The first large-scale exhibition in Ireland by the celebrated American performance artist, musician, visual artist, poet and writer Laurie Anderson opens to the public at the Irish Museum of Modern Art on Thursday 17 February. Laurie Anderson: The Record of the Time, sub-titled Sound in the Work of Laurie Anderson, comprises over 80 works, including installation, audio, video and art objects. Spanning Anderson’s career from the 1970s to her recent work, it sets out the different stages which led from her first creation to her latest audio piece. The exhibition will be opened by the composer and pianist Kevin Volans at 6.00pm on Wednesday 16 February, when Anderson will perform a version of Duets on Ice. In this, pre-recorded violin pieces are played, continuously, through a speaker inside the violin, as the instrument is simultaneously played live. As the pre-recorded pieces have no beginning or end, a timing device is introduced in the form of a pair of skates embedded in blocks of ice, which the artist wears as she plays, signalling that in a full performance the concert would eventually end when the ice melts.

The elements of narrative and duration implicit in Duets on Ice are central to Anderson’s work, as despite the multifaceted nature of her art and her use of sophisticated technology, she sees herself as essentially a storyteller. She says: “A typical large-scale-work will include film or video, animation, digital processing, music, electronics and stories. But it is the stories that are the constant thread. The work exhibited in The Record of the Time is primarily the work I’ve done with sound; there are several threads: the violin, the voice, words, sonic spaces and alter egos”. It is Anderson’s ability to combine modern technology, imaginative pictorial images, innovative music and trenchant narratives which has made her a leading figure in the world of multimedia art.

In one of the earliest works in the show, Handphone Table, 1977, visitors are invited to perceive sound through the bones in their arms, reflecting the artist’s experience when she was inspired to create the work, as she rested her head on her hands while using an electric typewriter. Another audio-visual experience is presented in Tape Bow Violin, 1977, and Neon Violin, 1983, which make use of the instrument which has virtually become Anderson’s second voice and which she has altered and electronically manipulated in every conceivable way. In The Parrot, 1996, we hear the voice of an electronic parrot, speaking in freeform and representing the way thoughts drift through the mind without the filters of logic or politeness.

The alter ego is also a recurring presence in Anderson’s work. In At the Shrink’s, 1975/77, we see a tiny clay model representing the artist onto which a super 8mm film is projected, while a soundtrack tells of the character’s experience while seeing the psychiatrist.   Some years later, while working on a filter to lower her voice to the register of a man’s, Anderson was prompted by the thought of what this “man” might look like to produce – with the aid of an ADO and a moustache – a three-feet-high male clone of herself in the form of The Clone, 1986.

Laurie Anderson’s debut as a performance artist dates from 1972, when she presented a concert for car horns in Rochester, Vermont. From the mid-70s she continued her work with music and sound and in 1981 had a number-one hit on the London charts with O Superman. Throughout the 1980s the artist presented more large-scale performances, working with film directors and musicians such as Brian Eno, Wim Wenders and Peter Gabriel, and in 1985 she made the acclaimed concert film Home of the Brave. In the early 1990s, her work assumed a more political side and she produced several works on the subjects of violence, conflict and censorship.

Laurie Anderson: The Record of the Time is curated by Thierry Raspail, Director, and Isabelle Bertolotti, exhibition Curator, Musée d’Art Contemporain de Lyon, and has been shown at the Museum Kunst-Palast, Dûsseldorf, and at PAC Padiglione d’Arte Contemporanea, Milan. The exhibition at IMMA has been organised by Karen Sweeney, Acting Curator: Exhibitions, at the Museum.

Artist’s Talk

On Thursday 17 February at 4.00pm, in the Baroque Chapel at IMMA, Laurie Anderson will discuss her practice, focussing particularly on her most recent projects. Admission is free, but booking is essential on Tel: +353 1 612 9900 or the automatic booking line +353 1 612 9948; Email: [email protected].

A fully-illustrated catalogue, with essays by Thierry Raspail and Laurie Anderson, accompanies the exhibition.

The exhibition continues until 2 May 2005.

Admission is free.

