9 September – 8 January

Coupled with Mise en scène, Part I at the Highlanes Gallery, Drogheda, this exhibition takes the form of an intervention in our beautiful and historic Sculpture Galleries.

Exhibited among the gallery’s collection of Canova Casts, Mise en scène, Part II comprises twenty small works by Eithne Jordan that respond to museum interiors in Ireland, France, and the United States.

Many of Jordan’s paintings feature sculptures which she sees as serving a multitude of purposes, but principally as a way of introducing the human figure into the institutional space. The artist notes that there are many layers of historical reference and interpretation distancing us from the humanity of the figure.

This series of exquisite miniature oils on board is a new departure for the artist. As Jordan notes:

‘I like the idea of doing a show in a space where a conversation can happen between my paintings and works from the collection that are on display. Here there are all kinds of echoes and connections with the Canova Casts and the sculptures represented in my paintings…’

This exhibition runs in parallel with Eithne Jordan’s Mise en scène, Part I (27 August – 1 October 2022) at the Highlanes Gallery, Drogheda. Both exhibitions, running concurrently, provide a unique opportunity for visitors to see the artist’s work in two very different contexts across the island of Ireland.

Curated by Margarita Cappock.

Download the free companion booklet.

IN CONVERSATION: Eithne Jordan & Margarita Cappock
1pm, Wednesday 19 October
Free but advance booking recommended via Eventbrite

Eithne Jordan lives and works in Dublin, and in the Languedoc, France. She studied at Dun Laoghaire School of Art before receiving a DAAD scholarship to Berlin where she lived and worked for a number of years. She has exhibited widely in Europe, and is a member of Aosdána and the RHA, where she holds the position of Keeper. Her work is in major public and private collections in Ireland, Europe, and the United States. Mise en scène, Part I and Part II are Jordan’s first shows in Ireland since her major exhibition, Tableau, at the Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin in 2017.   

Screening Room

14 July – 7 August 2022

DemocraCity (2011) is an animation produced by Mark Clare using the 3D modelling program Google Sketchup.

Taking the contradictory ideologies of B.F. Skinner (1904-1990) and Theodore John Kaczynski as its starting point, and an edited version of Arvo Part's Fratres for violin and piano as its soundtrack, DemocraCity is a combination of architectural models.

The animation takes the viewer on a journey through a timeline of iconic modernist buildings – symbolic of a utopian dream – and onwards through a cityscape and the industrial structures necessary to deliver the fuel that power our cities. We ultimately enter a landscape based on artist renditions for the Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository – due to become operational in 2023 – which extends deep into the granite bedrock of Finland.

Mark Clare (b.1968) is an artist whose practice embraces a variety of media and techniques, ranging from audio, animation, and video to photography, performance, and public interventions. He is presently artist-in-residence at UCD Earth Institute, Dublin and has previously exhibited at Crawford Art Gallery with I Believe In You (2014), and at the Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris and Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin.

Screening Room
16 June – 10 July

This screening of Amanda Dunsmore’s Senator David Norris coincides with Bloomsday (16 June) in the centenary year of James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922).

Recently acquired for the collection, Senator David Norris (2012) is a video portrait of the prominent Irish LGBTQ+ activist and renowned Joycean scholar. David Norris (b.1944), a founder of the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform who has served in Seanad Éireann since 1987, has suggested that to enter into the world of Ulysses we should: ‘Listen to it, read it as far as you can with your ears.’

Filmed in the attic of the James Joyce Centre (North Great George’s Street, Dublin), Dunsmore’s portrait of this usually animated raconteur is silent. Norris sits composed, surrounded by books and the remnants of Joyce related materials.

Senator David Norris was created as part of the Galway County Council Public Art Residency Programme with Galway’s older LGBT community.

Amanda Dunsmore (b.1968) examines place, people, and moments of political significance through her work. Employing archival processes and aesthetic tactics drawn from established conventions of portrait painting, she explores representations of societal transformation through contextual portraiture and social historic projects. Dunsmore's filmed portraits feature social actors who have transformed society, often filming them in locations of social-historic significance.

