinley, Thomas Murphy, Sinead Murray, Francesca Scott, Orla Sloyan, Jurate Tighe, Louise Wilde and Amelia Wrobel. It will be officially launched on Thursday, 28 May at 6pm. Image: Klym Bohatyrov, Tractor, 70x50cm, Oil on Canvas.

Oughterard Courthouse is delighted to host an upcoming exhibition entitled “Tropic Signal in Grey light”. Haitian – American Hansel Vieuxpatinaeh and Brazilian Arthur Rosa will launch their joint exhibition on Friday 29th May at 7pm , the exhibition will run from Saturday 30th to May to bank holiday Monday 1st June.

Join us in our Gallery for an Artist Talk with exhibiting artist Andy Parsons and Bairbre-Ann Harkin.
Bairbre-Ann is Curator of IMMA Horizons at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, with responsibility for IMMA’s Health Partnerships. She previously led IMMA’s Art & Ageing initiatives, championing inclusive and dementia-aware engagement and fostering key partnerships with IMMA collaborators such as Age&Opportunity, Global Brain Health Institute, Mercers Inst. for Successful Ageing (St James Hospital) among others.

For more information and to book, click here.

A Group Exhibition by Artists: Colleen Fitzpatrick, Maria Laffey & Linda Proudfoot

“Nature does not hurry yet everything is accomplished.” – Lao Tzu
We are all rooted in Mother Nature but look to the sky where we dream of flying on the wild wind.
This exhibition is a celebration of the vastness, beauty and vulnerability of nature in these uncertain times.
If we slow down and tune into nature we learn so much. We live in an age of soundbites and instant gratification.
Art can point us to the world and help us to see things we don’t usually notice, such as the pace and beauty of the natural environment.

Exhibition continues from 15/05/2026

‘From Clare to Here’ is a collection of paintings inspired by the Atlantic coastline of Counties Clare and Galway — landscapes shaped by weather, tide, limestone, and light.
These works explore the changing moods of the west coast: the movement of the ocean against rock, shifting skies over the Burren, distant headlands, and the ever-present Atlantic wind.
Drawn from a lifetime living along the coastline, the exhibition reflects a personal connection to the west of Ireland and the elemental nature of this landscape.
Through these paintings, viewers are invited to pause and reconnect with the rugged beauty of Ireland’s Wild Atlantic edge.

The Dock presents Soft Spot, an exhibition by Irish artist Helen O’Leary that foregrounds reuse, repair, and ecological thinking as generative artistic strategies.
Raised in rural Ireland in the 1960s and 70s, O’Leary’s formative ethos — “if you can’t make it, you can’t have it” — continues to inform her materially rigorous practice. Over decades, she has developed a distinctive formal language built from modest materials and unglamorous gestures. Her works occupy a dynamic space between painting and sculpture, blurring categorical boundaries while insisting on the physicality of their making.

Daisy Chains || Data Trails expands on the recurrent theme in Ciara Tuite’s practice ”body memory’. In this exhibition she explores ‘old practices’ and ‘ancient rituals’ which are embedded in our DNA Modern technology can’t replace the act of mark-making, storytelling, dance etc. In our ever-evolving world, the artist uses painting, text and installation as a conduit to ask the question – how can ancient rituals and digital culture walk side by side to promote peace? What if stone skimming, and barefoot walking are a necessity rather than a novelty to thrive in todays world? What if for a moment we swapped the screen for the sky?

‘Even now there are still places where a thought might grow.‘ – Derek Mahon

I wrote the phrase ‘keep the burning world at bay’ in a notebook during a deep sense of uncertainty at the start of the global pandemic and partly as an answer to my young daughter’s worried question when her school closed – ‘Will it be like this forever?’ I didn’t know, bluffing I told her it would be back to ‘normal’ soon.

“Intellectual / Emotional and Observed responses to nature and the environment”. Fine Art Print exhibition from one of Ireland’s finest painters.
‘Making Prints has always been part of my working method.
Each process informing, scrutinizing, and complementing the other’.

The Model is delighted to present Polyrhythms, a solo exhibition by German-Irish painter Tinka Bechert. Bringing together painting, sculpture and textile works made since 2018, the exhibition centres on a decisive shift in Bechert’s practice away from narrative imagery toward abstraction. Accompanying this development has been an increased attention to musical thinking, with rhythm, repetition and pacing guiding how the works unfold.

