A FAIR LAND or/and a Courgette based economy

Connect with your everyday creativity at IMMA this August 12 – 28

 IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art) and Grizedale Arts (UK) have collaborated to create an extraordinary new project in 2016 that examines the function of art. Echoing the role artists and the European Arts and Crafts movement played in creating and articulating a new vision for Ireland pre-1916 this project takes shape as a visual and working installation in IMMA’s iconic courtyard from 12 – 28 August 2016.

Re-thinking the Royal Hospital of Kilmainham cobblestoned quadrant as a model village, the project – entitled A Fair Land – aims to develop a system for living using basic and simple resources used in a creative way. Todays professionalised culture has arguably moved to distance us from our inherent everyday creativity, instead promoting more systematised living, convenience and globalisation, all fundamentally based on the exploitation of ‘labour capital’ (other people’s labour).

The ambition with this new project is to create a complete living system that is elemental, immediate and sustainable based on your own individual and collaborative labour. In doing so, A Fair Land will create a model for a way to live, envisaged, enabled and operated by a collective creative vision which enhances dignity and self-determination and looks at how that that can be delivered through creativity – an inherent human function. A Fair Land argues that the use of creativity in the everyday is a means to enable change and empowerment.

The project is envisioned as a kind of way station, creating an instant no-frills system that acts as an empowering opportunity to re-educate, re-engage and re-vision from both a personal and societal perspective, be you war refugee, economic migrant, downsizer, opt-outer, affluence escapee or Brexiteer. The core function of the project is an ongoing education where the system itself is the school. To this end a number of artists will put forward their visions for education drawn from ‘village’ resources.

A Fair Land has been developed by a wide range of people, including artists and creative practitioners, with the aim of making a new vision for a functioning future society. Each day the village will offer its visitors opportunities to eat, make, think, or trade – and through that process to copy, assimilate and teach. With a focus on creating objects that are useful, desirable and achievable, A Fair Land will present an active and tangible representation of the place of creativity in society, creating a space for families, friends and strangers to gather, get involved, and experience alternative perspectives on living.

Artists and collaborators include: Eavan Atkin / Samuel Bishop / Kat Black / Bluebell Youth Projects / Tania Bruguera / Rhona Byrne / Marcus Coates / Common Ground / Emily Cropton / CREATE / Coniston village building team / Michelle Darmody / Eoin Donnelly / Vanessa Donoso Lopez / Drew and Middori / Firestation / Motoko Fujita / Ryan Gander / Liz Gillis / Nicola Goode / Irish Architecture Foundation / Brenda Kearney / Suzanne Lacy / Renzo Martens/ Jonathan Meese / Meg Narongchai / Deirdre O’Mahony / Seodín O’Sullivan / Debbie Paul / Rialto Youth Projects / Niamh Riordan / Kirsty Roberts / Katie Sanderson / Sarah Staton / St. Andrews Community Centre / Francesca Ulivi / Miranda Vane / Fiona Whelan / public works / NÓS workshop / NVA / Somewhere / Sweet Water Foundation / Villagers from the Swiss village of Leytron / Tom Watt & Tanad Williams, and many more.

The project has been delivered with the generous and creative support of construction collaborators Swift Scaffolding, Hentech Fabrication and Rilco Roofing and has received additional funding from the Goethe Institut Irland.

This project is presented as part of an exciting on-going initiative, New Art at IMMA, proudly supported by Matheson,
which allows IMMA to continue to support artists’ vital work in a
strand of programming that recognises and nurtures new and emerging
talents, new thinking and new forms of exhibition-making.

A Fair Land is part of the official Ireland 19 / 2016 Cultural programme

For further details and images please contact [email protected]

Additional Information / A Fair Land Programme

About the Project

A Fair Land began with IMMA taking the unique step of
inviting Grizedale Arts, an international commissioning and residency
agency, to take up residence in IMMA’s own residency programme
from March 2016. Whilst in residence Grizedale Arts, in collaboration
with IMMA, invited a range of artists and creative practitioners from
Ireland and beyond to use the residency as a base to research and
develop a major activated project for our 17th century courtyard which
is at the heart of our building.

A reflection of pre-1916 Ireland, A Fair Land
reveals a vision for society informed, and led by creativity and
artistic practice – whether through a Ruskinian reconsideration of
industry, a vision for education or culture as a mechanism for political
activism – where the creative voice was central to new visions for
modern society emerging in Ireland and internationally.
 
You can follow the development of the project by looking for the hashtag #AFairLand on Instagram or Twitter

For more details and a full weekly programme please visit the exhibition page /en/page_237103.htm

This project has been made possible with the support of:

Click here to view the 2016 Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection exhibition page. 

THE HENNESSY ART FUND FOR IMMA COLLECTION

Thursday, 14th July, 2016: Today, Hennessy Ireland and IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art) announce a new multi-year partnership and acquisition fund to purchase works by Irish and Irish based artists that are not yet part of the IMMA National Collection of Contemporary and Modern Art. Entitled, The Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection, this initiative has enabled IMMA to purchase multiple works for the Collection for the first time since 2011.

Artists will be nominated by a selection panel, including Director Sarah Glennie and Head of Collections Christina Kennedy, and each year will include an independent guest curator. This year’s guest panellist is Emma Lucy O’Brien from the VISUAL Centre for Contemporary Art in Carlow, with final recommendations approved by the IMMA Collection & Acquisitions Committee, in line with IMMA’s Collection policy.

Four works by four different Irish based artists have been selected, and the chosen artists for 2016 are Kevin Atherton, David Beattie, Rhona Byrne and Dennis McNulty. All of the works are installations that variously engage film, performance, new media, sound, found objects, everyday materials and audience participation.  They are being exhibited as part of IMMA Collection: A Decade, an exhibition which provides a snapshot of how the National Collection of Modern and Contemporary art has developed over the past 10 years.

Kevin Atherton’s video installation is a recurring engagement with his younger self through a filmed conversation first begun in 1978 when he was 27 years old, and was most recently conducted by his more mature self in 2014, 36 years on. Rhona Byrne’s interactive work invites people to reconstruct her life-size sculptural installation and make their own environments.  Through a kinetic juxtaposition of materials including a cymbal and piece of concrete David Beattie explores the physicality of sound and how we experience it in our everyday, while Dennis McNulty’s research for a commission in Norway has led to a layered, performative multi-component work that takes 1930s science writing and a 1980s pop song by a-ha to join ideas of universal time.

The Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection will see artists based in Ireland and Irish artists living abroad eligible for selection each year. Works will be sought that show excellence and innovation within contemporary art developments and represent a signal moment of achievement within the artist’s practice. Work must also have been made within the previous five years.

Commenting on the Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA, artist Kevin Atherton said: ‘For me the recent purchase of my work by the Irish Museum of Modern Art, made possible by the generous sponsorship of Hennessy, means a great deal, acting as it does as a confirmation of the welcome I felt when I first moved to Dublin from London in 1999. Having chosen to come to a country with a vibrant and dynamic contemporary art scene seventeen years ago, I feel a part of that scene and am delighted that my work be viewed through an Irish optic that although rooted in Ireland is international in outlook.’

David Beattie added to this by saying, ‘The purchase of the work by Hennessy for the IMMA collection is a significant moment for myself as it is the first of my works to become part of a museum collection. I think being part of the IMMA collection has added significance because of the important role that IMMA plays in the wider art community in Ireland and internationally.’ 

Elaine Cullen, Market Development Manager for Moet Hennessy Ireland, said: ‘This new partnership with IMMA continues Hennessy’s long tradition of supporting and nurturing Irish talent within arts and culture. It’s a privilege to enable the acquisition of such high calibre work for the National Collection at IMMA.’

Sarah Glennie, Director of IMMA, said: “IMMA is, above all else, committed to supporting artists’ work. Together with artists, and visionary partners like Hennessy Ireland, the museum works to support the development, understanding and enjoyment of contemporary art in Ireland. As Ireland’s contemporary visual artists continue to strengthen, Irish artists’ work is increasingly recognised on the international stage as well as making an invaluable contribution to Irish society. Artists are an essential voice in any contemporary society and IMMA is committed to supporting Irish artists’ ability to live and work in Ireland. The Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection is a key initiative in supporting this objective, making it possible for the museum to purchase work for the first time since 2011.”

Founded in Cognac, France in 1765 by Corkonian Richard Hennessy, Hennessy’s distinctly Irish heritage has stood the test of time and today draws on more than 250 years of knowledge, talent, expertise and passion. Highlights of the Hennessy cultural calendar include the Hennessy Portrait Prize with the National Gallery of Ireland, the Hennessy Literary Awards, one of Ireland’s longest running cultural sponsorships, and Hennessy Lost Fridays with the RHA.