Amanda Dunsmore
Senator David Norris
2012
Video (Edition 2 of 3)
19:19 minutes
Purchased, the Artist, 2020
CAG.3087

Screening Room

19 May – 12 June

Last Man (2011) by Martin Healy follows a solitary male figure as he conducts caretaking activities in an empty building. Filmed in the old terminal of Cork Airport, the vacated site suggests a foretaste of a possible future, or perhaps the recording of a neglected past.

These possible scenarios conjure up both the concept of a world without oil – making air travel impossible – or even a future where aviation has become obsolete and what remains is nostalgia for the archaic technologies of the past.

The film’s title refers to The Last Man (1826), a dystopian novel by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley set in the late 21st century which imagines a future pandemic that ravages the human population. Healy’s work thus takes on eery new relevance in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and its resulting loss of life, public fear, and aviation restrictions.

Martin Healy (b.1967) is an Irish visual artist who works predominantly in video and photography. A graduate of Crawford College of Art & Design, he has exhibited widely over the past two decades and held residencies at Centre Culturel Irlandais, Paris; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; and PS1 Contemporary Art Centre, New York.

AS THEY MUST HAVE BEEN: Men of the South, 1922-2022

30 July – 25 September

Seán Keating’s group portrait, Men of the South, was completed a century ago this year.

The painting, which has become an icon of the period, was created in the long shadow of the Irish War of Independence (1919-21) when, during the truce of 11 July 1921, members of the Cork No. 2 Brigade visited the artist’s Dublin studio. Keating would later remark: ‘They trooped in, dressed and armed very much as they must have been on many an ambush.’

Exhibited in 1922 at both the Munster Fine Arts Club and Royal Hibernian Academy, Men of the South excited discussion in the Cork press and was ultimately purchased for the collection, in 1924, through the Gibson Bequest Fund.

This exhibition places Men of the South in context and seeks to draw out stories of the individuals depicted, the wider theatre of war, and the circumstances surrounding the making of a masterpiece. It also provides a rare opportunity to encounter Men of the South with its companion painting, An IRA Column (1921), which is on kind loan from Áras an Uachtaráin.

Accompanying this focused consideration of Men of the South is a broader exploration of 1920s Ireland, and the emergence of the Irish Free State, as represented through selected artworks by George Atkinson, Hugh C. Charde, Margaret Clarke, John Day, Paul Henry, Catherine Holland, Mainie Jellett, John Lavery, Louis le Brocquy, Séamus Murphy, Breda O’Donoghue-Lucci, William Rothenstein, Thomas Ryan, Oliver Sheppard, Estella Solomons, and Jack B. Yeats.

This centenary exhibition invites visitors to reflect upon the power of art to shape or reshape our histories, with an eye to posterity and bearing witness to lives and events ‘as they must have been’.

Curated by Michael Waldron

The exhibition is accompanied by a programme of free public tours and a special Heritage Week event, Men of the South at 100: An Oral History with Maurice O’Keeffe (Irish Life & Lore) and curator Michael Waldron at 5:30pm, Thursday 18 August, Crawford Art Gallery.

Listen back to Conor Tallon and Michael Waldron discussing AS THEY MUST HAVE BEEN on The Arts House for Cork’s 96fm.

16 July – 6 November 

Eye-catching, thought-provoking and mouth-watering in equal measure, Meat and Potatoes will open across two floors of exhibition space at Crawford Art Gallery this summer.

Bringing together works by historic and contemporary artists who have used food as their muse in myriad ways, the exhibition will be organised into three primary sections – BREAD, MEAT and POTATOES – which will be presented as staples in the history of food-focused art, as well as our personal diets throughout the ages. Visitors will have the opportunity to survey an abundance of food-related artworks produced over the last four centuries, from still lifes, to dining utensils and cookware, to video works and installations that consider the politics and concerns that have shaped perspectives on food right up to our present moment. 

A feast for all the senses, Meat and Potatoes will whet the appetite of anyone who has ever thought about food as a source of sustenance not only for the body, but also for the eyes, the mind, the soul, and society at large.

