What’s on in Connaught

In the Pale Light of a Shadow is an installation that explores how we perceive and relate to the world, particularly nature. The installation is made up of a number of visually spare, interconnected works.

Drawing on local ecology in Ballina along with a number of philosophical and art-historical references, the exhibition questions binaries between nature and culture. Through a range of imagery, subtle gestures and interventions, the works offer oblique reflections on nature, materiality, time, and the human shadows cast on land.

The exhibition title, “Quarters”, refers to the fact that most of the studies for these paintings were executed on the banks of the Moy across the four seasons. In the process, remembrance and riverscape merged with the tactile process of sketching and painting. Memory combined past and present. Ambient sounds of wind and rain, and sensations of heat and cold became elements of the work.

In the studio, the creative evolution of the paintings was an intuitive fusion of recollections, feelings, and physical and visual impressions, all stretching across my experiences at the riverbank. This work resulted in six paintings directly related to the

Lynda’s work often focuses on seemingly forgotten places within rural landscapes; overgrown and deserted buildings, abandoned fishing boats and other traces of lives once lived. Lynda explorea the relationship these have with the terrain they are weathered in, how they become embedded into a place; returning to and becoming part of it, bearing witness to sometimes forgotten vernacular ways of life and to the people who have left them behind. Her work draws a narrative through these elements, weaving layers of meaning into each painting through the use of unusual surfaces—old Ordnance Survey maps and Admiralty charts, railway tickets and diaries.

Exhibition continues from 15/11/25 until 27/09/26.

Jack Butler Yeats (1871–1957) is one of Ireland’s most celebrated twentieth-century artists. The Niland Collection, housed at The Model, holds an extensive body of his work spanning the full arc of his career – from early pen-and-ink illustrations and lively watercolours, to the expressive oil paintings that define his mature style.

Working across sculpture and installation, Rainey’s practice explores themes of transformation, reconstruction and material memory, drawing on references from classical statuary, mythology and archaeology. ‘Deviations’ brings together a new body of work that considers how objects, histories and narratives are continually reshaped through time.

As Above, So Below
Sara K. Dunn & Róisín Doherty
Engage Art Studios, ChurchFields, Lower Salthill

Working across pen drawing, painting, printmaking, clay and installation, Dunn and Doherty consider land as a living, layered space that holds memory, supports growth and connects the visible world with the hidden networks beneath it. The work reflects on how land can recover and transform itself beyond human ownership.

Culture Night printmaking workshop: Friday 18 September, 5-8pm, drop in.
Launch: Saturday 19 September, 2-5pm.
Open Sunday 20 and Wednesday 23 to Sunday 27 September, 12-5pm.

Exhibition continues from 11/09/26-09/10/26.

“Cultural Similitudes” is an exhibition of photographs from the archives of award-winning photographer Laura Jean Zito, pairing images she made in the Sinai Desert of the Bedouin with photos of people in Ireland over the last five decades, to foster an appreciation of the similarities that bind us together as humans rather than the oft portrayed focus on the differences that contribute to the destruction of the planet and our ability to live in it harmoniously. The exhibition will hold an opening reception at 7:30 on Friday, September 11, at which all are welcome. Gallery hours are 12-5 Tues-Fri and 10-3 Sat.

Exhibition continues from 15/11/25 until 27/09/26.

Jack Butler Yeats (1871–1957) is one of Ireland’s most celebrated twentieth-century artists. The Niland Collection, housed at The Model, holds an extensive body of his work spanning the full arc of his career – from early pen-and-ink illustrations and lively watercolours, to the expressive oil paintings that define his mature style.

Working across sculpture and installation, Rainey’s practice explores themes of transformation, reconstruction and material memory, drawing on references from classical statuary, mythology and archaeology. ‘Deviations’ brings together a new body of work that considers how objects, histories and narratives are continually reshaped through time.

In the Pale Light of a Shadow is an installation that explores how we perceive and relate to the world, particularly nature. The installation is made up of a number of visually spare, interconnected works.

Drawing on local ecology in Ballina along with a number of philosophical and art-historical references, the exhibition questions binaries between nature and culture. Through a range of imagery, subtle gestures and interventions, the works offer oblique reflections on nature, materiality, time, and the human shadows cast on land.

The exhibition title, “Quarters”, refers to the fact that most of the studies for these paintings were executed on the banks of the Moy across the four seasons. In the process, remembrance and riverscape merged with the tactile process of sketching and painting. Memory combined past and present. Ambient sounds of wind and rain, and sensations of heat and cold became elements of the work.