The art installation 600 is a site-specific piece which artist Jenny Wood-Sullivan originally made in 2018, but is delighted to be showing it again to coincide with the 2026 National Famine Commemoration event taking place at the Irish Workhouse Centre 17th May.
600 refers to this workhouse’s maximum capacity of paupers who could avail of poverty relief. This work gives a nod to the Japanese artform Senbazuru, which is the tradition of folding 1000 paper cranes as a gift of honour, healing and peace. Wood-Sullivan has folded 600 doves from 100 year old book paper which are then hung from the rafters of what was once the girls school room.

Oughterard Courthouse is delighted to host an upcoming exhibition entitled “Tropic Signal in Grey light”. Haitian – American Hansel Vieuxpatinaeh and Brazilian Arthur Rosa will launch their joint exhibition on Friday 29th May at 7pm , the exhibition will run from Saturday 30th to May to bank holiday Monday 1st June.

Exhibition continues from 06/03/2026.

The Living Ginger brings together a range of Jack Butler Yeats’s watercolours from 1895 to 1910, a formative period when his vivid sense of character and everyday life was emerging through dynamic, spirited compositions. The title comes from a phrase Yeats once used to describe the vitality he believed that all great painting should possess. That lively undercurrent gives these early works their enduring charge.

The Dock presents Soft Spot, an exhibition by Irish artist Helen O’Leary that foregrounds reuse, repair, and ecological thinking as generative artistic strategies.
Raised in rural Ireland in the 1960s and 70s, O’Leary’s formative ethos — “if you can’t make it, you can’t have it” — continues to inform her materially rigorous practice. Over decades, she has developed a distinctive formal language built from modest materials and unglamorous gestures. Her works occupy a dynamic space between painting and sculpture, blurring categorical boundaries while insisting on the physicality of their making.

Daisy Chains || Data Trails expands on the recurrent theme in Ciara Tuite’s practice ”body memory’. In this exhibition she explores ‘old practices’ and ‘ancient rituals’ which are embedded in our DNA Modern technology can’t replace the act of mark-making, storytelling, dance etc. In our ever-evolving world, the artist uses painting, text and installation as a conduit to ask the question – how can ancient rituals and digital culture walk side by side to promote peace? What if stone skimming, and barefoot walking are a necessity rather than a novelty to thrive in todays world? What if for a moment we swapped the screen for the sky?

‘Even now there are still places where a thought might grow.‘ – Derek Mahon

I wrote the phrase ‘keep the burning world at bay’ in a notebook during a deep sense of uncertainty at the start of the global pandemic and partly as an answer to my young daughter’s worried question when her school closed – ‘Will it be like this forever?’ I didn’t know, bluffing I told her it would be back to ‘normal’ soon.

The Model is delighted to present Polyrhythms, a solo exhibition by German-Irish painter Tinka Bechert. Bringing together painting, sculpture and textile works made since 2018, the exhibition centres on a decisive shift in Bechert’s practice away from narrative imagery toward abstraction. Accompanying this development has been an increased attention to musical thinking, with rhythm, repetition and pacing guiding how the works unfold.

A Group Exhibition by Artists: Colleen Fitzpatrick, Maria Laffey & Linda Proudfoot

“Nature does not hurry yet everything is accomplished.” – Lao Tzu
We are all rooted in Mother Nature but look to the sky where we dream of flying on the wild wind.
This exhibition is a celebration of the vastness, beauty and vulnerability of nature in these uncertain times.
If we slow down and tune into nature we learn so much. We live in an age of soundbites and instant gratification.
Art can point us to the world and help us to see things we don’t usually notice, such as the pace and beauty of the natural environment.

Exhibition continues from 01/05/2026.

Andy’s current body of work is about watching a sunset. It is based on people coming together to experience things collectively. The work depicts a group that has convened for the purpose of joy. “The work is based on a scene I witnessed where a group of people sat by a riverbank quietly watching a sunset”.

Andy has spent the last two years making paintings, drawings and sculptures that try to evoke this brief moment in time. The work explores ideas around time, memory, community and pleasure. Andy’s practice combines working in community contexts with making drawing, sculpture and painting.

Image by Cian Flynn

“Intellectual / Emotional and Observed responses to nature and the environment”. Fine Art Print exhibition from one of Ireland’s finest painters.
‘Making Prints has always been part of my working method.
Each process informing, scrutinizing, and complementing the other’.

