Lagganstown first studio open day

When Lagganstown held a community gathering to celebrate the restoration of the local handball alley next door to our studio we were invited to take part. We held our first studio open day to coincide with the festivities.

Aisling Egan, Brigid Teehan and Violeta Pserackaite ran workshops for local children. The kids were taught techniques in felting, sewing, clay moulding and got to take home pieces they made such as dreamcatchers.

Violeta's felting workshop

Aisling Egan mentoring local children in sewing

Many older visitors were former pupils of the school, who related to us colourful anecdotes of their experience there. Punitive discipline imposed by the teachers on them for rather slight misdemeanors featured quite often in their reminisces, though these were tempered with plenty of humor, even fondness.

Emer Lynch - Outside Junction Art Trail

Emer Lynch - Astound on corner of Market St, Clonmel, Co. Tipperary

My escape view was pierced by webbed wires, sectioning the sky.
Poles and lamps that tower over humble me. I felt estranged but
spots of brightness in the clouds caught me. The sky gleams and
breathes between the valley of the buildings, crowning the shapes
beneath. To look beyond the blockades is joyous; the belly of an
endeavouring seagull glistens, wings pumping against the dazzling
presentation of infinite forget-me-not blue.

Emer Lynch 2009

Bewilder on corner of Emmet St & Market St, Clonmel, Co. Tipperary

As they were too big for the space we had, Emer Lynch decided to display her large scale photographs on the street. With the help of Bill J Doyle and his drilling expertise she had them mounted at various locations around Clonmel town. She left a map at our Market Place gallery to pinpoint their locations around the town. The map has subsequently been recreated in google maps.

Bewilder on corner of Emmet St & Market St, facing Market St.

Emer Lynch's Stupefy on  Market St, Clonmel, Co. Tipperary

Emer Lynch's Heavenly Hurt on Market St, Clonmel, Co. Tipperary

Emer is heading off to pastures anew. She'll be showing at New York's Heller Gallery in The Post-Glass Video Festival 2010, more info on her and the show can be found in the how is this glass? blog here. We wish her well.

Interactive artwork 1 : Dead nature being revived

For the Junction Fringe Festival Exhibition Brigid Teehan decided to incorporate some shop display furniture to create an interactive piece. Gallery visitors were invited to draw and/or write on a revolving four-sided paper-covered tower. The following is from the blurb :

"It is a six day recording of a network of memories in response to the title ‘Dead nature being revived’. The theme is one of hope: that the possibilities of regeneration are limitless and out of destruction can come new life and growth.

Participants can choose to equally ignore the title and make whatever marks/images come to mind or react to others work on the paper tower."

Most participants chose the latter.

Junction Fringe Festival Exhibition

Flyer for event depicting each artists' work.

This pop-up exhibition was run in the fringe section of Clonmel's annual festival, the Junction Festival, a nine day long multi-disciplinary arts festival featuring modern theatre, dance, family spectacles, street theatre, rock, world music and trad. It was the 10th anniversary of the festival this year and while it has always had some visual art elements to it, it now included a gallery exhibition.

A disused commercial unit was made available to us. The venue this time was a former mobile phone shop in Market Place, Clonmel a couple of doors down from our 1st exhibtion space. As before it was arranged courtesy of Pat Quirke.

STAC Gallery Talk

On Saturday 19th June, several artists talked about the work they had on show. Invited artist Etaoin Holahan gave a short history of Endangered Studios, a group run on similar ethos to ours in Co. Kilkenny. This was followed by an open discussion on the creative uses for empty commercial spaces chaired by members of ArtHive. 

 Endangered Studios artist Etaoin Holahan with accompanying video projection.

 

Bill J Doyle talks about his metal sculpture Wilderness.

Brigid Teehan presents her installation Still Life: Shipton

Dennis Ryan talks about his ceramic piece Keep your Feet on the Ground.

Lagganstown Studio: A Profile

An antique filing cabinet contains an eclectic repository of visual imagery, most of it but not all 2D. 

David Best's work here seems to consist mainly of combined photo-etchings of medieval prints of anatomy, botany and architecture. Some have subsequently been painted on and/or collaged with items such as playing cards glued to them.

South Tipperary Arts Centre Exhibition

Invite for show, reverse & front.

Our 2nd group show is open from 3rd June until the end of June courtesy of STAC, Clonmel's local arts centre. STAC is a long established art gallery so the artists didn't have to worry about preparing the space, making this a more conventional exhibition.

The shows' opening was listed in an event page in Facebook as well as being promoted by the arts centre. It helped bring in a large crowd for the opening and for the duration of the show.

Emer Lynch in front of her video installation HoriZoN during opening.

Brigid Teehan - Still Life: Shipton installation

l to r: artworks by Violeta Pserackaite, Dennis Ryan, Brigid Teehan & Deirdre Delamere