Opening hours: Tuesday – Saturday 10.00am-5.30pm
                           Sundays & Bank Holidays 12 noon- 5.30pm
                           Closed  Monday and 25 March 

For further information and images please contact Patrice Molloy or Daniela Sabatini at Tel: +353 1 612 9900: Email: [email protected] 

26 January 2005                                                                    

A series of exhibitions by leading Irish and international artists, including Jasper Johns, Laurie Anderson, Dorothy Cross and Tony O’Malley; special shows to celebrate the work of the White Stag Group and to mark 50 years of collecting by the Contemporary Irish Art Society, and the publication of a full-colour catalogue of IMMA’s Collection are all part of an exciting and wide-ranging programme for 2005 at the Irish Museum of Modern Art announced today (Tuesday 18 January) by the Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, Mr John O’Donoghue, TD. Plans for the coming year also include a number of exhibitions by highly-regarded younger artists, many being shown for the first time in Ireland; an exhibition of Latin American art from one of the largest private collections in Europe; a new schools programme in association with the Abbey Theatre, and a series of lectures on developments in contemporary music since the 1950s.

Speaking at the launch of the programme at IMMA, the Minister O’Donoghue said: “I should like to begin by congratulating everyone at IMMA on a highly successful year in 2004, which saw visitor number grow to 350,000, the highest in the Museum’s history. I am pleased to say that the programme for 2005 looks equally exciting. The first opportunity to see a large-scale show by such a ground-breaking figure as Jasper Johns is something to which, I am sure, the public will respond with enthusiasm; as they will to the first major Dorothy Cross survey exhibition and the Tony O’Malley retrospective.

“The Museum’s acquisitions policy has come in for much favourable comment recently, and the Collection catalogue – for which my Department was pleased to provide a special subvention – and the accompanying exhibition will be awaited with particular interest. I should also like to commend IMMA’s ongoing work, through its Education and Community and National Programmes, in bringing its resources and expertise to people and places, all too often marginalised from such activities. The level of creativity and hard work which this programme represents deserves our support, and I am very pleased to have been able to increase the Museum’s current funding to €4,800,000 this year, an increase of 22% on 2004. From what I have seen of their plans for the year ahead, we can rest assured that they will make good use of it”.

Commenting on the programme, IMMA’s Director, Enrique Juncosa, said: “We are very pleased again to announce a whole array of diverse international exhibitions for 2005. These include an important survey of recent works by the American painter Jasper Johns and exhibitions by highly-praised younger artists like Mark Manders (The Netherlands), Pierre Huyghe (France), Franz Ackermann (Germany), Jaki Irvine (Ireland) and Fred Tomaselli (USA). I would also like to underline the importance of women artists in the programme, with substantial mid-career retrospectives of the work of the Americans Laurie Anderson and Catherine Lee, and of the Irish artist Dorothy Cross. Other Irish shows this year include a survey of Tony O’Malley, an historical exhibition on the White Stag Group, and a celebration of the work of the Contemporary Irish Art Society. In addition, the largest exhibition of the year will present a survey of current Latin American art with works by artists such as Doris Salcedo, Santiago Sierra or Guillermo Kuitca.

“We are especially happy to announce the publication of the long-awaited, fully-illustrated catalogue of the collection this Spring. This was postponed from last year to include several important acquisitions which we managed to secure in 2004, including the works by James Coleman. The different Education and Community Programmes, and the National and Artists’ Work Programmes will, of course, continue.

“Finally, I would like to say that 2005 will be quite a musical year. Beside the Laurie Anderson exhibition, the celebrated composer Kevin Volans will give a series of lectures on contemporary music, discussing among other things Jasper Johns’ connections with John Cage. We will also be presenting a concert of the work of the Irish composer Brian Boydell during the White Stag exhibition”.

Exhibitions

The programme begins with one of the undoubtedly highlights of the year – the first large-scale exhibition in this country by the iconic American painter Jasper Johns (9 February – 24 April). The show presents some 90 paintings, prints and drawings created since 1983, a period of significant development in the artist’s work. This will be followed by an exhibition of the work of another celebrated American –  performance artist, musician, writer and visual artist Laurie Anderson (17 February – 2 May). The Record of the Time will set out the different, and fascinating, stages which led Anderson from her first creation in the 1970s to her latest audio work.

A further three new shows open shortly after this, beginning with the first exhibition in Ireland by the French artist Pierre Huyghe (23 February – 15 May), whose film works explore themes of reality and fiction, history and memory. Some 20 paintings by the New York artist Fred Tomaselli, made using a dazzling array of materials, opens on 9 March (until 19 June), while an exhibition of installation-based sculpture by the younger-generation Dutch artist Mark Manders can be seen from 16 March (until 29 May).