For further information visit www.imma.ie and www.hennessy.com, log onto the Hennessy Cognac Ireland’s Facebook page www.facebook.com/HennessyCognacIreland, or follow Hennessy on Twitter @HennessyIRL and Instagram @HennessyIRL.

-ENDS-

The Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection 2016 Artists

Kevin Atherton

Kevin Atherton is an artist who works with performance and new media in sculptural contexts. A fine art educator, his is a time-based practice with an ongoing interest in the relationship between the real and the fictional. Since 1980s he has created many large scale public sculptural commissions. He was Head of the Department of Postgraduate Pathways in the Faculty of Fine Art in NCAD and as such has influenced a whole generation of young artists.

In Two Minds premiered in 1978 at the Project Arts Centre  and recently has been included in the following group exhibitions:  2009: San Francisco MOMA; 2012: MOMA Vienna, Tate Britain, ICA London;  2014:  IMMA, Primal Architecture.

David Beattie

David Beattie is an artist who lives and works in Dublin, Ireland. He has received a number of Arts Council bursaries, most recently 2015, and was awarded the Harpo Foundation Award in 2010. Recent solo exhibitions include Temple Bar Gallery and Studios (2011); The Mattress Factory Art Museum, Pittsburgh and Mercer Union Centre for Contemporary Visual Art, Toronto, Canada (both 2010). Beattie has been included in numerous group exhibitions including In the Line of Beauty, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2013), O Brave New World, Rubicon Projects, Brussels (2013) All Humans Do, The Model, Sligo and Whitebox, New York (2012); Holding Together, Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin (2010); La Part des Choses, Mains d’Oeuvres, Paris, and in Quiet Revolution, Hayward Touring, UK (2009).

Rhona Byrne

Rhona Byrne lives and works in Dublin, Ireland. Rhona makes sculptural objects and spatial environments combining sculpture, performance and processes of participation that explore a negotiation of object, place and social practice. Recent and upcoming projects and exhibitions include, Pathways, Education Hub, Art commission, Maynooth University; A Fair Land, Irish Museum of Modern Art; Mobile Monuments, Fingal County Council public art commission; Huddle Tests solo show at Temple Bar Gallery and Studios; Huddlewear, Facebook AIR program residency/commission; Mobile Monuments, Fingal County Council 1916 Public Art commission; On that Note, Heart of Glass, Liverpool; Moving Thresholds, National Gallery of Ireland; Ridge, Verksmi∂jan, Hjalteyri, Iceland; It’s All up in the Air, Norfolk and Norwich Arts Festival, Uk; Bolthole, Open Studio, Tate Modern and Tate Britain, IMMA
www.rhonabyrne.com   

Dennis McNulty

Dennis McNulty makes video works, sound works and installations, and in recent years, has produced a number of complex multi-layered performance works. His work is conceptual and research driven and often draws on aspects of cinema, sculpture, sound and performance to create hybrid forms.  How as human beings we unconsciously accumulate knowledge through our interaction with our environment, especially the built environment and how that has played out through history in terms of architecture and engineering – frequently provides the starting point for McNulty’s artworks.

Through research, McNulty looks for new frameworks for activity, to create works which propose a new kind of relationship to time and space, to histories, as well as our bodily experience of such forms.

I reached inside myself through time, 2015 was specially commissioned for the group exhibition LIAF 2015: Disappearing Acts, Lofoten, Norway’s International Art Festival, curated by Matt Packer and Arne Skaug Olsen.

Recent and current exhibitions include The Time Domain, a site specific live work, presented during Liverpool Biennal 2016, co-commissioned between Bluecoat School and Liverpool Biennial;    2015: I reached inside myself through time, commissioned for LIAF, Lofoten International Art Festival, Norway, 2014: PROTOTYPES, Limerick City Gallery of Art, Limerick; A Leisure Complex, Collective, Edinburgh; 2013:  INTERZONE, The Box, The Wexner Center, Columbus, Ohio; The Face of Something New, Scriptings, Berlin;  
A Stew of Universals, ZKU, Berlin;  2012:  PRECAST, off-site project, London;  INTERZONE, Seamus Ennis Center, Fingal, Co Dublin, 2011:  The Eyes of Ayn Rand, Performa 11, New York;  
Another Construction, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin;  Space replaced by volume, Granoff Centre for the Arts, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island.

About Hennessy
Immersed in Irish heritage, Hennessy has evolved to become one of Ireland’s most well-known and cherished brands. Founded in Cognac, France in 1765 by Corkonian Richard Hennessy, the brand’s distinctly Irish heritage has stood the test of time and today draws upon some 200 years of knowledge, talent, expertise and passion. It is a brand that is intrinsically linked to the Irish way of life and is complemented by Hennessy’s commitment to Ireland’s unique sociability and skill in creating unforgettable experiences.

Hennessy’s Savoir-Faire is evident from its unique heritage, tradition and exceptional craftsmanship which create Hennessy Cognac. Though the Hennessy brand has evolved throughout the years, the true art form of its traditions and methods remains timeless.

About IMMA
IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art) is Ireland’s leading national institution of Contemporary and Modern art. Based in its home at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, IMMA is celebrated for its vibrant and dynamic exhibition and education programmes.

IMMA is the home of the National Collection of Modern and Contemporary art. Now numbering over 3,500 works, IMMA ensures that this collection is accessible to visitors to IMMA and beyond, through exhibitions, collaborations, loans, touring partnerships and digital programmes.

Visited by over 475,000 people in 2015, IMMA is one of Ireland’s leading cultural institutions and a key source of creativity and inspiration for visitors of all walks of life. One out of every eight IMMA visitors experiences visual art for the first time through their IMMA visit. The museum is driven to inspire a curiosity and appreciation of Irish contemporary art amongst their audience and the wider Irish public.

 

 Listen, Hissen, Hessin!
The first live performance of six-piece experimental sound group Hissen at IMMA this June

6.30pm – 8pm, Wednesday 22 June 2016
The Passion According to Carol Rama, IMMA Galleries
Free, but advance booking required, to book click here 

Listen, Hissen, Hessin! is a one night live performance in response to The Passion According to Carol Rama; Italian artist Carol Rama’s current exhibition at IMMA. A roving soundscape performed by six Dublin based visual artists working under the aegis of Hissen, featuring Karl Burke, Jessica Conway, Teresa Gillespie, Jonathan Mayhew, Suzanne Walsh and Lee Welch. This will be their first public performance as a six-piece experimental sound group and will take place within the galleries at IMMA.

Deliberately contrasting with the aesthetic of Italian artist Carol Rama’s work (1918-2015), Listen, Hissen, Hessin! riffs off Rama’s strategies and approaches to making her work – instinct, experiment, materiality, the queering of perceptions, wit, contradictions, freedom, and sensuality. The evening seeks to capture this attitude, offering it an alternative form via sound and motion.

This performative soundscape is a response to the architecture of the space, the artworks on display, and between the artist/performers themselves. It is improvised, lo fi, and layered using a combination of digital sound, voice, musical instruments, human touch, and found objects – a hanging window blind, an air vent, a stool.

Through live scoring and choreography, Listen, Hissen, Hessin! seeks to agitate the viewers experience of the exhibition, to break a certain social order, and to question any conclusion you might come to in reading Carol Rama’s, or indeed Hissen’s, work. To echo Anne Dressen’s recent description of Carol Rama in Artforum (February 2016), the event plays off a sense of the artist as “trouble-maker”.

The title of the event Listen, Hissen, Hessin! references the urban phrase ‘hessin’, defined as a lack of motivation to do anything other than party, and a desire to do anything illegal.

Hissen is supported by the Studio 6 open programme at Temple Bar Gallery + Studios, Dublin.

-ENDS-

For images and additional information please contact Monica Cullinane [email protected] 01 612 9922 or [email protected]

Additional Information

Carol Rama
Ignored for decades by official art history, Italian artist Carol Rama is now recognised as essential for understanding developments within contemporary art. Her influence can be seen in the work of a later generation of artists such as Cindy Sherman, Kara Walker, Sue Williams, Kiki Smith and Elly Strik. Rama was belatedly recognised in 2003, receiving the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale, one of the most prestigious international art exhibitions. The Passion According to Carol Rama is on show at IMMA until 1 August 2016.

This is the first substantial exhibition of Carol Rama’s work and comes to Dublin following exhibitions in MACBA, Barcelona, Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, and EMMA, Finland. With a selection of almost two hundred works, the exhibition offers a guide through the artist’s many creative moments. Neither exhaustive nor retrospective, The Passion According to Carol Rama is the most extensive presentation of the work of this artist to date. It acts as an attempt to recognise and restore a life’s work still unknown but nevertheless slated to become classic.

Born in 1918 in Turin, Carol Rama – never academically trained or faithful to individual art movements – developed a body of work over seven decades that is as unique as it is obsessive, Rama experimented with alternative materials, developing techniques for inventing new spaces of desire and her work challenges the dominant narratives around sexuality, madness, animalism, life and death.