This exhibition features the work of Comhghall Casey, Monika Crowley, Lisa Fingleton, Mary Kelly, Anne Kiely and Mary Palmer, Maria McKinney, Abigail O’Brien, Geraldine O’Neill and Deirdre O’Mahony, in addition to Jean in Bed with Jaundice by John Bratby and Tommy Sutton Getting in the Spuds in the Snow by Camille Souter, which are on kind loan from the Glebe Gallery in Donegal.

Click on the links below to download an essay in pdf format.

Ellie O’Byrne: Art is always food for thought, not least when it’s art about food.

Cristín Leach: Consuming Beauty: There’s Eating and Drinking in that.

Click on the logo below to view the calendar of events.

Screening Room
22 April – 15 May

Showing for a limited time, our series of screenings from the collection continues with Dorothy Cross’ short film Jellyfish Lake.

Jellyfish Lake (2002) by Dorothy Cross resulted from the artist’s investigations into the biomechanics of Chironex fleckeri (box jellyfish). Filmed in an isolated lake in Palau, Micronesia, millions of golden jellyfish migrate across the lake daily.

Cross plunges the viewer under water to view a naked woman floating beneath the sunlit surface. Unlike the solid form of the body, the contrasting golden jellyfish are amorphous and transparent yet there is mutual awareness: the human form is laid bare to nature’s defences but collide temporarily

Dorothy Cross (b.1956) works in sculpture, photography, and film to examine the relationship between living beings and the natural world. Living in rural Connemara on Ireland’s west coast, the artist sees nature, the ocean and the body as sites of constant change and flux. Having studied in this building during the 1970s, Cross went on to represent Ireland at the 45^th Venice Biennale in 1993 and continues to exhibit internationally.

Screening Room

3 – 20 March

Grace Weir’s short film Dust defying gravity shows for a limited time in a new series of screenings from the collection.

Dust defying gravity (2004) by Grace Weir consists of a single 4-minute tracking shot that traces through the rooms at Dunsink Observatory, Dublin and documents the aging telescopes and measuring instruments that are dispersed throughout the building. As the camera passes over a mechanical model of the solar system, the dust in the air of the room becomes visible, floating, and scintillating like a field of stars.

Grace Weir (b.1962) is a visual artist who works primarily in the moving image and installation. In her work, she focuses on the slippages between the conceptual and experiential in different fields of enquiry. In 2001, she represented Ireland at the 49^th Venice Biennale and, from 2012 until 2015, she was Artist-in-Residence in the School of Physics, Trinity College Dublin.

17 March – 25 September

BOTANICA: The Art of Plants gathers selected historic and contemporary works from the collection to probe how artists have, over time, represented plants in their practices through pastel, pencil, paint, print, and sculpture.

Running from spring to autumn, this exhibition touches on the histories of plant collecting – and ethical questions of colonialism that arise from it – and considers the place of gardening, the hidden meanings of flowers, and the medicinal applications of plants, among other themes.

BOTANICA offers a timely reflection on our relationship with plants. Indeed, just as the pandemic has underscored Millennials’ increasing attraction to caring for houseplants, our impact on the environment and biodiversity has come to define a new geological age: the Anthropocene.

In art, plants have figured as accompaniments to important themes, borne symbolic meanings, and emerged as subjects in their own right.

In this exhibition, the selected artworks range from landscapes and still lifes to botanical and arboreal studies. Are there encoded meanings in flowers? What are the medicinal qualities of plants? Can trees speak?

BOTANICA features artworks by Emily Anderson, George Clausen, Thomas F. Collier, Sylvia Cooke-Collis, Susanna Adelaide Deane, Augustin Amant Edouart, Gerda Frömel, Debbie Godsell, Patrick Hennessy, Katie Holten, Evie Hone, Marshall Hutson, Mainie Jellett, Fiona Kelly, John Lavery, Maurice MacGonigal, Robert Matthews, Nellie Möckler, Rosaleen Moore, Sarah O’Flaherty, Monica Poole, Kathy Prendergast, Dod Procter, Vivienne Roche, Nigel Rolfe, Harry Scully, and Jennifer Trouton.

Curated by Michael Waldron

Click on the interactive tour below to view the exhibition online.
Click on the bottom right icon to view in fullscreen mode.

26 February – 28 August 2022

For an event linked to this exhibition, see below.