Completing the line-up of international artists for 2005 will be a mini-retrospective by the American sculptor Catherine Lee (22 June – 4 September), a display of installations and wall paintings by the German artist Franz Ackermann (20 July – 23 October) and three film works by Isaac Julian, one of Britain’s pre-eminent contemporary filmmakers, which will be shown in sequence from 21 September to 15 January 2006.

In addition, the Daros Collection of Latin-American Art, part of one of the most important private collections of contemporary art in Europe, will be shown from 5 October to 8 January 2006.

Irish and Irish-based artists will have a particularly strong presence in 2005. The first large-scale survey of the internationally-acclaimed Irish artist Dorothy Cross will open on 25 May (until 11 September). Comprising sculpture, installation, performance, photography and film, it will review her work from the 1980s to date. This will be followed on 26 October (until January 2006) by a major retrospective of the work of the much-loved Irish painter Tony O’Malley, now recognised as one of the leading Irish artists of his time, who died in 2003.

The work of the White Stag Group, which comprised a number of British artists who brought a new vitality to the Irish art scene in the 1930s and ‘40s, will be shown from 6 July to 2 October, while from 17 November to February 2006 IMMA will join forces with the Contemporary Irish Art Society for an exhibition celebrating 50 years of the society’s important work in collecting art and endowing public institutions.

Collection

The coming year will also be an important year in terms of the development and presentation of the Museum’s Collection. To Have and to Hold, a major exhibition drawn from the Collection, will open on 27 April and will include one of the recently-acquired works by James Coleman, an installation by the celebrated American artist James Turrell, a sculpture by Michael Craig Martin and a group of paintings by Hughie O’Donoghue. These will be shown alongside other key works acquired since 1991. The exhibition is being organised to coincide with the publication of a full-colour catalogue of the Collection, made possible by a special subvention from the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism.

From 13 December the Collection will show The Silver Bridge, an ambitious new installation by the Irish artist Jaki Irvine. A selection of works on paper will also be presented from December, while further works form the Collection will be included in the Tony O’Malley exhibition.
 
Following tours to Beijing and Shanghai in 2004, plans are in train for a tour of works from the Collection to Zaragoza in Spain and to Newfoundland in Canada.

Education and Community

The Museum’s Education and Community Programme had another busy and successful year in 2004. The Curating Now symposium, on contemporary curating practice, attracted more than 250 participants and brought eight leading international curators into contact not only with IMMA’s work, but also with that of a number of other public and private galleries in Dublin. Another notable event was the publication of a comprehensive evaluation of the Museum’s work with the Government’s Breaking the Cycle initiative addressing educational disadvantage.

In 2005, in association with the Scene Change exhibition celebrating 100 years of design at the Abbey Theatre, IMMA and the Abbey will run a programme of visits for 20 schools from throughout Ireland, supported by the Department of Education and Science. The Museum will also join with the other National Cultural Institutions for an Open Week across all the institutions from 12 to 20 February.

In addition to the annual schools’ programme at IMMA itself, the continuation of the grant-in-aid from the Department of Education and Science will enable the Museum’s Education and Community Department to support six venues involved in the National Programme in developing a primary school programme of their own.

In addition to the talks and lectures programme with artists and curators, IMMA will host a series of six lectures on contemporary music by the South African-born Irish-based composer and pianist Kevin Volans, to coincide with the Jasper Johns and Laurie Anderson exhibitions.

National Programme

The Museum’s National Programme is designed to promote the visual arts throughout Ireland by taking the Museum’s Collection and programmes to a variety of locations ans situations around Ireland.

In 2005 the programme will take the Museum’s resources and expertise to 18 locations around the country from Cork to Donegal. These will include an exhibition of works from the Collection at the Glor Music Centre in Ennis, Co Clare, and the Public and Private Narratives show, seen at the Museum in 2004, visiting the Sligo Art Centre.

The collaboration with the Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Dun Laoghaire, will be developed further, with students getting involved in projects based on works from IMMA’s Collection which relate to the major disciplines within the college.

Artists’ Work Programme

The Museum’s studio/residency programme, the Artists’ Work Programme, has hosted over 200 artists since it began in 1994. Artists who participate in the programme live and work in eight studio spaces, three self-contained apartments and five spacious bedrooms, all of which are situated in the renovated coach houses opposite the main Museum building.

The artists are asked to make themselves as available as possible to meet with visitors to the Museum, providing access to the process of making art and giving the public an additional layer of experience to that available in the
Museum’s galleries. Slide talks, studio visits, panel discussions and Open Days are organised around the residencies, all of which are free and open to the public.

