Coming Soon - Exhibition of forgotten photography marks the centenary of Synge’s death
I thank you very much for sending the photographs to me. Violet Wallace got hers. She told me she was going to write to you. The big girl, her heart was well broken when she seen how she looked, hoping that you will be able to sketch her better next year.
Barbara Coneely, writing to John Synge in 1900.
In May 1898 the writer John Millington Synge went to the Aran Islands for the first time. He bought a second hand camera and took some photographs of life on the islands. In May 2009 those photographs go on exhibition on Inis Meain, the island most associated with Synge and where the descendants of many of the people photographed still live.The exhibition marks the centenary of Synge’s death and represents one of the most important and overlooked achievements in the art of photography in Ireland.
‘John Millington Synge | Photographer’ opens in Cniotáil Inis Meáin Teo at 13.30 on Saturday 16 May. The writer and map maker Tim Robinson and Breandán Feiritéar will do the honours.
The exhibition has been put together by the Gallery, Siamsa Tíre in association with Cniotáil Inis Meáin Teo, Ionad an Bhlaoscaoid Mhóir and le Centre Culturel Irlandais in Paris.
The photographs of J. M. Synge are shown with the permission of the Board of Trinity College Dublin.
Information:
Ciarán Walsh: siamsagallery@eircom.net | +353 (0)66 7123055
Gallery Gives Artist Seven Days Hard Labour
Artist Kieran Herlihy will spend seven days physically reconstructing the exhibition space in the Siamsa Tíre arts centre in Tralee. Coming from a background in graffiti and street art, Herlihy is one of a new generation of artists that is changing the look of visual arts in Ireland. His latest solo show, ‘7 years 7 days,’ challenges the very idea of an exhibition and the way artists work with art spaces and interract with people in those spaces.
Herlihy is a leading exponent of grime aesthetics, specialising in grungy and punky installations featuring a vast arsenal of found objects - everything from old doors to motorbikes. Anything goes. ‘7 years 7 days’ will be installed over seven days commencing on the 4 of April. The gallery will be open during the installation phase and interaction between the artist and the public is an essential part of the creation of the work; “My work has grown to involve others … the end result is a body of work that resembles a story of experiences, events and people. It is my aim that the viewer will connect with a piece and revisit a memory or share a story”.
Kieran Herlihy | 7 years 7 days
an event, the Gallery, Siamsa Tire,Tralee
April 2009
Siamsa Tíre,The National Folk Theatre and Arts Centre,Town Park,Tralee, Co. Kerry.
+353 66 712 3055 (T) | siamsagallery@eircom.net
‘7 years 7 days’ has been commissioned by the Gallery, Siamsa Tire and curated by Maurice Galway as part of the Pictures ‘09 programme. ‘Pictures’ is a collaboration between the Gallery, Siamsa Tíre, Dingle Film Festival and Cork Film Centre.The whole process will be the focus of a film directed by Maurice Galway and produced by the Gallery Siamsa Tíre in association with Cork Film Centre. This will be launched during the 3rd edition of The Dingle Film Festival in September 2009. Live video footage of the artist at work will be broadcast online at www.siamsagallery.ie on Friday 10 of April.
The installation phase concludes with a party on the seventh day, April 11, during which the exhibition will be opened by Lucy Phelan, Course Director, Art, Craft and Design, Colaiste Stíofáin Naofa, Cork.The exhibition runs until 2 of May.
Information:
Ciarán Walsh: siamsagallery@eircom.net | +353 (0)66 7123055
Maurice Galway: maurice@dinglefilmfestival.com | +353 (0)87 9139962
