Irish Art Scene

What is a nation? And what do we need to be considered part of a nation? This event aims to consider our identity as curators, as Italians, as Europeans in a precarious time, especially because of politics and economics. We are living in hard times: both Ireland and Italy are suffering due to the global crisis and our governments are forced to cut funds to support culture. Thus the art system is in danger and a lot of people have decided to leave their own country to find other possibilities abroad. The “new emigration”, composed of graduates and highly educated people, art professionals, doctors, engineers, is changing an entire social system, especially in Italy. Taking inspiration from the financial crisis and funding cuts, the event will focus on the reaction of artists to these issues, their interpretations of the causes and effects, and their strategies to address or overcome them. Quoting Boris Groys, “artists today are using the same forms and proces...

Helen Sharp is an artist living and working in Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. Helen grew up on the tiny Hebridean island of Vatersay in Scotland and left the islands to take up a place in Edinburgh College of Art where she gained a First Class honours in Sculpture and received the Andrew Grant Bequest Scholarship for Highest Academic Achievement. Helen went on to gain a Masters with Distinction in Time Based Art from Dartington College of Arts gaining the highest degree result in her year. After some time teaching and also exhibiting internationally many times, Helen went on to be director of Catalyst Arts Gallery in Belfast and then to complete a PhD in Art from the University of Ulster. Alongside and equally as important to her academic career, Helen has continued her art practice and recently had a major solo show called the `Hero and Now’, exhibiting film,  photography, print and installation. Helen was one of five shortlisted artists for the Cultural Olympiad...

This major mid-career survey of the work of the internationally admired Brazilian artist Rivane Neuenschwander covers a decade of her work. A Day Like Any Other highlights her unique contribution to the narrative of Brazilian Conceptualism and reveals her wide ranging, interdisciplinary practice that merges painting, photography, film, sculpture, installation, collaborative actions and participatory events. Three installations in the exhibition involve direct visitor participation. The first, I Wish Your Wish , 2003, is based on a tradition at a church in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, where the faithful tie silk ribbons to their wrists and to the gates of the church; and, according to tradition, their wishes are granted when the ribbons wear away and fall off. At IMMA hundreds of similar ribbons are printed with visitors’ wishes from Neuenschwander’s past projects exhibited elsewhere. Visitors are invited to remove a ribbon from the wall and tie it around their wrist. Acc...

Located In the north east inner city Dublin, Fire Station Artists’ Studios was established in 1993 to support professional visual artists. Fire Station provides subsidised residential live/work spaces for visual artists. The studios are let for up to two years and nine months and for shorter periods for international artists. A long term residency at Fire Station allows an artist to focus on their practice and general career development in a supportive and well-resourced environment. Fire Station provides large scale sculpture workshop facilities and training opportunities for artists through its Skills Programme. This programme has expanded to include digital and film training and continues to host technical training and master classes which incorporate critical reflection. A key policy of Fire Station is to contribute to the debate on collaborative and socially engaged arts practice. This is achieved through working with both local and international ar...

Located in Dublin city center, Broadstone Studios is an independent visual artists’ studio workspace that was founded in 1997 by visual artist Jacinta Lynch. The core philosophy of the studio is one of autonomy that supports professional development for contemporary visual artists through the provision of affordable studio workspace within a safe, secure, accessible and creative environment. Support facilities include a black & white darkroom, digital video editing facilities and a large ground floor project and exhibition space. The large open project space enables the studios to provide public access for a predominantly private artists workspace through a series of practice led initiatives, partnerships and collaborations. Broadstone Studios works in partnership with many artists’ studio organisations, both nationally and internationally to research new models for studio providers, to lobby and advocate on behalf of visual arts workspace’s and to create networ...

This exhibition is devoted to images of China by Scottish photographer John Thomson (1837-1921). Born in Edinburgh Thomson first travelled to Asia in 1862, where he set up a professional photographic studio.  Fascinated by local cultures, Thomson returned in 1868, settling in Hong Kong.  Over the next four years he made extensive trips to Guangdong, Fujian, Beijing, China’s north-east and down the Yangtze.  This exhibition is drawn from his time in these regions. In the early days of photography, when negatives were made on glass plates, a cumbersome mass of equipment was required but Thomson was nevertheless able to capture a wide variety of images.  His works present the human aspects of life in China through the extensive record of everyday-street scenes, rarely captured by other photographers of that era. After returning to Britain, Thomson took an active role informing the public about China, through illustrated lectures and publications. ...

Block T is an organisation that has been operating from a formerly disused tile warehouse located in Smithfield Square, Dublin since July 2010. Block T  provides a platform for visual and performing arts, as well as fostering philosophical, social and technological innovation, locally and internationally through education and exchange. Producing an interdisciplinary and varied programme, Block T hopes to establish engagement that encompasses a diverse and wide ranging audience Block T's wider mission is to provide a platform for creative thinking from all avenues. It strives to help independent, self-sufficient and productive individuals to bridge the gay between theory and practice in their art or discipline and to give them exposure to a wider audience. Block T is a 8000 square foot space which encompasses 11 resident artist studios, a gallery space, a workshop room, a performance room, a communal room and a photography darkroom. View Larger Map