In 2005, the Artists’ Work Programme will host 27 artists from as far afield as Israel, Argentina, Peru and the USA.

For further information and images please contact Patrice Molloy or Daniela Sabatini at tel: +353 1 612 9900; email: [email protected].

18 January 2005

An exhibition of works from the Irish Museum of Modern Art Collection opens to the public at Glór Irish Music Centre, Ennis, Co Clare, on Friday 4 February 2005. Spring is Sprung is part of a collaborative exhibition between the Museum, Glór and IMMA’s National Programme. The exhibition combines artworks by Irish and international artists in a wide variety of media, and includes a series of prints by Sean Scully, a film by Helena Gorey, sculpture by Siobhan Hapaska and paintings by Jack B Yeats and Peter Doig.

The Irish-born artist Sean Scully lives in New York and is renowned for his adherence to the stripe in his expressionist paintings. In tandem with the emergence of Neo-Expressionist in the 1980s, he loosened the precise grid-like style of his earlier works, replacing it with bold rough-edged columns and panels of thickly applied paint.  Pomes pennyeach is a series of prints in keeping with the robust quality of his paintings.  His vertical stripes are inset with boxes of horizontal stripes, which nestle comfortably without appearing static. 

Also working with the line, Helena Gorey’s highly-abstract artwork attempts to find a visual expression for the scientific laws governing such natural phenomena as the movement of the wind or changing light conditions. Gorey is concerned to acknowledge the underlying cosmic order while simultaneously recording the tremendous variation that is inherent within it. Her paintings and, more recently, her video works pay homage to the wonder of the endless diversity hidden in the overall order.  Gorey’s paintings eschew ostentatious gesture, drawing instead on understatement to carry her message. Video and digital technology, used by her for the first time in Red I, represents a seamless progression from her previous painting practice.

The exhibition also includes two paintings by Jack B. Yeats; The Bouy and Talk.  The foremost Irish painter of the first half of the 20th century, Yeats spent a lifetime painting the folk life and culture of his country, from simple, routine village scenes to romantic episodes around dramatic political and literary events.  All of his paintings are imbued with a romantic sensibility in which the circus performer, the local boxing champion or the experienced old fisherman, become heroic figures whose struggles and history of survival are echoed by the rugged and often stormy application of paint. The Bouy shows Yeats at his most minimalist. The bouy tossing on the waves becomes a symbol for man’s vulnerability in the face of the sublime forces of nature, and recalls for Yeats all the sea shanties and stories that he was surrounded with as a child in Sligo.

Commenting on the show, Katie Verling, Director of the Glor Irish Music Centre, said: “We are thrilled to have such a high-calibre exhibition in Ennis. The quality of work in the show reflects the growing reputation of the Glor Gallery”

The Glór Gallery is located in the RIAI Award-winning, light-filled music centre located in the heart of Ennis. Glór Gallery’s reputation has grown significantly in 2004 with several high-profile exhibitions including Mike Byrne, Mick O’Dea, the National Gallery of Ireland, the Crafts Council of Ireland and Lorraine Wall selects…. Lorraine Wall, a native of Ennis, a Board member of IMMA and an artist of national importance, invited eleven outstanding Irish painters to exhibit with her in this unique exhibition in Glór. The artists who readily agreed to exhibit are Brian Bourke, Basil Blackshaw, Barrie Cooke, Felim Egan, Martin Gale, Richard Gorman, Seán McSweeney, Patrick Pye, Maria Simonds-Gooding, John Shinnors and Charles Tyrell.

The National Programme is designed to create access opportunities to the visual arts in a variety of situations and locations in Ireland.  Using the Collection of the Irish Museum of Modern Art and exhibitions generated by the Museum, the National Programme facilitates the creation of exhibitions and other projects for display in a range of locations around the country. 

The National Programme establishes the Museum as inclusive, accessible and national, de-centralising the Collection, and making it available to communities in their own localities, on their own terms, in venues with which the audience is comfortable and familiar.

A series of workshops and gallery talks will be held alongside the exhibition supported by the Department of Education & Science. A number of schools and colleges from County Clare will participate part in the workshops.

Spring is Sprung continues until 28 February 2005. Admission is free.

For further information please contact Patrice Molloy at Tel: +353 1 612 9900; Email: [email protected].