IMMA Talks Seminar: Sexuality, Identity & the State
1.30pm – 6pm, Wednesday 22 June 2016
Also on Wednesday 22 June IMMA will present a free seminar Sexuality, Identity & the State which will address issues of gender, sexuality, identity and the state, as it relates to the work of artists Carol Rama and Patrick Hennessy, currently on exhibition at IMMA, amongst others. Comprising of presentations by artists, writers, curators, educators and psychoanalysts, the seminar will draw on queer theory, feminism and psychoanalysis across a range of disciplines, and consider wider research agendas that span the history of art, culture and society. For further details and booking click here

IMMA announces its Summer Party music programme, curated by Cillian Murphy, with Hauschka, Meltybrains?, Caoimhin O Raghallaigh and New Jackson (DJ). Tickets on Sale Fri 20th May at 10am.

Now in its third year, the IMMA Summer Party returns on Saturday 16 July with a truly unique night time celebration of music, performance, food and drinks in the buildings and grounds of IMMA.

In advance of tickets going on sale later this week, IMMA is delighted to announce highlights of the music programme, curated by Irish actor Cillian Murphy. Once the singer and guitarist with a rock band, actor Cillian Murphy has both a visceral love of music and an impeccable ear, leading to the selection of an exciting, experimental line up for IMMA.

While each act is musically very different, all of the artists selected by Murphy are known for their unique and mesmerising live performances. From the intense soundscapes of German pianist/ composer Hauschka through the refined elegance of Gloaming composer and fiddler Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh to the electronic disco explosion of New Jackson (DJ set) and the bewildering and energetic brilliance of Ireland’s own Meltybrains? audiences are in store for a creative and engaging night of live music. From the intimate to the epic, expect music to fill the Great Hall and stunning Baroque chapel, spilling out onto the formal lawns of the IMMA Gardens.

This may be Murphy’s first curation of a live music programme but it certainly isn’t his first involvement with music, having previously collaborated with the likes of Feist, Money, I Break Horses, Orbital’s Paul Hartnoll, Mark Garry, Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene, Irish music blog Fractured Air, and fellow Cork musicians The Frank and Walters, on whose recent record he makes an appearance. 

We are also delighted to announce today that emerging curator Anna Gritz of the Schinkel Pavillon Berlin, and previously of South London Gallery, is the performance and film curator for the IMMA Summer Party and will be programming a series of live interventions to take place across the site throughout the night. Details will be announced over the coming weeks.

As always delicious food and drinks will be available to purchase on the night and the grounds and galleries of IMMA will be open to art and culture lovers during the night. A highlight of the summer calendar the IMMA Summer Party has sold out every year so we encourage you to get buying those tickets! Tickets go on sale on Friday 20th May at 10am, priced €18 and are available through www.imma.ie

-ENDS-

For more information and images please contact [email protected] or 01 612 9922 or [email protected] or 01 612 9920

Additional Information

HAUSCHKA
German pianist Hauschka (real name Volker Berttelmann) is one of the most recognisable 21st-century proponents of prepared piano. His first forays into public performance were with major label hip hop act God’s Favourite Dog and a drum and bass quintet Nonex. When you listen to his music this makes more sense than you might at first think: the sound of Hauschka is both instinctive and fuelled by a love of rhythm.

“One thing about Hauschka’s music is that once you’ve seen it performed live (..) it’s impossible to dissociate the visual from the sounds you’re hearing. (..)some of it even comes mid-song, and watching him reach one hand into his instrument’s guts to jam sticks into its strings—while still playing with his other hand—makes for one of the more visually interesting piano performances you’ll ever witness.” (Undertheradarmag.com)

NEW JACKSON (DJ set)
New Jackson is the new electronic/house project from Dubliner David Kitt. From his studio near the sea, he makes nocturnal house jams with a ghostly disco hint.

"New Jackson bashes through electronic pitch changes, dressed in funky rhythms and topped off with some mechanical synth work…his set was a masterclass in live-electronic performance."  –GoldenPlec

CAOIMHÍN Ó RAGHALLAIGH
One of the most exciting and innovative traditional musician of his generation and member of The Gloaming, Caoimhiìn Oì Raghallaigh makes music on a 10- string fiddle called the hardanger d’amore, and travels the world as a solo musician, in duos with Dan Trueman, Mick O’Brien and Brendan Begley, and as a member of The Gloaming and This is How We Fly. He has performed on some of the most beautiful stages in the world, including the Sydney Opera House, the Royal Albert Hall and the Lincoln Center. He has made twelve recordings to date, ranging from quite traditional to fairly out there, and continues to explore the region where traditional music begins to disintegrate. His is currently musician-in-residence in the John Field Room at the National Concert Hall.

“[Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh is] the most imaginative and fascinating musician in all of trad” Earle Hitchner, Irish Echo

MELTYBRAINS?
The members of Meltybrains? are classically trained musicians Tadhg Byrne, Brian Dillon, Bernhardt Bix McKenna, Donnacha O’ Malley and Micheál Quinn, but their music is indefinable.

"They literally blew my mind. They’re such accomplished musicians. All I can say is see Meltybrains? when you can. They are incredible live" Niamh Hegarty (BBC NI)

CILLIAN MURPHY
Irish actor Cillian Murphy was once the singer and guitarist with a rock band, has both a visceral love of music and an impeccable ear. After leaving University, Murphy joined the Corcadorca Theater Company in Cork, and played the lead role in Disco Pigs. Having come to prominence first in Kirsten Sheridan’s film adaptation of Disco Pigs in 2001, Murphy’s career is both on stage and screen. He starred as Scarecrow in Batman Begins (2005) – a role he reprised in The Dark Knight (2008) and The Dark Knight Rises (2012) – and also picked up a plethora of awards and nominations for his performances in Neil Jordan’s Breakfast On Pluto, Ken Loach’s The Wind That Shakes The Barley and Christopher Nolan’s Inception. He currently stars in BBC drama Peaky Blinders.

He has previously collaborated with a number of Irish and International musicians including Feist, Money, I Break Horses, Orbital’s Paul Hartnoll, Mark Garry, Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene, Irish music blog Fractured Air, and fellow Cork musicians The Frank and Walters. This is his first live music curation.

Roger Casement – The Hollywood Biopic
Critically acclaimed artist Simon Fujiwara opens new work at IMMA

Simon Fujiwara, The Humanizer
20 May – 28 August 2016

A new work by Berlin based, British/Japanese artist Simon Fujiwara, titled The Humanizer, is presented by IMMA on the occasion of the centenary of the Easter Rising. The Humanizer is Fujiwara’s proposition for an imagined Hollywood biopic composed almost uniquely of sound and based on the life of historical Irish nationalist figure Roger Casement (1864-1916). Created with contemporary Hollywood movie professionals including renowned screenplay writer Michael Lesslie (Macbeth, 2015; Assassin’s Creed, 2016) and Oscar winning designer Annie Atkins (The Grand Budapest Hotel, 2014; Bridge of Spies, 2015). The Humanizer is one of three major new works commissioned by IMMA that reflect on the legacy of the commemoration of the Irish State. New commissions by Irish artists Jaki Irvine and Duncan Campbell will be presented later this year.

Simon Fujiwara was drawn to Sir Roger Casement’s extraordinary life. Considered the world’s first human rights campaigner, he was awarded a knighthood in recognition of his fight for the rights of slaves, before turning against the British in the Irish nationalist cause that lead to the Easter uprisings of 1916. His fateful demise came at the hands of the British government and his execution was sealed following the discovery of a highly controversial diary, ‘The Black Diaries’, containing explicit “evidence” of Casement’s homosexual activities. Casement’s life was so full of drama that as early as 1934 there were plans to shoot a Hollywood Casement biopic, as Fujiwara discovered in letters sent from Universal Pictures to Casement family members. Although the life of Roger Casement provided enormous potential material for a film the movie was banned by the censorship laws in the nations involved. 

Inspired by the Universal Pictures letters which are housed in the archives of the National Library of Ireland, Fujiwara enlisted a group of contemporary Hollywood movie professionals to collaborate with him in imagining how the facts of Casement’s biography might be depicted through the lens of today’s multinational movie corporations. Fujiwara gave Casement’s biography to acclaimed Hollywood screenwriter Michael Lesslie who developed a movie script in which Casement’s life and character were adapted, manipulated and often completely reinvented to comply with the current models of the Hollywood biopic form. Leslie presents Casement as a righteous man born in the wrong age – a man who may have betrayed the country he worked for, but never betrayed his principals. In true Hollywood style, every character, action and line in the script underlines this overarching narrative construct.