In the studio, the creative evolution of the paintings was an intuitive fusion of recollections, feelings, and physical and visual impressions, all stretching across my experiences at the riverbank. This work resulted in six paintings directly related to the

Exhibition continues from 11/09/26-09/10/26.

“Cultural Similitudes” is an exhibition of photographs from the archives of award-winning photographer Laura Jean Zito, pairing images she made in the Sinai Desert of the Bedouin with photos of people in Ireland over the last five decades, to foster an appreciation of the similarities that bind us together as humans rather than the oft portrayed focus on the differences that contribute to the destruction of the planet and our ability to live in it harmoniously. The exhibition will hold an opening reception at 7:30 on Friday, September 11, at which all are welcome. Gallery hours are 12-5 Tues-Fri and 10-3 Sat.

The exhibition takes its name from the Irish for a seam or joint, Siúnta weaves together separate narratives into imagined ecological relationships. Forms of flesh, fur, flower and feather mingle and merge. Subjects develop symbiotic and antagonistic relationships, display unfamiliar actions and establish new habits together.

Niamh Coffey is a Dublin-based visual artist from Laois, whose practice encompasses textiles, drawings and sculpture. Their work uses ideas from ecology, queer theory and Irish folklore to create imagined ecological relationships. Niamh graduated from NCAD in 2016 with a degree in Sculpture and Expanded Practices.

Opening by Geraldine Mitchell at 6pm 17 September.

The Faraway Nearby, a solo exhibition of new paintings of remembered geographies and stories that question the uncertainty of what is real and what is imagined and how stories can become something else in the retelling,

Mags Duffy is based in the Custom House Studios. She works across painting, textiles, photography and text. Drawing on her experience of living in a rural coastal environment in the West of Ireland, she creates real and imagined landscapes that explore inner and outer worlds and the fragility of living in these places. She has exhibited nationally and internationally.

Lynda’s work often focuses on seemingly forgotten places within rural landscapes; overgrown and deserted buildings, abandoned fishing boats and other traces of lives once lived. Lynda explorea the relationship these have with the terrain they are weathered in, how they become embedded into a place; returning to and becoming part of it, bearing witness to sometimes forgotten vernacular ways of life and to the people who have left them behind. Her work draws a narrative through these elements, weaving layers of meaning into each painting through the use of unusual surfaces—old Ordnance Survey maps and Admiralty charts, railway tickets and diaries.

Exhibition launch 18th September 5-8pm at Leitrim Sculpture Centre.

Matters of Process is a new exhibition series exploring the work of artists who completed a Technical Development Research Residency (TDR) at the Centre the previous year. During their residencies, artists experimented with a range of materials, objects and ideas investigating the often-hidden processes and energies embedded in their making. The exhibition brings these processes into view, revealing how they shaped the emergence of new work.
Artists – Brenda Kearney, Vanessa Donoso-Lopez, Margo McNulty, Anna Spearman, David Spence.

As Above, So Below
Sara K. Dunn & Róisín Doherty
Engage Art Studios, ChurchFields, Lower Salthill

Working across pen drawing, painting, printmaking, clay and installation, Dunn and Doherty consider land as a living, layered space that holds memory, supports growth and connects the visible world with the hidden networks beneath it. The work reflects on how land can recover and transform itself beyond human ownership.

Culture Night printmaking workshop: Friday 18 September, 5-8pm, drop in.
Launch: Saturday 19 September, 2-5pm.
Open Sunday 20 and Wednesday 23 to Sunday 27 September, 12-5pm.

Exhibition runs 18/09/26-15/11/26.

Desire Lines is aemi’s 2026 touring programme, an annual selection of artist and experimental film that brings together a range of voices from Irish and international contemporary practice.

Featuring films by Chloe Brenan, Collectif Faire Part, Eóin Heaney, Olivia Normile and Basma al-Sharif, ‘Desire Lines’ premiered at the Irish Film Institute in January and has since screened in Belfast and Galway with further dates also confirmed to take place later in 2026 in Wicklow, Louth and Offaly.

Exhibition runs 13/09/26-17/01/26.

Cathy Wilkes grew up in a working-class area of East Belfast and moved to Glasgow aged 19, in 1985. After returning to Ireland for four years, she has lived in Scotland since 1994. Her art and writing are introspective, and sometimes at the edge of legibility. At the same time, out of Wilkes’ non-dualist world emerge figures and objects which are potently direct and seditious. The exhibition includes three Untitled installations from 2026, 2024 and 2019 together with paintings and sculpture from the same period. Cathy Wilkes represented Britain at the 58th Venice Biennale in 2019 and Scotland at the 51st Venice Biennial in 2005.