An exhibition from the Irish Museum of Modern Art’s own Collection exploring the many ways in which visual artists respond to issues and events that have either personal or public significance opens at the Sligo Art Gallery on Thursday 13 January 2005. Public and Private Narratives: Selected Works from the IMMA Collection comprises paintings, drawings, sculptures and installations which illustrate the ways in which artists give visual expression to both public events and private experiences. The exhibition also deals with the means by which important public events are celebrated visually.  Featured in the exhibition are works by contemporary Irish artists such as Dorothy Cross and Brian Maguire and the Portuguese-born painter Paula Rego.
 
Paula Rego’s prints draw on the tradition of children’s storybook illustration.  For example, in The Baker’s Wife  the exaggerated changes of scale are reminiscent of that  Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The artist uses a variety of tones to intensify still further the dream-like quality of the work and the dark shadows add a new and terrifying dimension to the familiar nursery rhymes. Stories, such as Little Miss Muffet, which are traditionally for children, are given a very grown-up imagery that borders on unpleasantness, particularly in this etching.

Brian Maguire deals with ideas of alienation and isolation within society and personal relationships.  His work has been at the cutting edge of contemporary Irish art in spite of the fact that he continued to use the medium of painting at a time when it was not popular.  As artist-in-residence in state prisons, Maguire sees himself as much an outsider as the inmates with whom he works.  His expressionistic painting brings the hidden corners of the individual’s experience to our attention with a raw energy and psychological power. The artist states: “All my pictures come from a need to accept reality as I find it.  But they are pictures.  I spend a lot of time trying to make them coherent in a formal sense, to make them beautiful – beautiful to me, maybe not to others”. Liffey Suicides effectively shows the artist’s ability to demonstrate the distances that separate us, by choosing to paint his picture from the darkness of the water below the bridge from which the living peer down.
 
Other men’s flowers by the well-known, and indeed controversial, British artist Tracy Emin is a portfolio of text which, typically of Emin, is autobiographical and even printed in her own handwriting, bringing her own personal narrative into the public arena.

Also shown is documentation of Ghost Ship by Dorothy Cross, a public art project in which Cross painted a decommissioned lightship in phosphorescent paint and moored it in Scotsman’s Bay, Dun Laoighaire, creating a ghostly presence, which repeatedly appeared and disappeared, in the dark sea.
 
Commenting on the exhibition Catherine Marshall, Head of Collection at IMMA, said: “While never, for a moment, straying from the visual, contemporary artists show extraordinary ingenuity in putting narratives of public and private experience across.  That is very difficult now, since there is no longer an agreed history or version of events.  These artists manage to overcome that hurdle in the most exciting and innovative ways.” 
 
An exhibition guide accompanies the exhibition (price 4.00 euro).
 
Public and Private Narratives: Selected Works from the IMMA Collection continues until 5 February 2005.
 
Admission is free.

Opening hours:   10am to 5.30pm Monday to Saturday.

For further info and colour  and black and white images please contact Patrice Molloy at Tel: +353 1 612 9900, Fax: +353 1 612 9999, Email: [email protected]

The first major exhibition in Ireland by the iconic American artist Jasper Johns opens to the public at the Irish Museum of Modern Art on Wednesday 9 February 2005. Past Things and Present: Jasper Johns since 1983 comprises some 90 paintings, prints and drawings created over a period of significant development in the artist’s work. During this time Johns moved away from the flags, targets and other symbols, which had brought him instant acclaim in the late 1950s, to a range of arresting new imagery, much of it intensely personal, melancholic and even surreal. Organised by the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, which has an extensive collection of Johns’ work, the exhibition is presented in association with THE IRISH TIMES. It will be opened by the celebrated Irish filmmaker Neil Jordan at 6.00pm on Tuesday 8 February.

Jasper Johns first came to public attention over 50 years ago, with his now-famous images of flags, numerals and impersonal household objects, or – as he described them – “things we already know”. Radically different from the prevailing Abstract Expressionism, they offered a new way of thinking about the nature and function of art. However, by the early 1980s he had adopted a much more personal iconography, including things present in his home and studio, allusions to his childhood and family and quotations from artworks – his own and others’. He acknowledged this change in 1984: “In my early work I tried to hide my personality, my psychological state, my emotion….      I sort of stuck to my guns for a while, but eventually it seemed like a losing battle. Finally, one must simply drop the reserve.”