The script was then enacted by a company of professional actors in Dublin, before being set to a musical score that evokes a prolonged Hollywood trailer. The sound element, which includes Hollywood style music and foley, was produced in Berlin in collaboration with artist and sound designer Moritz Fehr. Set across a series of four rooms that house objects and personal effects, the sound fragments of the biopic interject into the rooms at unexpected times, rupturing what appears to be, at first glance, an authentic historical exhibition of Casement’s life.  Fujiwara’s selection of objects did not belong to Casement, however, but are props loaned from Berlin’s renowned Babelsberg Film Studio where a number of historic movies from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, 1927, to Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds, 2009, have been filmed.

Accompanying the exhibition props are a series of replica documents from Casement’s life including love letters, an arrest report and of course the famous ‘Black Diaries’ all produced by Oscar winning designer Annie Atkins and historic handwriting specialist Jan Jericho (Valkyrie, 2008, Cloud Atlas, 2012). Here existing paper documents from Casement’s life are recreated through the lens of the Hollywood designer to make them appear, at times, even more authentic than their originals.

Through fragments of sound, a minimum of objects, documents, and an environment of red curtains and carpet reminiscent of a cinema, The Humanizer seeks to evoke the experience of a big budget Hollywood movie with the most modest means. Without the seductive moving pictures associated with movies to communicate exactly what we are seeing, the audience is no longer a passive recipient but an active agent in visualising the movie. The Humanizer asks if today’s audience, with its unprecedented reserves of visual information can picture an entire movie, its locations, cast and even its message without ever having to see it?

The Humanizer is presented as part of an exciting on-going initiative, New Art at IMMA, proudly supported by Matheson, which allows IMMA to continue to support artists’ vital work in a strand of programming that recognises and nurtures new and emerging talents, new thinking and new forms of exhibition-making.

The work is supported by Ireland 19/2016 and is presented as part of the Ireland 2016 Centenary Programme.

Associated Talks

Artist Discussion with Simon Fujiwara and Michael Lesslie
Friday 20 May, 1 – 2pm / Lecture Room
Artist Simon Fujiwara and the renowned screenplay writer Michael Lesslie explore processes of script writing, heroism and conventional Hollywood narratives, as it relates to the historical biography of Roger Casement. Moderated by Rachael Thomas, Head of Exhibitions, IMMA. Book here

Curator’s Lunchtime Talk: Drop In
Wednesday 1 June, 1.15 – 2pm / Meeting Point / Main Reception                                                                                         
Join Karen Sweeney, Exhibitions, IMMA, for a free exhibition walkthrough, where background information on The Humanizer will be explored in detail. No booking required, drop in.

For a full programme of events and free tickets visit www.imma.ie

IMMA is delighted to announce DEAN DUBLIN as our Major Hotel Partner for 2016. Since they opened their doors in 2014, Dean Dublin has strived to create a fun and vibrant space for their guests, right in the heart of the city. An ideal partnership, both IMMA and Dean Dublin value cutting edge and contemporary art with Dean Dublin showcasing original artworks by Irish artists throughout the hotel. Their collection, curated by James Earley, features many artists whose work is also represented in the IMMA Collection; these include Irish artists Mark Francis, Richard Gorman, Patrick Scott and Samuel Walsh. The Dean Dublin Lobby features a glowing Neon LED sign I Fell in Love Here by British artist Tracey Emin, whose work is also included in the IMMA Collection, on long term loan from the Weltkunst Collection.

This partnership will allow Dean Dublin to offer their guests the unique opportunity to engage with IMMA’s creative and experimental programmes, while it enables IMMA to invite some of the most influential figures in the Irish and international art world, including artists, curators and collectors, to come to Dublin.

The Dean Dublin IMMA partnership begins with the opening of a new work by Simon Fujiwara, opening at IMMA on Friday, 20th May. Entitled The Humanizer, this new commission is an imagined Hollywood biopic of Roger Casement with contributions from scriptwriter Michael Lesslie (Macbeth, 2015, Assassin’s Creed, 2016) and Oscar winning designer Annie Atkins (Grand Budapest Hotel, 2013). Future partnerships include the IMMA Summer Party, curated by Irish actor Cillian Murphy.

IMMA Director Sarah Glennie said; “IMMA’s partnership with Dean Dublin is one of our most important and significant relationships for 2016. A major factor in the delivery of our ambitious programme is the ability to offer hospitality to our artists enabling us to host some of the most influential figures in the Irish and International art world here in Dublin; something we simply could not do without Dean Dublin support. We really value this visionary support of IMMA and look forward to growing our relationship with Dean Dublin in the future”.

Bryan Davern, GM of Dean Dublin, welcomed the partnership; “As IMMA’s Major Hotel Partner we are delighted to welcome leading figures in the Irish and international art world to stay and experience Dean Dublin. Our values are aligned with what IMMA does best, creating new experiences that engage visitors.”
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– ENDS  –

For more information and images for IMMA please contact [email protected] or [email protected] 01 612 9922

For more information on Dean Dublin please contact Aoife Kelly / Jenny Headen [email protected] / [email protected] 

Additional Information

IMMA
IMMA – Irish Museum of Modern Art, is Ireland’s national institution of contemporary and modern art. Based in its home at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, IMMA is celebrated for its vibrant and dynamic exhibition and education programmes.

IMMA is the home of the national collection of modern and contemporary art. Now numbering over 3,500 works, we ensure that this collection is accessible to visitors to IMMA and beyond, through exhibitions, collaborations, loans, touring partnerships and digital programmes.

Visited by over 475,000 people in 2015, IMMA is one of Ireland’s leading cultural institutions and a key source of creativity and inspiration for visitors of all walks of life.

One out of every eight IMMA visitors experiences visual art for the first time through their IMMA visit and it is hugely important to us to create an enjoyable and engaging experience of contemporary art for everyone. We are driven to inspire a curiosity and appreciation of Irish contemporary art amongst our audience and the wider Irish public.

Dean Dublin
We don’t do conventional. We do fun. Cool & comfortable rooms filled with stuff that will make you smile. Spaces for work & play. Food & drink to tweet home about. Smack bang in the heart of Dublin city.

No fussy hotel formality, just book, arrive, say hallo, grab an elevator & settle in. We’ve fifty two bedrooms in our building. Some are small. Some are big. Some are really, really big. They’re all deadly sleeping spaces. We want you to feel like you’re staying over at a mate’s house so we’ve filled your room with fun stuff: big bouncy beds, super soft linen, blast power showers, Grafton Barber products, Marshall amps connecting to your gadgets, Netflix on your Samsung TV, loads of classic vinyl for your Rega turntable, munchies to make you grin, original new Irish art on the walls & much more. You might never leave your room. That’s OK with us.

We love to work, to play, to eat, to drink, to dance. So besides our sleeping places, we’ve got The Dean Bar, The Blue Room, The Loft, Sophie’s on the roof, Everleigh in the basement. Everyone is welcome, it’s an open house. You don’t need to be staying at Dean Dublin to hang out at Dean Dublin: a seven am Clement & Pekoe coffee grab; a quiet corner to use as a hot desk; rotisserie for lunch; an unbelievable New York-Italian dinner; a table full of classic cocktails; DJs on the decks; sunrise; sunset.

We are smack bang in the heart of Dublin City. We’ve done our best to keep the noise to a minimum but there’s always going to be a big buzz around here at night, that’s the location you’re staying in when you stay with us. Please make sure to consider this when booking. Stay in, head out, work, party, it’s up to you. http://deandublin.ie/

Image credit: Colm MacAthlaoich, Candy Forest

A snapshot of the last ten years as seen through the IMMA Collection
A Decade opens at IMMA today with major new acquisition; Willie Doherty, Remains

Pierre Huyghe, Block Party, 2002 – 2004, Super 16mm film transferred to video, Duration 5 min 45 sec Edition of 6. Collection Irish Museum of Modern Art, Purchase 2005.

IMMA Collection: A Decade
28 April 2016 – 8 January 2017

IMMA presents IMMA Collection: A Decade – a snapshot of how the National Collection of modern and contemporary art has developed over the past 10 years. IMMA’s remit is to collect the art of now for the future, to reflect key developments in visual culture and to keep them in the public domain for future generations. Great works of art entering IMMA’s Collection shape future conversations about art, Ireland and the world we live in and expand the reputation of contemporary Irish artists globally.

Commenting on the exhibition Christina Kennedy, Senior Curator: Head of Collections, IMMA said: “The large number of donated works featured in this exhibition reflects IMMA’s almost exclusive reliance on gifts and private philanthropy in recent years. As a result of significant funding cuts IMMA has not had the resources to have a viable acquisitions budget since 2011. As a result, the practice of younger and mid-career artists from the past five years are glaringly absent from the IMMA Collection story. It is particularly through purchases that IMMA can best fulfil its vision and mission to chart the nation’s artistic memory and it is therefore vital that IMMA resume purchasing such critically important Irish and international works as a matter of urgency.”

