Etching and aquatint
41 x 35cm
Edition 40
Grand Locks
SIMON
2022
‘Returning Home’ opening 28th October – 5th November 2022 @chqdublin.
‘Returning Home’ is a charity exhibition of fine art prints from 48 members of @graphicstudiodublin and is a collaboration with @simoncommunity, kindly supported by HLB Ireland.
2021
‘The Art of Home’ opens Monday 4th- Saturday 9th October 2021, 10am- 6:30pm at @CHQ Dublin, Custom House Quay, Dublin 1.
‘The Art of Home’ is an exhibition of fine art prints from 41 members of Graphic Studio Dublin with Simon Communities of Ireland. Proceeds will be split 50/50 with the artists and Simon Communities helping to promote the solutions that will bring an end to homelessness in Ireland.
MIDDEN
MID.DEN
Definition of midden
1: DUNGHILL
2a: a refuse heap : KITCHEN MIDDEN, Shell Midden (archaeological)
2b: a small pile (as of seeds, bones, or leaves) gathered by a rodent (such as a pack rat)
Middens are indicative of accumulation, consumption and disposal. They grow unnoticed and slowly become part of the landscape, piling and collapsing, altering and camouflaging until they are no longer discernible unless excavated. Although considered by their makers as piles of rubbish, so much non-documentary information can be extracted from these middens, but equally much is also open to interpretation and misinterpretation, constantly shifting between meaning and suggestion.
MIDDEN collective are Sarah Edmondson, Mary Martin and Niamh McGuinne. Collaborations so far have focussed on the interpretation of evidence; of decidedly unscientific work made in response to lunar and lunisolar calendars; a critique of geo/human-centric time, measurements, and purported experiences; a pseudoscientific exploration into humans’ interactions with the moon and an appraisal of lunar myths and missions, combining fact with fiction to create new narratives.
And we don’t have to look too far…everywhere around us are potential-middens, middens-in-disguise, partial-middens, middens-in-hiding, proto-middens, middens-in-waiting, pseudo-middens, pop-up-middens, and we along with the pack rats are the authors of their creation.
Image credits: Kate Bowe O’Brien
A Fragile Armour
In A Fragile Armour, an iridescent sculpted mother-shell is poised midair, slowly revolving. It alludes to a life’s work/worth, of time built up slowly in calcified strata. Redolent of shelter and protection, it has been (perhaps temporarily) abandoned for reasons unclear – suggesting time has been stilled and stretched into a single interminable moment. Beneath it lies a midden of shells, discarded as if rubbish. The once valuable husks are all that is left of the memories and experiences that have contributed over time to shape the mother-shell. Prints attempt to capture the essence of the shell, to take a more scientific approach but they still cannot capture everything. When the mother-shell finally departs all that will be left will be her midden, which may lie dormant waiting to be rediscovered, excavated and reinterpreted.
I am interested in how significance and the balance of value shifts depending on the moment in time and how interpretation is always evolving. I consider the value of the throwaway: what will be considered rubbish and what will be treasured.
The Trash Heap has Spoken by Neva Elliot
MID.DEN
Definition of midden
1: DUNGHILL
2a: a refuse heap : KITCHEN MIDDEN, Shell Midden (archaeological)
2b: a small pile (as of seeds, bones, or leaves) gathered by a rodent (such as a pack rat)
Middens are indicative of accumulation, consumption and disposal. They grow unnoticed and slowly become part of the landscape, piling and collapsing, altering and camouflaging until they are no longer discernible unless excavated. Although considered by their makers as piles of rubbish, so much non-documentary information can be extracted from these middens, but equally much is also open to interpretation and misinterpretation, constantly shifting between meaning and suggestion.
MIDDEN collective are Sarah Edmondson, Mary Martin and Niamh McGuinne. Collaborations so far have focussed on the interpretation of evidence; of decidedly unscientific work made in response to lunar and lunisolar calendars; a critique of geo/human-centric time, measurements, and purported experiences; a pseudoscientific exploration into humans’ interactions with the moon and an appraisal of lunar myths and missions, combining fact with fiction to create new narratives.