Past Things and Present: Jasper Johns since 1983 has at its core nearly all the prints made during the period, drawn from the Walker’s complete archive of his graphic works. The balance comprises paintings and drawings which expand these motifs and weave in imagery familiar from his earlier work. Several works based on the important Ventriloquist canvas from 1983 are included. The Seasons paintings of 1985-86 are represented by the beautiful Winter (1986), as well as several prints and drawings of the overall theme.

John’s use of traced outlines of works by Hans Holbein, Matthias Grûnewald and others is explored in a number of objects, including the encaustic and sand painting Green Angel (1990). The exhibition also presents some wonderful images from the so-called Catenary series from the late 1990s and early 2000s, as well as several very recent works that incorporate the outlines of a painting by Edward Manet. In addition to the works from the Walker collection, paintings and drawings have also been loaned from many other important public and private collections, including Johns’ own collection. Several works in the show have never been publicly exhibited prior to this exhibition being shown at the Walker from November 2003 to February 2004.

Jasper Johns was born in 1930 in Augusta, Georgia, and was raised in South Carolina. He moved to New York in the early 1950s, where he became friendly with a number of artists, including Robert Rauschenberg, John Cage and Merce Cunningham, who were inventing new ways of exploring the experiences of daily life in their art, music and dance works. During this period Johns’ work was centred on commonly seen objects such as flags, letters and numerals and even studio and household objects such as paintbrushes, tableware and coat hangers. His radical departure from this subject matter, which began in 1983, forms the heart of this new exhibition.

The exhibition is curated by Joan Rothfuss, Curator of the Permanent Collection at the Walker Art Center, and is made possible by the generous support of Judy and Kenneth Dayton, Martha and Bruce Atwater, Margaret and Angus Wurtele, the Broad Art Foundation and the Fifth Floor Foundation. The exhibition has been shown at the Walker Art Center, the Grenville County Museum of Art, South Carolina, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, and IVAM (Institut Valencia d’Art Modern), Valencia.

Talk
Joan Rothfuss will give a talk on the exhibition in the gallery space at 11.30am on Wednesday 9 February. Admission is free, but booking is essential on Tel: +353 1 612 9900 or the automatic booking line +353 1 612 9948; Email: [email protected].

A fully-illustrated catalogue, with an introduction by Kathy Halbreich, Director, Walker Art Center, and essays by Joan Rothfuss, Richard Shiff, University of Texas, and Victor I Stoichita, University of Fribourg, Switzerland, accompanies the exhibition (price €25.00).

The exhibition continues until 24 April 2005.

Admission is free.

Opening hours: Tuesday to Saturday 10.00am-5.30pm
                          Sundays and Bank Holidays 12 noon- 5.30pm
                          Closed  Mondays and 25 March 

For further information and images please contact Patrice Molloy or Daniela Sabatini at Tel: +353 1 612 9900: Email: [email protected]                                                                      

11 January 2005

A new exhibition focusing on set and costume design at the Abbey Theatre opens to the public at the Irish Museum of Modern Art on Thursday 9 December. Scene Change: One Hundred Years of Theatre Design at the Abbey Theatre, which is being shown as part of Abbeyonehundred, explores the creative role of the designer. The exhibition has been selected from the National Theatre Archives by Mairead Delaney, Archivist with the National Theatre Archives, and the leading stage designer Joe Vanĕk, who is also co-curator of the show with Helen O’Donoghue, Head of Education and Community Programmes at IMMA. The exhibition will be officially opened at 6.00pm on Wednesday 8 December by the distinguished Irish artist and theatre designer Robert Ballagh.

Scene Change presents key visual material of signature work by designers for recent productions, alongside earlier Abbey and Peacock designs. These include model boxes from several Abbeyonehundred productions, such as Francis O’Connor’s design for The Shaughraun and Guido Tondino’s for The Playboy of the Western World. Earlier work by prominent designers, including Carl Fillion (The Burial at Thebes), Joe Vanìk (Dancing at Lughnasa) and Monica Frawley (By the Bog of Cats), is also being shown. The work of such noted costume designers as Joan O’Clery, Wendy Shea and Browen Casson is being presented alongside early designs by Dorothy Travers-Smith, Norah McGuinness and Charles Ricketts.

 The exhibition offers visitors an opportunity to see designs by artists engaged by W B Yeats, shortly after the foundation of the Abbey, through the transitions in style and fashion throughout the century to the innovative and individual style of contemporary designers. Many designers have lent drawings, production notebooks and sketches to the show, providing a fascinating glimpse of the processes behind what we see on stage.