In November 2021, a major donation of unique maritime artworks was gifted to Crawford Art Gallery by The Port of Cork Company.

This significant collection consists of 17 maritime paintings, a ship’s register (1912) from The Cork Harbour Commissioners referencing both the Titanic and Lusitania, an illuminated address to Charles Stewart Parnell (1846-1891), and a silver Admiralty Oar from 1686.

Now visitors will have the opportunity to encounter a selection of paintings from the Port of Cork collection, including works by George Mounsey Wheatley Atkinson (1806-1884), Henry Albert Hartland (1840-1893), Robert Lowe Stopford (1813-1898), and Seán Keating (1889-1977).

Although not attending to certain social or political realities of late nineteenth-century Ireland, these artworks do act as a visual reminder of that time. They also underscore Cork Harbour's links with empire, its international significance for commerce and trade, and ever-present story of migration. Glimpses of half-remembered histories are framed within these heritage views of Cork Harbour. Each artist provides an insight into the Port of Cork's operations, from Atkinson's extraordinary rendering of naval vessels to Hartland and Stopford's depictions of commercial shipping and leisure craft. Perhaps unexpectedly, Keating's elevated View of the Port of Cork draws us into Cork City itself and remembers the busy working quays of recent memory.

Take in panoramic views of Cork Harbour from the late nineteenth century, turn back the clock on locations ranging from Cobh (Queenstown) and Monkstown to Blackrock Castle, and learn of the variety of seagoing vessels, including the famed SS Sirius.

_{Curated by Michael Waldron}

Click here to view The Birdlife of Cork Harbour event. 

Click on the interactive tour below to view the exhibition online.
Click on the bottom right icon to view in fullscreen mode.

23 April – 17 July 2022

Crawford Art Gallery is delighted to welcome the Zurich Portrait Prize for a third consecutive year in partnership with the National Gallery of Ireland.

Sponsored by Zurich, this annual competition is open to artists working in Ireland, and Irish citizens based abroad. Submissions are not restricted by media; however, all entries must have been completed within the last three years. The winner of the competition will receive a cash prize of €15,000 and will be commissioned to create a work for the National Portrait Collection, for which they will be awarded a further €5,000. Two additional awards of €1,500 will be given to highly commended works. The 2021 shortlist will go on display in the National Gallery of Ireland (13 November 2021 - 3 April 2022) before being exhibited at Crawford Art Gallery (23 April - 17 July 2022).

This year’s judging panel is formed by artist Eamonn Doyle, art historian Róisín Kennedy, and curator Seán Kissane.

The 24 shortlisted artists for the Zurich Portrait Prize 2021 are:

• Serena Caulfield (Wexford), Dad, 5/10/2020, Oil on wood panel
• Carey Clarke (Dublin), Portrait of David Somerville, Oil on canvas
• Mollie Douthit (Cork), Life in lockdown part IV: Laying on my kitchen floor with lavender eye mask to stave off a migraine, Oil on linen panel
• Lizzie Downes (Dublin), Inside, Archival photographic print
• Sarah Doyle (Dublin), Portrait of Uachtarán na hÉireann Michael D. Higgins, Photograph
• Gabhann Dunne (Dublin), I love ya boy, Oil on board
• Beverley Healy (Belfast), Looking for Gold, Egg tempera on true gesso board
• Vanessa Jones (Dublin), Cabbage Baby (self-portrait), Oil on linen
• Dragana Jurišić (Wicklow), Daithi sleeps, Archival pigment print
• Paul MacCormaic (Dublin), Portrait of Catherine Corless, Historian and Human Rights Activist, Oil and acrylic on canvas
• Jonathan Mayhew (Dublin), All I could do was sit and collect dust, Sculpture made from the artist’s hair, dust & detritus
• Tom McLean (Galway), Note to Self, Oil on aluminium
• Cian McLoughlin (Dublin), Lockdown Three, Oil on canvas
• Poot Mendes (Dublin), Bobby + Isaac, Photograph
• Nick Miller (Sligo), Portrait of Patrick Hall – painting, Oil pastel and paint on linen
• Julia Mitchell (Tipperary), Knight of Kilcooley Abbey, Oil on canvas
• Gráinne Moloney (Clare), Girl with Hen, Oil on canvas
• Emily O’Flynn (Cork), Portrait of a Girl Through a Pandemic, Video on plasma screen
• Conor O’Leary (Surbiton, England), Fiona and Woody, Evening Light, Photograph
• Liz Purtill (Kerry), Paulus, Egg tempera, heavy paper mounted on wood
• Emma Roche (Wexford), Shower Painting 2 (Self-portrait), Knitted acrylic paint on wood panel
• Salvatore of Lucan (Dublin), Me Ma Healing Me, Oil on canvas
• Brian Teeling (Dublin), Declan Flynn in Dublin, Photograph
• Riley Waite (Oregan, USA), Ian Was Here, Oil on canvas