And we don’t have to look too far…everywhere around us are potential-middens, middens-in-disguise, partial-middens, middens-in-hiding, proto-middens, middens-in-waiting, pseudo-middens, pop-up-middens, and we along with the pack rats are the authors of their creation.
Magic Seeds
Magic seeds planting instructions:
Best time to plant: Toss out your window on a full moon night
Maturity: Overnight
“Dear Santa can I have some magic seeds to grow a tree and some wood to build a treehouse…”
So began my daughter’s letter to Santa many years ago…I can assure you that this was not a test of faith, this was for real and the sentiment encapsulated all that is magical about treehouses and their hold on the imagination.
In the hierarchy of dens, a treehouse holds the loftiest position, a natural and ambitious progression from cushion and blanket constructions. A treehouse allows for passwords, codes and rules to be invoked and amended, a place to act out independent belonging. It is a home/haven outside of family convention…a little walk on the wild side.
Treehouses follow a unique aesthetic – they should look rough and ready, imperfect but also solid, a little dangerous and difficult to get into and most importantly somewhere you could hide away from sight.
The first print I made was an etching of my destined for destruction treehouse, precariously situated in a diseased Dutch elm in our back garden. That I was eighteen at the time goes to show how big a part it played in my childhood. Likewise the treehouse that answered my daughter’s letter sits perched on stilts in our treeless back garden and has since found its way into her paintings…nowadays it is just a shell of its former self, rotten in places and to some neighbours perhaps a bit of an eyesore but no one has the heart to dismantle it just yet.
Secretion
03:58 digital and transferred 16mm film, 2021
Positing a moment of flux where identity and form can undergo a shift is the theme of this short film, incorporating sculptural installation, wearables and performance. The film alludes to an engineered environment in which the subject undergoes a physical and/or imaginative metamorphosis.
Inspired by the self-healing capability of snails and their hermaphroditic character the protagonist collects their mucus to fashion a cape. The much sought after secretion is highly prized for its restorative qualities enabling the snail to repair cracks in its fragile armour and is increasingly being harvested to treat damaged human skin, membrane and tissue. While faith is fundamental to protect its transformative power, the act of hand sewing the protective shell is in itself a form of trial, a test of dedication. Considered abject by some, a desire to become snail-like is to defy sexual categorisation and to acknowledge the importance of self-determination.
While human to snail transferrals are the subject of fantasy, the energy required as catalyst to make the leap is garnered from Wilhelm Reich’s experiments in the 1950s and the enclosures reference his Orgone Accumulator. Playing with scale, the snails charge the accumulator which transfers this biological energy to its occupant providing the potential for an activated experience.
Please contact me to request links to videos at nmcguinne@gmail.com
Do you think I think so
Episode 16 – Eumaeus
Etching and aquatint
46 x 38cm
Edition 18
2022 marks 100 years since James Joyce’s modernist novel Ulysses was published in its entirety. To celebrate this, The Graphic Studio Dublin invited 18 visual artists, to each make an original print, responding to one of the 18 episodes in the book under the title Ulysses Imagined.
I was immediately drawn to the reference to shelter in this episode; the cab shelter inside which the story unfolds and its counterpart of Eumaeus’ hut. Within this protective space the characters appear to be hiding something from each other, be it their true identity or intentions so I am also thinking of pretence, theatrics and masquerade.
The exhibition is accompanied by a commissioned text by Nuala O’Connor, set in letterpress. Celebrated author of Nora. O’Connor’s book, published in 2021, imagines Joyce’s home life, through the eyes of his wife Nora Barnacle. The book was chosen as this year’s read for One Dublin, One Book initiative.