Works selected for IMMA Collection: A Decade explore memory, identity and place, and questions of globalism, the environment and connectivity – from the local to the universal.  The exhibition includes many of the wide range of media represented within the IMMA Collection; painting, sculpture, drawings and prints, photography, film, video, installation and performance and include works by both Irish and international artists, giving you a sense of the huge variety of artistic practice in contemporary art.

A key display within the exhibition is Remains, 2013, by Willie Doherty, a powerful fictitious film based on real events. As part of a spate of punishment shootings in 2012 in Derry by the dissident Republican group Republican Action Against Drugs (RAAD), a father was ordered to bring his son and another boy, a cousin, to a specified location to be kneecapped. Such punishments were administered by the IRA to control drug use or anti-social behaviour during the conflict in the North of Ireland but are now used by dissident republicans to exert control. Commenting on the work Doherty stated “I revisit these same locations in Remains to explore the idea of the generational nature of the conflict, how it passes through families and the vicious circle that people can get caught up in".  Remains is one of a selection of significant acquisitions that are the result of generous donations to the IMMA Collection, including works such as Cape Siren (2008) by Philip Taaffe, significant gifts from the Novak/O’Doherty Collection, David Kronn Collection, the Graphic Studio and a diplomatic gift of works from the Federal Government of Mexico. 

Other key works include Block Party (2002-2004) by French artist and filmmaker Pierre Huyghe celebrating the block party as a force of community and cohesion with New York City neighbourhoods, Clarendon Road (2000-2005) by Howard Hodgkin, deploying his characteristic brushstrokes and saturated colours to respond to the view of a London house, and Vulture (Dragon) (2010) by Surrealist painter Leonora Carrington.

The works are shown in a series of rotating displays, the next works in the exhibition will be shown from July 2016.  Admission is free.

Associated Talks and Events
A series of talks, events and digital resources will focus on aspects of IMMA Collection’s newly installed exhibition displays.  Entitled A Decade, the exhibition brings together many works that resonate with ideas of identity, memory and place. Speakers will include Tim Robinson (writer, artist and cartographer), Willie Doherty (artist) and others.

The series will also consider how a museum can best fulfil its mission to chart the nation’s recent artistic memory. Key topics will look at the place of collecting, of philanthropy and the role of the State in the funding of art for the National Collection of Modern and Contemporary Art. 

Please see www.imma.ie for more details.

Curators Lunchtime Talk: Drop In                                                                                                                        
Fri, 27 May, 1.15 – 2pm / Meeting Point / Main Reception
Join Christina Kennedy, Head of Collections, IMMA for an exhibition walkthrough of A Decade, where she will explore the curatorial context of the works on display, consisting of purchases, donations and loans in the past decade.

For a full programme of talks and events please visit www.imma.ie

 

Gerard Byrne, artist, Sarah Glennie, Director, John Cunningham, IMMA 1000 founder, Jesse Jones, artist and Grace Weir, artist at the IMMA 1000 launch.

IMMA, the Irish Museum of Modern Art, today launched a new fund designed to support the future of contemporary art in Ireland – IMMA 1000. A reaction to the devastating cuts experienced by the Arts sector in recent years IMMA 1000 is initially a three year fundraising programme 2016 – 2018. The fund launches with €60,000 which IMMA plans to double in year one through donations of €1,000 each from 60 visionary individuals.

IMMA Director Sarah Glennie said; “IMMA 1000 is a new fund specifically created to support our work with Irish artists in the drastically altered social and economic environment we find ourselves in today. Severe cuts in arts funding since 2008 have had a devastating effect on supports available directly to contemporary artists, and as a result artists simply cannot afford to live and work in Ireland, creating a huge concern for the future of Irish art, and contemporary Irish culture.”

“Artists tell us about ourselves, they challenge us; they create space for difference, debate and imagination. Their voice is an essential part of a vibrant and dynamic society and it is essential that we value artists and create a sustainable base for them in Ireland. With IMMA 1000 we want to create a support infrastructure for working Irish artists today, securing the ecosystem for the future.”

IMMA 1000 will do this in three key ways;
– Supporting artists to live and work in Ireland through bursaries and the IMMA residency programme.
– Supporting artists’ income through commissions and exhibitions.
– Supporting artists’ work through the purchasing of work for the IMMA Collection.

IMMA has been supported in this initiative by Goodbody as the exclusive corporate founding partner for IMMA 1000. As Ireland’s longest established stockbroking firm, Goodbody understands the importance of creating a legacy today for future generations. That’s why it has made a firm commitment to contribute significant funds to this important initiative over three years.

“Goodbody has high regard for IMMA and the work it does. We believe artists deserve a secure place in Irish society,” said Roy Barrett, Goodbody Managing Director. “Goodbody wants to help to build and sustain the cultural institutions that make art viable in Ireland. IMMA 1000 is a project of real ambition that we are honoured to support.”

IMMA 1000 was conceived on behalf of IMMA by businessman John Cunningham, Director CheckRisk, who responded to a talk by IMMA Director Sarah Glennie to a group of business leaders in 2014. He was struck by the critical difficulties, outlined by Sarah, facing artists in Ireland following the economic crisis. John, together with a group of founding donors, has already raised €20,000 for the initiative creating, with Goodbody, a founding fund of €60,000 in year one.

“In the business world we frequently hear concerns about ‘brain drain’ in Ireland; where the most talented and promising graduates and young leaders are leaving the country due to the economic crises, creating a void in the future ecosystem. We should be equally alarmed about the hundreds of artists who are no longer able to live and work in Ireland. Artists are crucial in forming and communicating our valuable cultural identity, a vital asset to Irish business abroad and a vital need for Irish people at home. We have to do something tangible to create the future we want for our country, and I want a future with Irish art, something we can achieve together through IMMA 1000.”

Speaking at the launch, leading Irish artist Gerard Byrne, also an IMMA Board member, said;
 
“As an artist working in Ireland for the last twenty years I’ve seen first-hand how critical it is that our arts institutions are enabled to support artists’ ongoing practice and the making and collecting of their work. Artists have a significant contribution to make to a country’s wellbeing and as an artist working internationally it is very clear to me the benefits to a society where artists are valued. We must value our artists and IMMA must be enabled to invest in their future by investing in the present. Simply put, IMMA 1000 can support this investment.”

Why Now?
Substantial cuts in arts funding since 2008 have had a devastating effect on supports available directly to contemporary artists. Arts organisations such as IMMA have also seen cuts of close to 50% in their government funding resulting in fewer acquisitions for public collections, fewer commissions of new work and reduced artist fees.

Overall these combined cuts create an overwhelming reduction in the funding that institutions such as IMMA can use to directly support artists. The commercial art market in Ireland also faces considerable challenges. As organisations slowly start to rebuild after years of successive cuts it is essential that IMMA is able to actively support Irish artists so that Ireland will remain a viable place for them to live and work into the future. If not, the effect of their loss will be felt for generations to come.

Find out more about IMMA 1000 here.

-ENDS –
For more information and images please contact [email protected] or [email protected] 01 612 9920

Additional Information
IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art) is Ireland’s national institution of contemporary and modern art. Based in its home at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham, IMMA is celebrated for its vibrant and dynamic exhibition and education programmes.

IMMA is the home of the national collection of modern and contemporary art. Now numbering over 3,500 works, we ensure that this collection is accessible to visitors to IMMA and beyond, through exhibitions, collaborations, loans, touring partnerships and digital programmes. Visited by over 475,000 people in 2015, IMMA is one of Ireland’s leading cultural institutions and a key source of creativity and inspiration for visitors of all walks of life. One out of every eight IMMA visitors experiences visual art for the first time through their IMMA visit and it is hugely important to us to create an enjoyable and engaging experience of contemporary art for everyone. We are driven to inspire a curiosity and appreciation of Irish contemporary art amongst our audience and the wider Irish public.

Above all else we are committed to supporting artists’ work. Together with artists and other partners we work to support the development, understanding and enjoyment of contemporary art in Ireland. As Ireland’s contemporary visual artists continue to strengthen their work is increasingly recognised on the international stage as well as making an invaluable contribution to contemporary Irish society. Artists are a key voice in any contemporary society and IMMA is committed to supporting Irish artists’ ability to live and work in Ireland.

Related Bios

John Cunningham
John Cunningham has been in business for over 30 years holding senior positions in Irish Permanent, Friends First, Ross Bank, Zurich Bank and Alexander Mann Solutions. He is currently a Director of CheckRisk and is consulting to a wide range of organisations. He is a graduate of the Marketing Institute, Smurfit Graduate School and Insead. He is Chair of the Immigrant Council of Ireland, Director of The Irish Youth Foundation. He is Chair of the judging panel for the CSR awards for Chambers Ireland. John has interests in travel and collecting art.