Scene Change is part of a strand of programming at IMMA that explores contemporary visual culture, revealing the interplay between the fine and applied arts. Previous exhibitions have looked at designs for flexible living in Living in Motion (2003), illustration and graphic design in Brian Cronin (1998) and the work of the celebrated Irish milliner in Philip Tracey (2001). This is the first time the Museum has focused on stage design.

The exhibition also marks the very productive relations which have existed over several years between the Abbey’s Outreach/Education Department and IMMA’s Education and Community Department. Commenting on this Helen O’ Donoghue, Head of Education and Community Programmes, IMMA said, “Scene Change offers a new and very welcome opportunity to explore with second and third level students the intersections between our two institutions and the theatre and visual arts”.

 On Wednesday 8 December at 5.00pm Joe Vanĕk and Mairead Delaney will give a talk in the exhibition space on the evolution of theatre design in relation to the Abbey’s 100-year history. Admission is free, but booking is essential on Tel: 01-612 9948; Email: [email protected].

A catalogue with a text by Joe Vanĕk accompanies the exhibition.

Scene Change: One Hundred Years of Theatre Design at the Abbey Theatre continues until 20 February 2005.

Opening hours: Tuesday – Saturday 10.00am – 5.30pm

                          Sunday & Bank Holidays

                          and 28-31 Dec & 1 Jan 12 noon – 5.30pm

                         Monday & 24-27 Dec Closed

For further information and images please contact Patrice Molloy Tel: +353 1 612 9900; Email: [email protected].

8 December 2004

The year just ending has been one of the most successful to date for the Irish Museum of Modern Art, not only in the quality and diversity of its programmes but also in the all-important area of public engagement with its work. Visitor numbers for 2004 are set to exceed 350,000, the highest yearly total in IMMA’s 13-year history. In addition to those visiting the Museum itself, many thousands more attended exhibitions and events throughout Ireland organised by IMMA’s National Programme.

Highlights for 2004 included:

· A series of exhibitions by leading international artists, including the Italian painter Francesco Clemente, the French installation artist Sophie Calle, the Brazilian photographer Vik Muniz and the Spanish abstract painter Juan Uslé.

· The largest exhibition of contemporary Chinese art ever seen in Ireland, which continues into 2005 and has proved a great popular and critical success. The show is part of the China/Ireland Cultural Exchange.

· Views from an Island, which brought works from the Collection by 23 Irish artists to Beijing and Shanghai, also under the auspices of the China/Ireland Cultural Exchange.

· Several important acquisitions by the Museum’s Collection, most notably three film works by the celebrated Irish artist James Coleman, three paintings by Hughie O’Donoghue and a painting by Sean Scully created in memory of the late Dorothy Walker.

· Curating Now, a major symposium on curating contemporary art in public museums and galleries, which attracted more than 250 participants and brought eight eminent international curators into contact not just with IMMA’s work, but also with that of many other public and private galleries in Dublin.

· The publication of a comprehensive evaluation of the Museum’s work with the Government’s Breaking the Cycle initiative, designed to address educational disadvantage at primary school level; also the completion of the Artformations action research project, with the Abbey Theatre and the Arts Council, and the related exhibition.

· A complete redesign of IMMA’s website, which provides a greatly increased level of information and services.

Commenting on the past year, the Museum’s Director, Enrique Juncosa, said, “Everyone at IMMA is delighted at the public’s very positive response to our range of programmes. Several of the developments, such as the acquisition of the James Coleman work, the Curating Now symposium and the redesigned website, are not just important in themselves, but will enable us to build on this success in future years”.

For further information, or to receive images, please contact Patrice Molloy at Tel: +353 1 612 9900, Email: [email protected].

30 November 2004

An exhibition of over 20 works from the Irish Museum of Modern Art’s Collection opens to the public on Friday 19 November at Naas General Hospital as part of a collaborative project between the hospital and IMMA’s National Programme. Looking Beyond combines artworks by Irish and International artists in a wide variety of media and includes paintings by Jack Yeats and Paul Henry, tapestries by Louis le Brocquy and prints by Ilya Kabakov.

Works in the exhibition range from The Flying Komarov, one of ten character albums by the Russian artist Ilya Kabakov, who deals with both hope and fear through his fictional characters to St Stephens Green, Closing Time by Jack B Yeats, a good example of his unique form of expression by this artist who spent a lifetime painting the folklife and culture of Ireland.