The art installation 600 is a site-specific piece which artist Jenny Wood-Sullivan originally made in 2018, but is delighted to be showing it again to coincide with the 2026 National Famine Commemoration event taking place at the Irish Workhouse Centre 17th May.
600 refers to this workhouse’s maximum capacity of paupers who could avail of poverty relief. This work gives a nod to the Japanese artform Senbazuru, which is the tradition of folding 1000 paper cranes as a gift of honour, healing and peace. Wood-Sullivan has folded 600 doves from 100 year old book paper which are then hung from the rafters of what was once the girls school room.

A new and exciting Creative Art Collective exhibition will open on Friday, 15 May 2026, running through to Sunday, 14 June 2026, at the Mariner Hotel in Westport, Co. Mayo. This vibrant showcase features new work by four artists: Carole Shubotham, Richie Delaney, Katie Delaney, and Stephanie Glynn.
Bringing together four distinctive voices in contemporary art, the exhibition presents a diverse and engaging collection. Free to all.

Every Thursday evening we host free events in our galleries as part of ‘Gallery Lates’, part of Galway City Council’s Night-Time Economy Action Plan.

Ranging from curator talks, tours, family friendly workshops and multilingual events, Galway Arts Centre has developed a programme aiming to open our doors to more people to experience our contemporary art exhibitions in informal and enjoyable ways as part of ‘Gallery Lates’.

Please see link www.galwayartscentre.ie/whats-on/ for ‘Gallery Lates’ and extended public programme of events for our current exhibition ‘UnWorlding’.

Exhibition continues from 15/05/2026

‘From Clare to Here’ is a collection of paintings inspired by the Atlantic coastline of Counties Clare and Galway — landscapes shaped by weather, tide, limestone, and light.
These works explore the changing moods of the west coast: the movement of the ocean against rock, shifting skies over the Burren, distant headlands, and the ever-present Atlantic wind.
Drawn from a lifetime living along the coastline, the exhibition reflects a personal connection to the west of Ireland and the elemental nature of this landscape.
Through these paintings, viewers are invited to pause and reconnect with the rugged beauty of Ireland’s Wild Atlantic edge.

Curated by Megs Morley, produced by Tracy Bass

‘UnWorlding’ explores wildness, the untamed, the feral and the unruly—not as chaos, but as a force that resists systems of control. Bringing together film, photography and sculptural installations incorporating readymade objects, the exhibition assembles figures, landscapes and sites where this wildness persists: in terrains marked by colonial violence, in the unruly geographies of queer desire, and in forms of life that exceed the boundaries imposed by the human.

Funded by an Arts Council Visual Arts Project Award

Taiwanese-American artist Ben Sloat’s exhibition, A New World is Possible, I Can Hear Her Breathing bridges the animist cultures of Taiwan and Ireland through use of materials which transform from raw to cultural states. Employing the respective craft traditions of these countries, Sloat proposes a new kind of syncretism of the handmade: one that blends histories, provides for coalition, and points to new possibilities for the future. Sloat will be working with two local Irish craftspeople, Brid Kivneen for traditional straw and Angela Nolan for willow, in the production of his installation in Gort.

Exhibition continues from 22nd May 2026 to 22nd June 2026

Outset Gallery is pleased to present How Painters Think, a group exhibition by HERmetics_in_the_studio collective opening Thursday 22 May at 18.00.

This exhibition explores the idea of “aesthetic nomadism” within painting, tracing the movement of thought across materials, processes, and surfaces. Each artist works through drawing, collage, printmaking, 3D elements, and found objects before arriving at the painted image, revealing the layered and evolving nature of painterly thinking.
Artists : @louisewallaceartist @majellaclancy @marytkeown @patriciadoherty.visualartist @sineadaldridge1

@hermetics_in_the_studio

Join us in our Gallery for an Artist Talk with exhibiting artist Andy Parsons and Bairbre-Ann Harkin.
Bairbre-Ann is Curator of IMMA Horizons at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, with responsibility for IMMA’s Health Partnerships. She previously led IMMA’s Art & Ageing initiatives, championing inclusive and dementia-aware engagement and fostering key partnerships with IMMA collaborators such as Age&Opportunity, Global Brain Health Institute, Mercers Inst. for Successful Ageing (St James Hospital) among others.

For more information and to book, click here.