Gerard Byrne
Gerard Byrne (b. Dublin 1969) is a visual artist working with photographic, video, and live art. In 2007 he represented Ireland at the 52nd Venice Biennale. He has also participated in dOCUMENTA 13, Kassel, 2012; Performa, New York (2011); the 54th Venice Biennale (2011); Auckland Biennial (2010); Gwangju Biennial (2008); Sydney Biennial (2008); Lyon Biennial (2007); Tate Triennial (2006); and the Istanbul Biennale (2003). Solo exhibitions of his work include Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, St. Gallen (2014); The Whitechapel Gallery, London (2013); Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon (2012); IMMA, Dublin (2011); Milton Keynes Gallery (2011); The Renaissance Society, Chicago (2011); Lismore Castle Arts, Ireland (2010); The Common Guild, Glasgow (2010); Lisson Gallery, London (2009); ICA Boston (2008); Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen (2008); Dusseldorf Kunstverein (2007); Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius (2007); MUMOK, Vienna (2006); BAK, Utrecht (2004); Frankfurter Kunstverein (2003) and the Douglas Hyde Gallery, Dublin (2002). In 2006 he was a recipient of the Paul Hamlyn award. He is represented in London by Lisson Gallery and in Stockholm by Galerie Nordenhake.

Grace Weir
Grace Weir represented Ireland at the 49th International Venice Biennale and has exhibited widely nationally and internationally. She is currently Artist-in-Residence in the School Of Physics, Trinity College Dublin. As part of the IMMA Collection her film work Dust Defying Gravity, 2003, has been shown since its purchase in 2004 in many group exhibitions and beyond IMMA in venues across the country.

Working primarily in the moving image, Grace Weir makes a critical appraisal of film through film-making, in a practice that fuses documentation with highly authored situations. Weir probes the nature of a fixed identity and these questions are underpinned by the theories under her scrutiny, whether it is relativity, intentionality, film theory, the duality of light or the philosophy of time and history. She is interested in issues that are not unspecified because something is missing but because of their nature and content. Weir is interested in the slippages between the conceptual and experiential in different fields of enquiry. She examines how the imperfect world of direct experience plays a role in our understanding of theoretical concepts. Researching facts not as self-evident objects in the world but as processes, Weir takes a transdisciplinary approach in her research. The resulting work is wide ranging, from structural cinematic works to ‘footnote’ videos, web projects and installations. 

Jesse Jones
Jesse Jones (b. Dublin 1978) has been selected to represent Ireland at the 57th Venice Biennale in 2017 and an exhibition of her work No More Fun and Games is currently showing at the Dublin City Gallery, The Hugh Lane, until June 2016. She completed an MA in visual arts practice at DLIADT in 2005 and has worked and exhibited extensively at home and abroad.
Jones’s practice reflects and re-presents historical moments of collective resistance and dissent. In her films and videos she explores the gesture of the revolutionary action, and finds resonance in our current social and political landscape. Jones’s work takes many forms; from gallery based film and installation to large scale public events. She has collaborated with diverse groups; from opera singers and marching bands to activists, in a practice which aims to excavate the hidden meaning within our popular collective consciousness. She has completed a fellowship in Location One New York.
She has had a solo show in REDCAT Los Angeles (2011), and work commissioned for Collective Gallery in the UK.

She has shown internationally at the 9th Instanbul Biennial and Nought to Sixty at the ICA (2008). Her recent exhibitions include Artsonje centre Seoul (2013).

 

On Thu 24 March 2016 IMMA launches its Spring programme with two major solo exhibitions from Irish artist Patrick Hennessy, and Italian artist Carol Rama; both born in the same decade and both neglected by the official art circles of their time. Although extremely different artists, one a realist painter, the other not faithful to any particular movement, Hennessy and Rama both explore human sexuality, gender and identity while challenging the political and social culture of their time.

Patrick Hennessy De Profundis is the first major exhibition of the work of the post-war realist painter Patrick Hennessy RHA (1915-80) since 1981. Re-examining and repositioning Hennessy’s work as part of the IMMA Modern Irish Masters Series this exhibition reflects on what Hennessy’s work might mean to audiences today.

At a time when gay men were subject to social and legal persecution for the simple fact of their sexual orientation, Hennessy and his lifelong partner Henry Robertson-Craig bravely chose to exhibit works that clearly marked them as homosexual. They have almost no peers in Irish art, but Hennessy’s late work demonstrates an engagement with the emerging international queer-art movement of the 1970s.

A prolific artist, Hennessy created portraits, landscapes, equine studies and still-lifes that found a steady market in the Irish and international art world, but he also created works unlike anything being made in Ireland at the time. Fusing realism with a Surrealist subjectivity learned in Paris, he painted human figures isolated in the landscape, male nudes and portraits of handsome African men that puzzled Irish critics who branded him ‘something of an outsider’.

‘A strange and exotic presence in Irish art’, ‘standing alone’, ‘very un-Irish’, where just some of the terms used by critics writing about Hennessy’s work in Dublin in the 60s and 70s. The label ‘Surrealist’ was generally used to explain-away Hennessy’s images that were not easily read. In reality many of his works were comprised of visual codes that signified clear narratives of homosexual life. While these codes were impenetrable to some; they were readily interpreted by those around his circle that included artists like Francis Bacon, the Two Roberts (Colquhoun & MacBryde), John Craxton and Lucian Freud; as well as the writers Elizabeth Bowen, Cyril Connolly, Brendan Behan and others.

Also opening the same day is The Passion According to Carol Rama, an exhibition of almost 200 works by artist Carol Rama (1918 – 2015). It is the largest exhibition of the artist’s work to date and comes to Dublin following exhibitions in MACBA, Barcelona, Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, and EMMA, Finland.

Ignored for decades by official art history, Carol Rama is now recognised as essential for understanding developments within contemporary art. Her influence can be seen in the work of a later generation of artists such as Cindy Sherman, Kara Walker, Sue Williams, Kiki Smith and Elly Strik. Rama was belatedly recognised in 2003, receiving the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale, one of the most prestigious international art exhibitions.

Divided into four thematic sections this exhibition is a guide through Rama’s many creative moments. Neither exhaustive nor retrospective, The Passion According to Carol Rama acts as an attempt to recognise and restore a life’s work still unknown but nevertheless set to become a classic. 

The early work of Carol Rama, made when she was just twenty years old, is inscribed with experiences of institutional confinement and death. These works question Fascism’s heroic ideals of health and virtue while also confronting Modernism’s representations of sexuality, disability and femininity. Her watercolour figures from this period were censored as ‘obscene’ by the Italian government of 1945.

By the 1960s, Rama had moved towards the creation of ‘bricolages’: organic maps made from taxidermy eyes, fingernails, mathematical symbols, syringes and electrical circuits. Evolving her practice again in the 1970s Rama began to work with rubber from bicycle tyres; a material closely associated with her life as her father had a small bicycle factory in Turin. Rama treated rubber like a taxidermist treats skin – she dissected the tyres using them within her work to create different surfaces and textures. Punctured, flaccid, decomposing and aged by light and time, Rama’s rubber tyres are like our bodies: vulnerable material transformed by their history. 

During the 1980s, Carol Rama returned to figurative modes of working – perhaps inspired by a sudden recognition of her early work by the curator Lea Vergine in 1980. She also began to identify with the figure of the ‘mad cow’ – referencing the mad cow epidemic that was sweeping across Europe at that time – and developed an animalist ethic: a kind of expanded feminism that looked beyond the centrality of humans. In doing so, Rama’s work can be seen to transcend species, gender and sexuality, and affirm a community of all living things.

Exhibition conceived by the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) and the Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris (MAMVP), organised by MACBA and co-produced with PARIS MUSÉES / MAMVP, EMMA – Espoo Museum of Modern Art, IMMA – the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin and GAM – Galleria Civica d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Torino. Curated by Teresa Grandas (MACBA) and Paul B. Preciado (documenta 14).

Fully illustrated catalogues are available to accompany these landmark exhibitions. Patrick Hennessy De Profundis is designed by Niall & Nigel at Pony with text by Seán Kissane, Curator: Exhibitions, IMMA, and contributions from art writer Robert O’Byrne, artist James Hanley and a biography Kevin A. Rutledge. The Passion According to Carol Rama includes contributions from Anne Dressen, Maurizio Cattelan, Melissa Logan and Alexandra Murray-Leslie (Chicks on Speed), Lea Vergine, Teresa Grandas, Paul B. Preciado, and an interview by Corrado Levi and Filippo Fossati with the artist, amongst others.

