JAN 2020
Though our need to connect is innate, many of us frequently feel alone. In this exhibition, international artist Nicola Anthony has been commissioned to work throughout 2019 with individuals in Ireland who feel isolated, displaced, or lonely. Her artistic practice always starts by “gathering the human stories”. In this case she reached out to communities, invited people across the country to write to her, and worked specifically in the County of Wexford to host workshops which would aim to connect individuals, remove the stigma of loneliness, and invited individuals to share their stories and become the subject of an artwork.
Taking the stories they told her about their lives, or the thousands of letters they wrote her, Nicola creates an immersive installation of interwoven, kinetic text sculptures:
“On my journeys to Enniscorthy I observed murmurations of starlings performing a mesmerising dance of togetherness over the River Slaney. This phenomenon is called emergent behaviour: Their apparently choreographed coordination is caused by thousands of individual movements and instinctive actions. Emergence also occurs in water molecules, resulting in its behavior as a liquid - flowing, eddying, tidal.
There are parallels with how humans behave in a crowd or as part of a society. This observation inspired the central sculpture in the exhibition, featuring birds filling the cavernous ceiling. Beneath sits a solitary bird.
Each starling is made of words, kindly loaned by Louis De Paor, from his poem Fáilte Uí Dhonnchú which portrays crowds of people walking past a homeless Romanian woman. She is surrounded yet still incredibly alone. The original Irish of De Paor’s poem becomes sculpture - the poem itself displaced, migrating, reassembled.
On my journeys, I follow the same river for hours listening to birdsong. I have been collecting bottles of river water to use in ink drawings which simulate droplets of dew being compelled together.
Being made of 60% water ourselves, this metaphor for society enchants me: Everyone is connected, part of Ireland, part of the world... but the river splits and divides; it crosses borders, emerging as streams, loughs and puddles; becoming gentrified and compartmentalised, purged and evaporated... it forgets that each droplet is part of the whole.”
Nicola Anthony
This exhibition is organised as part of the First Fortnight Festival programme. First Fortnight utilises arts and culture to challenge mental health stigma while supporting some of Ireland’s most vulnerable people through creative therapies.
Opening event Fri 10 Jan, 6pm
Exhibition runs: Sat 11 - Fri 24 Jan
Hours: 10am - 5pm Mon - Thur / 10am - 4pm Fri / 10am - 4pm Sat / closed Sun
Artist’s talk - Around the world in 800 stories: Sat 11th Jan, 4pm. Event free, reserve your seat here.
Artist’s Workshop - The Secret Life of Colour: Sat 18 Jan, 1.30pm - 3.30pm. Tickets €15, limited capacity. Buy your ticket here.
Venue: The Presentation Arts Centre, Convent Rd, Templeshannon, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford, Y21 X889
WORKSHOP
The secret life of colour
Beat the January blues by joining in this fun art workshop which explores colour, chromatography and inks - resulting in your very own beautiful collaged artwork.
Artist Nicola Anthony will be teaching you the properties of colours and inks, how to find calm and happiness through creativity, as well as how to express yourself through art. No art experience needed, all experience levels welcome
TALK
Around the world in 800 stories
Sculptor Nicola Anthony has travelled the world to make art about those who experience life differently, to delve into challenging life stories, and to find the human essence that bonds all of us despite our differences. In this talk Nicola will give insight into the exhibition at the Presentation Arts Centre for which she worked with communities in Wexford county who experience profound loneliness or disconnection. She will share some wonderful stories that her research platform, the Human Archive Project has explored - from tales unexpected happiness and serendipity in Singapore, to the testimonies of holocaust survivors in the USA, to the feelings of displacement of those who have migrated to or from Ireland.
For more information on First Fortnights Festival click here.
