An exciting new exhibition ‘A Survey of the Landscape’ will be launched on May 4th and run until November 4th at The Waterford Gallery of Art in O’Connell Street.
‘A Survey of the Landscape’ focuses on how the environment has been captured, depicted, and reframed by artists, and will feature works by some of Ireland’s most renowned artists including Mary Swanzy HRHA, Seán Keating PPRHA, William Conor RHA PPRUA, Eileen Murray, Paul Henry RHA, Dermod O’Brien PPRHA, Bea Orpen HRHA, Donald Teskey RHA and more.
The exhibition will also launch two new exciting commissions for the gallery. Supported by Creative Ireland, visual artist Paula Barrett has developed a series of three photographic images as part of her Turf Projects series. A graduate of the National College of Art and Design (Dublin), Barrett centres her work on the theme of Landscape and the systems which inform our experience of it.
In 2015 she initiated Turf Projects, a photographic study of the particular qualities of light and colour experienced in the Irish Landscape. She has been compiling a catalogue of Irish colour palettes from around Ireland and alongside her photographic palettes she has created a set of paints and worked with communities in Cork and Roscommon to put these colours back into the landscape, drawing attention to the natural features of these areas and promoting a specificity and harmony between the natural landscape and the built environment. Barrett says, “the historical genre of landscape painting is the primary reference point for my work. I am interested in place-making and perception of place, the crossover between the wild and domestic.”
The exhibition will also feature a new immersive artwork artist, Waterford native Carmel Cleary, who studied photography at the Crawford College of Art & Design in Cork. Since graduating in 1990 Cleary has received many awards including Photographer of the Year in her graduating class.
Cleary notes, “nature fascinates and inspires me. Rock, which appears solid and immobile, is shaped and softened as water insistently carves a pathway for itself. Boundaries are overstepped. As I photograph nature it is framed by my interpretation and echoes human sensuality.”
Recent generous donations of artworks will be included as highlights of the exhibition. The Friends of the National Collection of Ireland (FNCI) have acquired for the gallery ‘The Coulin’, c.1930s, painted by Waterford based artist, Robert Burke. The FNCI, founded in 1924, have been long standing supporters of the gallery and its collection and The Waterford Gallery of Art is extremely grateful to FNCI, and in particular FCNI Council Member, Dr Bulbulia.
Artform Dunmore East will also present to the collection a significant new artwork, ‘Parchment Tree 5’ (2018) by artist Michael Wann. Born in Dublin in 1969, Wann lives and works in Co. Sligo, gaining his BA in Fine Art from Sligo Institute of Technology. Wann’s work is specifically drawing-based and often featuring masterful charcoal mark-making techniques to depict the surrounding natural environment.
Joan and Roger Johnson and Newtown School (the historic foundation of the Waterford Art Collection) very kindly donated a fascinating map of the city of Waterford created in 1948, also by artist Robert Burke.
‘A Survey of the Landscape’ takes place from May 4th to November 4th 2023.
The Waterford Gallery of Artis open to the public from Wednesday to Saturday 10am-5pm, and admission is free.
Source: Waterford City & County Council