The exhibition will be accompanied by the shortlisted artists from the Zurich Young Portrait Prize 2021.

Click on the image below to view a virtual tour of the exhibition.

23 April – 17 July 2022

Crawford Art Gallery is delighted to welcome the Zurich Young Portrait Prize for a third consecutive year in partnership with the National Gallery of Ireland.

This is an annual inclusive art competition which aims to foster and support creativity, originality and self-expression in children and young people. The Zurich Young Portrait Prize accepts entries from young people, up to the age of 18, of all abilities, from across the island of Ireland. 20 finalists in four categories (ages 6 and under, ages 7–11, ages 12–15 and ages 16–18), chosen by our panel of judges, will be displayed at the National Gallery of Ireland from 13 November 2021 to 3 April 2022. The exhibition will then travel to Crawford Art Gallery, where it will be displayed between 23 April and 17 July 2022. The overall winner will be awarded a personalised wooden box of high-quality art materials, specific to their choice of material in their portrait, and a cash prize of €500.

This year’s judging panel is formed by Aideen Barry, Joe Caslin, and Tadhg Crowley.

The shortlisted artists for the Zurich Young Portrait Prize 2021 are:

• Adam Wiercioch Chinatamunnee (Cavan, aged 5), My Father, Watercolour and ink on paper
• Liam Kehily (Dublin, aged 5), Mammy, Coloured pencils and graphite pencil
• Marianna Krolik (Dublin, aged 6), Mia, Watercolour and pencil on paper
• Emilie Cowley Lane (Meath, aged 5), My Gaga, I miss you so much, Poster paint on cork board
• Rebecca Sheahan (Dublin, aged 5), E E … Evie, Acrylic on canvas
• Aliana Aherne (Dublin, aged 9), Mixed Up Me, Oil paint on paper
• Rita Ruitong Chen (Wicklow, aged 8), My Mum, Watercolour and pencil on paper
• Ellie Giblin (Dublin, aged 10), My Glamorous Grand-Aunt, Chalk pastels and charcoal on sugar paper
• Eleanor Margey (Donegal, aged 11), Magnifying Glasses, Drawing pencils and white pen on paper
• Úna and Braden McDonnell (Louth, aged 6 & 8), Úna with the dancing curls, Polystyrene base, papier mache, acrylic paint, papers, markers and plasticine
• Della Cowper-Gray (Kildare, aged 14), Painting in a different world now (My Father The Artist), Pencil and pastel on paper
• Cora Lee (Dublin, aged 13), Working from Home, Pencil, marker and pen on paper
• Joanna Lipska (Kildare, aged 14), Chip-Chop, Colouring pencil on paper
• Lijun Ma (Dublin, aged 15), Self Portrait, Paint on canvas
• Ayesha Siddique (Laois, aged 14), Ayesha’s portrait, Acrylic and pencil on canvas
• Niamh Brady (Cork, aged 18), Unmasked, Pencil and paint marker on paper
• Mia Buckley (Cork, aged 17), Tudor, Acrylic paint on canvas
• Ross McHale (Kildare, aged 16), Life’s Loop, Relentless Rebirth, Acrylic on cardboard animation
• Loren McKenna (Tyrone, aged 17), Deliberation, Oil on cardboard
• James Moonan (Louth, aged 16), Grandad, Pencil, acrylic, corrugated card on paper

The exhibition will be accompanied by the shortlisted artists from the Zurich Portrait Prize 2021.

Click on the image below to view a virtual tour of the exhibition.