Both are available from the IMMA Shop, in Gallery and online

ENDS –

For further information or images please contact
Monica Cullinane E: [email protected]  T: +353 (0)1 612 9921 or Patrice Molloy E: [email protected] T: +353 (0)1 612 9920

Additional Notes for Editors

About the artist – Patrick Hennessy RHA (1915-80)
Patrick Hennessy was born in County Cork in 1915 and moved with his family to Scotland in 1921. He was trained as painter in the academic tradition at Dundee College of Art, where he was greatly influenced by his tutor, the leading Scottish landscape artist James McIntosh. Hennessy excelled at Dundee and on graduating won a scholarship to travel to Europe. Between 1938-39 he went to Florence, Rome and Venice studying the work of the old masters. He then settled in Paris, the centre of Surrealism and avant-garde culture, where he worked for a time under Fernand Léger.

At the outbreak of the Second World War, he was part of the influx of artists and writers who returned to Ireland like Louis le Brocquy, Gerard Dillon, and the White Stag Group – led by Basil Rákóczi and Kenneth Hall. These outward-looking artists formed the backdrop against which Hennessy made his work.

He showed annually at the Royal Hibernian Academy and the Dublin Painters Society until the mid-50s when he was instrumental in the founding of the Ritchie Hendriks Gallery which would go on to represent some of Ireland’s leading artists. In the late 50s he gained a level of international success having regular exhibitions in the UK and North America where he found a steady market for his work. In 1959, due to ill-health he spent the winter in Tangier, Morocco. This was a turning point in his life and career as he would spend less and less time in Ireland before finally settling in Tangier in the early 70s.

The title of the exhibition, De Profundis, is taken from a painting by Hennessy that shows Dublin in ruins. It derives from Psalm 130, ‘From the depths I cry to thee O Lord’, but more notoriously it is the title of the last work of prose written by Oscar Wilde and addressed to his lover Lord Alfred Douglas. It was highly unusual for an Irish (or British) artist or writer to quote Wilde in a positive way. Wilde was synonymous with the shame that dare not speak its name and artists distanced themselves from him. Hennessy exhibited this work at the RHA in 1944 and frequently afterwards.

This exhibition re-examines and repositions Patrick Hennessey’s work as part of the IMMA Modern Irish Masters Series, a strand of programming that looks at the post-war period to shed light on artists who have been critically neglected; but also to reflect on what their work might mean to audiences today.

About the artist – Carol Rama (1915 – 2015)
Born in Turin, Carol Rama was never academically trained or faithful to any particular art movement. Instead Rama developed a body of work over seven decades that is as unique as it is obsessive. Carol Rama experimented with alternative materials, developing techniques for inventing new spaces of desire. Her work challenges dominant narratives around sexuality, madness, animalism, life and death.

Associated Events

Curators Conversation: The Passion According to Carol Rama
Wednesday 23 March, 6.30 – 7.30pm, Johnston Suite
Curators Teresa Grandas (MACBA) and Paul B. Preciado (documenta 14) explore how Rama’s work offers anarchic representations of female sexuality, gender and politics which allow an essential revision of avant-garde movements of the last century. Followed by the exhibition preview and opening party. This talk is free but booking is required. Book now

Modern Irish Masters Series| Patrick Hennessy De Profundis
Sun 10 April, 3 — 4pm / Johnston Suite / FREE
Seán Kissane (Curator, Exhibitions, IMMA) presents a keynote lecture offering a new perspective on the work of Irish artist Patrick Hennessy. This talk will give rich insights into Hennessy’s images which address themes such as war, religion, gender and sexuality.  This talk is free but booking is required. Book now

Curators Lunchtime Talks
Join IMMA curators for insightful exhibition walkthroughs, where a thematic selection of artworks are explored in detail. These talks are free and no booking is required, just turn up on the day.

Friday 6 May, 1.15 – 2pm / Meeting Point, Main Reception / FREE
The Passion According to Carol Rama with Rachael Thomas, Head of Exhibitions, IMMA.

Saturday 23 July, 1.15 – 2pm / Meeting Point, Main Reception / FREE
Patrick Hennessy De Profundis with Seán Kissane, Curator: Exhibitions, IMMA.

Seminar | Gender, Identity and the State, Date to be announced
Comprising of presentations by artists, writers, curators and educators, this seminar address issues of gender, sexuality, identity and the state as it relates to the work of artists Hennessy, Rama and others. Participants will draw on critical and queer theory across a wide range of disciplines. Further details to be announced.

IMMA announces landmark Lucian Freud Project for Ireland
alongside an expanded 2016 programme of new work celebrating the radical thinkers and activists whose vision for courageous social change in Ireland and beyond remains relevant to us today. 

Reflection (Self Portrait), 1985 (oil on canvas), Freud, Lucian (1922-2011) / Private Collection / © The Lucian Freud Archive / Bridgeman Image

IMMA is pleased announce highlights from our 2016 exhibition programme today, Tue 8 March 2016. To watch the 2016 programme film, with contributions from Jaki Irvine and Duncan Campbell, click here 

Sarah Glennie, Director of IMMA, said: “We are delighted to announce today that the IMMA Collection has secured an important long-term loan of 50 works by Lucian Freud (1922-2011); one of the greatest figurative painters of the 20th-century. From September 2016, the IMMA Collection: Freud Project will be presented in a new, dedicated Freud Centre in the IMMA Garden Galleries for five years. With this extraordinary resource IMMA will create a centre for Freud research with a special programme of exhibitions, education partnerships, symposia and research that will maximise this exciting opportunity on offer in Ireland.”

“Ireland’s commemoration year 2016 presents an important moment to examine the role of the artist in shaping our contemporary society, and we have commissioned a number of leading artists to create and present new work that reflects the legacy of Ireland’s past as a means to understand our present. Irish artist Jaki Irvine is developing a new work based on her novel Days of Surrender (2013) that tells the story of Elizabeth O’Farrell and her partner Julia Grenan, two out of several hundred women who took an active part in the Rising yet were almost erased out of history. British/Japanese artist Simon Fujiwara’s new project The Humanizer places Roger Casement’s extraordinary biography at the core of an imagined new Hollywood biopic, while Irish born artist Duncan Campbell is working on his first film based in the Republic of Ireland, which takes as a starting point a series of American anthropological studies of Gaelic speaking rural communities in Ireland in the 60s and 70s.

“Artists will take over our courtyard this summer for an ambitious new project; A Fair Land, presented in collaboration with Grizedale Arts. Echoing the role artists played in creating and articulating a new vision for Ireland pre-1916, A Fair Land will be developed and activated by a range of artists and creative practitioners with the aim of creating new, artist-led visions for a functioning future society.”

“These new commissions are presented alongside major solo exhibitions by Irish artist Patrick Hennessy, who is the second study in our Modern Irish Masters Series, and Italian artist Carol Rama, both born in the same year and both neglected by the official art circles of their time. In the Autumn we present a major exhibition of artist Emily Jacir, whose work explores silenced historical narratives, movement and resistance, and in a new invited curators initiative Indian curator Sumesh Sharma and Irish curator Kate Strain will present projects at IMMA that reflect their individual practices and bring new curatorial perspectives into IMMA’s programme”

These new art projects are presented as part of an exciting on-going initiative, New Art at IMMA, proudly supported by Matheson, which allows IMMA to continue to support artists’ vital work in a strand of programming that recognises and nurtures new and emerging talents, new thinking and new forms of exhibition-making. Tim Scanlon, partner at Matheson, said, “Nurturing new talent is central to what we do in Matheson. Our on-going involvement with IMMA on the New Art at IMMA programme continues to be an exciting way for us to support new and emerging talent.”

Sarah Glennie continued; “The focus of IMMA’s 2016 programme is to celebrate the radical thinkers and activists who paved the way for courageous social change, whilst reflecting on the artistic and cultural community who played an active role in the period leading up to 1916. They imagined creativity as central to the new society and in 2016 we consider their legacy and their ideals, many of which we are still working towards today over a hundred years later. We ask what artists can tell us about our collective cultural identities and the societies we live in today whilst considering the role artists can play in helping us remember, reflect and commemorate. We explore these questions through the lens of contemporary arts practice; creating a space for difference, debate and imagination in Ireland’s year of national reflection.”

The IMMA Collection: Freud Project launches in 2016 and this important body of work, on loan to IMMA from a number of private collections, will be the focus of several major programming initiatives for the next five years. Lucian Freud is one of the greatest exponents of figurative painting in the 20th-century and the works on loan to IMMA include a selection of Freud’s finest paintings, as well as numerous etchings. Ranging across six decades these works will focus on many of the artist’s key areas of interest, including paintings of the same person at different ages, self-portraits, and double portraits. With this extraordinary resource IMMA will create a centre for Freud research with a special programme of exhibitions, education partnerships and symposia that will maximise this important opportunity for Irish school children, third level students, artists and Irish audiences of all ages, examining what it means to have works like these in the public domain. The lengthy duration of the loan will mean that the audience can build a relationship with Freud, really get to know these works and understand how Freud painted. The evolving programme of curated exhibitions and events will allow us to explore, with our audiences, Freud’s role and legacy in 20th-century art and what these works mean today for contemporary art.