Joyce’s famous novel has inspired many different artists since its publication: writers, musicians and visual artists. This exhibition gives 18 printmakers the opportunity to create a work using an episode from Ulysses as a starting point. The resulting prints, in a wide variety of techniques, illustrate how art of the past inspires art of the future. A line from Nuala O’Connor’s text alludes to that continuum:
‘We loop into infinity, eating ourselves and each other, the end in our beginning and the beginning in our end’.
The exhibition is curated in collaboration with Anne Hodge, National Gallery of Ireland along with Peter Brennan and Mateja Smic of Graphic Studio Gallery.
Visual Artists: Kelvin Mann, Andrew Folan, Fiona Kelly, Yoko Akino, Monika Crowley, Tom Phelan, Kitch Doom, Vaida Varnagiene, Robert Russell, Niamh McGuinne, Elke Thonnes, Shane O’Driscoll, Louise Leonard, Jean Bardon, Daniel Lipstein, Matthew Gammon, Dermot Ryan, Clare Henderson.
Text by Nuala O’Connor. Box set illustration by Eilis Murphy.
Gormworm
Sarah Edmondson, Mary Martin and Niamh McGuinne
19.03 – 16.04.2022
OPENING: 19.04 6-9 pm
OPEN HOURS: SA, SU 4-6 pm
GORMWORM is a three-person exhibition of decidedly unscientific work made in response to lunar and lunisolar calendars. A critique of geo/human-centric time, measurements, and purported experiences.
roof,Noli me Tangere, Hirsute (etchings on paper) and Her Suit, (printed textile)
sarah-edmondson.com | instagram.com/sarah_edmondson
marymartinstudio.com | instagram.com/marymartin_
Shell of Secretion
The installation consists of Shell of Mucus, a collection of four costume pieces (Cap of Insight; Mouthpiece of Flux, Mantle of Quietude and Gauntlet of Chance) and a 3:58 minute colour digital film titled Secretion.
The hand sewn costume pieces are wearables and comprise screen and transfer printed textile and metal including touch/heat sensitive components, aluminium mesh, acetate and etchings on paper.
- Cap of Insight, 20 x 20 x 50cm, hand-stitched textiles, etching on paper and acetate.
- Mouthpiece of Flux, 10 x 18cm, printed textile and aluminium.
- Mantle of Quietude, 85 x 90cm, printed textile/film and wire mesh.
- Gauntlet of Chance, 18 x 15cm, hand-stitched Tyvek printed with heat sensitive ink.
Inspired by the self-healing capability of snails, the installation suggests an activated experience in which I present an invitation to participate – either physically or imaginatively.
Lunar Ozone
This interactive/wearable work looks at our interactions with the moon, in particular myth versus fact regarding its influence over our day to day existence. The premise involves harvesting lunar ozone – by charging a receptive foil headpiece at night for wear during the day. It connects with a theory of ambient biological energy, a concept dating from the 1950s and prevalent to this day.
[Hu]manned Mission
The moon is a distant object, gazed upon by more humans than any other solid object in the universe (Morton, 2019), yet its surface has only been walked on by 12 white American men. The only people to have experienced it first-hand. However, does that make the rest of our knowledge less valid?
[Hu]Manned Mission is a pseudoscientific exploration into humans’ interactions with the moon. An appraisal of lunar myths and missions, combining fact with fiction to create new narratives. It offers an invitation to reconnect and communicate with your moon, to consider the importance of language in your quest, because … it matters what stories we tell to tell other stories with; it matters what knots knot knots, what thoughts think thoughts, what descriptions describe descriptions, what ties tie ties. It matters what stories make worlds, what worlds make stories (Haraway, 2016).
Lunar Confessions
A series of prints incorporating elements associated with undercover investigation; an anonymity of monochromatic silhouettes accompanied with dramatic/implausible testimonials are presented alongside a moon-pod and wearable moon-hat to encourage audience involvement with the objective to collect observations, confessions and elicit an imaginative response.
These observations/comments will be recorded in person by the research team.