The Freud Project is a major addition to the IMMA Collection, and in 2016 we will also present IMMA Collection: A Decade, providing a snapshot of how the National Collection has developed over the past ten years. Works selected explore themes around memory, identity and place, questions of globalism, the environment and connectivity; from the local to the universal. Featured artists include Pierre Huyghe, Willie Doherty, Niamh O’Malley, Eva Rothschild, Dorothy Cross, Tim Robinson, Peter Hutchinson, Philip Taaffe, Howard Hodgkin, Maria Simonds Gooding, Amanda Coogan and others.

The exhibition highlights major acquisitions to the IMMA Collection during the last decade, and emphasises the importance of IMMA rebuilding resources to continue to purchase major Irish and international works for the nation. IMMA has not had an institutional acquisitions budget since 2011 and works such as Cape Siren (2008) by Philp Taaffe or Remains (2013) by Willie Doherty are just two key acquisitions that would not have been impossible without the generous support of donors.

As always our exhibition programme will be accompanied by a rich and varied programme of live performance, events, talks, and learning programmes which will provide audiences of all ages exciting opportunities to enjoy our programme, opening up conversations and bringing the audience deeper into the thinking and making of contemporary art. This includes the continuation of our programme of talks and events entitled Art I Memory I Place, which takes place in the particular context of the ‘decade of centenaries’. Focusing on artists whose work addresses themes relating to memory and place, the purpose of this programme is to broaden and deepen the current discussion about the subject of remembrance and commemoration and to take account of such work. The thematic of IMMA’s 2016 programme will be further explored in a major symposium, co-curated by Annie Fletcher, Chief Curator, Van Abbemuseum Eindhoven.

Summer Party 2016, with a music programme curated by Cillian Murphy
At the heart of this activated programme opening IMMA up to new audiences is our annual Summer Party. Now in its third year, the IMMA Summer Party will return on Saturday 16th July with more art, music, performance and food events designed to open up the beautiful buildings and grounds of IMMA, day and night. Cillian Murphy will curate the music programme in 2016. Once the singer and guitarist with a rock band, actor Cillian Murphy has a visceral love of music and an impeccable ear. Having previously collaborated with the likes of Feist, Money, I Break Horses, Orbital’s Paul Hartnoll, Mark Garry, Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene, Irish music blog Fractured Air, and The Frank and Walters, this will be his first curation of a live music programme.

A full programme of events is available on www.imma.ie

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For more information or images please contact [email protected] 01 612 9922
 
Additional Information – IMMA Exhibition Highlights 2016
For additional information on each exhibition please click the hyperlink to reach the exhibition page.

The Passion According to Carol Rama
24 March – 1 August 2016
This first substantial exhibition of Italian artist Carol Rama’s work comprises of almost 200 works and comes to Dublin following exhibitions in MACBA, Barcelona, Musée d’Art moderne de la Ville de Paris, and EMMA, Finland. Born in 1918 in Turin, Rama was never academically trained or explicitly faithful to any particular movement, except for the period of the “Movimento di Arte Concreta” (MAC). Instead, she developed a body of work over seven decades that is as unique as it is obsessive. Belatedly recognised in 2003, she was awarded the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale.

Patrick Hennessy De Profundis
24 March – 24 July 2016
‘A strange and exotic presence in Irish art’, Patrick Hennessy RHA (1915-80), was one of Ireland’s most successful post-war realist painters. At a time when people were persecuted for their sexual orientation, Hennessy made works containing narratives of homosexual life that align him with the emerging queer-art movement of the 1970s. This exhibition re-examines and repositions Hennessey’s work as part of the IMMA Modern Irish Masters Series.

IMMA Collection: A Decade
28 April – 31 December 2016
IMMA Collection: A Decade provides a snapshot of how the Collection has developed over the past 10 years. Works explore themes around memory, identity and place, questions of globalism, the environment and connectivity; from the local to the universal. Featured artists include Pierre Huyghe, Willie Doherty, Niamh O’Malley, Eva Rothschild, Dorothy Cross, Tim Robinson, Peter Hutchinson, Philip Taaffe, Howard Hodgkin, Maria Simonds Gooding, Amanda Coogan and others.

Simon Fujiwara The Humanizer
20 May – 28 August 2016
Berlin based, British/Japanese artist Simon Fujiwara’s new project ‘The Humanizer’ places Roger Casement’s extraordinary biography at the core of an imagined new Hollywood biopic that takes the life of the compelling yet baffling figure of Roger Casement through the conventions of the Hollywood narrative machine, exposing our modern day desire for the perfect Hollywood hero in an age where everyone is somebody.

A Fair Land
15 August – 4 September
IMMA is collaborating with Grizedale Arts who, following a period of research and development in IMMA’s residency programme, will create, in collaboration with IMMA, an extraordinary new project that examines the ‘usefulness’ of art by inviting artists and creatives to take over the iconic IMMA courtyard this summer. Echoing the role artists played in creating and articulating a new vision for Ireland pre-1916, A Fair Land will be developed and activated by a range of artists and creative practitioners with the aim of creating new, artist-led visions for a functioning future society which visitors to IMMA during August will be invited to help inhabit, debate and enjoy. Artists and collaborators include Jonathan Meese, Renzo Martens, Suzanne Lacy, Ryan Gander, Karen Guthrie, Publicworks, Deirdre O’Mahony, Consiton Youth Club, Rhona Byrne, villagers from the Japanese mountain village of Toge, Gareth Kennedy, Seodín O’Sullivan, NÓS workshop, Irish Architecture Foundation (IAF), NCAD, and IADT with many more to be announced.

Invited Curators at IMMA: Sumesh Sharma and Kate Strain
September – early 2017
This new invited curators initiative will see Indian curator Sumesh Sharma and Irish curator Kate Strain presenting projects at IMMA that reflect their individual curatorial practices and bring new curatorial perspectives into IMMA’s programme. Sumesh Sharma co-founded the Clark House Initiative, Bombay in 2010 where he presently is the curator along with being the invited curator to the biennale of African contemporary art – Dak’Art 2016, Senegal. His practice deals with alternate histories that are informed by the Black Arts movement, Socio-Economics, Immigration in the Francophone and Vernacular Equalities of Modernism. Kate Strain is a Dublin-based curator researching the overlap between performance and performativity in visual arts practice. Ongoing projects include The Centre For Dying On Stage, Department of Ultimology, On Curating Histories, and the paired curatorial practice RGKSKSRG. She has worked in a curatorial capacity at Project Arts Centre, the National College of Art and Design, Trinity College Dublin, and internationally on collaborative projects in Torino, Amsterdam and Graz.

Emily Jacir: Europa
21 October – 5 February 2017
IMMA presents the first survey exhibition of artist Emily Jacir’s work in Ireland. Emily Jacir: Europa brings together almost two decades of sculpture, film, drawings, large-scale installations and photography and focuses on Jacir’s dialogue with Europe, Italy and the Mediterranean in particular. Known for her poignant works of art that are as poetic as they are political and biographical, Jacir explores various histories of migration, resistance and exchange.

IMMA Collection: Freud Project, 2016 – 2021
From Mid-September 2016
The IMMA Collection has secured an important long-term loan of 50 works by Lucian Freud (1922-2011), regarded as one of the world’s greatest realist painters. The works, on loan from a number of private collections, will be presented in a dedicated Freud Centre in the Garden Galleries for five years and will be titled IMMA Collection: Freud Project, 2016 – 2021. With this extraordinary resource IMMA will create a centre for Freud research with a special programme of exhibitions, education partnerships, symposia and research that will maximise this important opportunity for Irish school children, third level students, artists and all audiences in Ireland and abroad.

Jaki Irvine If The Ground Should Open…
November 2016
Taking her novel, Days of Surrender (2013), as a starting point Jaki Irvine’s new film work If The Ground Should Open… (2016), will be presented alongside a live performance event. The novel tells the story of Elizabeth O’Farrell and her partner Julia Grenan, two out of several hundred women who took an active part in the 1916 Rising yet were almost erased out of Irish history.

Duncan Campbell
December 2016 – early 2017
Following his first major exhibition in Dublin at IMMA in 2014, Irish-born artist Duncan Campbell (Turner Prize Winner 2014) is working on his first film based in the Republic of Ireland. Stemming from research in the IFI (Irish Film Institute) Archive, Campbell’s film will take as a starting point a 1960’s UCLA anthropological film study of rural Kerry, and a number of US anthropological studies from that period. Campbell reflects on the tension of the anthropologists’ projections onto the Gaelic speaking peasant cultures of their studies and the complexities of a society whose precarious existence faces threats of immigration, industrialisation and reform.  As with many of Campbell’s films this new work uses a combination of archive material and self-shot footage and uses a study of the past to throw a new perspective on our present.