Commenting on the project Johanne Mullan, National Programmer at IMMA said: “The arts have traditionally had a strong part to play in the healing process and their vital role in the well-being of many individuals has being clearly documented. The presence of a vibrant Visual Arts Programme at Naas General Hospital is testament to the benefits of initiatives such as this and IMMA is delighted to be involved in this project. It is clear that Naas General Hospital is seeking to promote the visual arts within the hospital not merely to distract but to engage the patient, visitor and staff alike.”

Rhonda Gibson, Community Affairs Manager, National Irish Bank, added "We are delighted to support this exhibition which brings art to patients at Naas General Hospital. Our award-winning Branching Out Programme has helped us facilitate learning, development and community involvement across Ireland through the arts".
 
Naas General Hospital, through this exhibition and through a series of workshops, is working towards enhancing the environment of the hospital and facilitating greater access to and participation in the arts. Each artwork in Looking Beyond is both thoughtful and stimulating and leads the viewer to both question and re-affirm their values and beliefs.

The National Programme, now in its eighth-year, is designed to make the assets, skills and resources of the Museum available to centres outside Dublin. Through the lending of exhibitions and individual works, and the development of collaborative projects with other organisations, the National Programme establishes the Museum as inclusive, accessible and national.

A series of workshops for hospital staff and patients will be held alongside the exhibition as part of the Branching Out project.  Branching Out is a programme designed by the Irish Museum of Modern Art and National Irish Bank to be national, inclusive and participative, bringing the visual arts to the community and providing opportunities for the community to get involved.

Catherine Marshall; Head of Collections at IMMA will give a talk on the exhibition on Monday 22 November at 1.00pm.

Looking Beyond continues until 5 January 2005 at Naas General Hospital.

The exhibition is on view in the main foyer of the hospital.

For further information and colour and black and white images please contact Monica Cullinane or Patrice Molloy at Tel : + 353 1 612 9900, Fax : +353 1 612 9999, email : [email protected] 

16 November 2004 

A daily online calendar of events, exhibition guides and essays available to download and the permanent collection database of some 1,650 works are just some of the features now available on the Irish Museum of Modern Art’s newly designed website, www.imma.ie, launched today Monday 15 November 2004.  Other innovations include booking forms, free postcards of works from the Museum’s Collection and a larger text version of the site for the visually impaired.  The new website also makes available online an improved level of information and visuals and is a significant step forward in offering increased access to all the Museum’s activities.

The complete redesign of the Museum’s website has resulted in a visually strong, fresh new look which allows for easier navigation.  The top navigation includes four new sections Visit IMMA, About IMMA, Support IMMA and Contact IMMA.  All Museum programmes appear on the left-hand navigation and each heading has a drop-down menu for further information on a specific aspect of the programme.  Each exhibition features a selection of images, downloadable text from an essay or exhibition guide and links to other relevant sites.  All visuals for exhibitions have the option of zooming in on the image to view more details.  The Education and Community Programme’s entirely new section lists all its programmes and activities and comprises booking forms on various projects which are available to download.  The Permanent Collection database is now online and allows the visitor to search the Museum’s Collection with a specific search query – a particular artist, artwork, collection or donation can be found at the touch of a button. 

The sites interactive features allows the user to register to receive regular information updates, send a free e-card to a friend, download booking forms and essays from exhibition guides and view an online daily calendar of events. The new site is Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) compliant and adheres to the WAI Level A Guidelines which provides a bigger text format of the site to allow the visually impaired to view the site. Other features includes a site map, search engine facility, links section, staff contact details and the option of a print version for every page.  The new site was developed by Redsky in consultation with Monica Cullinane, Public Affairs Executive, IMMA.

Commenting on the new website Enrique Juncosa, Director of IMMA, said “We are delighted with this new and clearer website. Its easy and fast navigation makes up-to-date and in-depth information about the Museum’s activities available to all web users.  This new site is an excellent resource to all IMMA visitors from the foreign tourist to the student and the local resident”.

Contact details for Redsky
Redsky, Docklands Innovation Park, 128-130 East Wall Road, Dublin 3. 
Tel: +353-1-887 8620 Email: [email protected]

For further information please contact Monica Cullinane or Patrice Molloy at Tel : +353 1 612 9900, Fax : +353 1 612 9999, Email : [email protected]

15 November 2004

An exhibition showing the work of younger Irish artists from the Irish Museum of Modern Art’s Collection has opened to the public at IMMA.  Tír na nÓg: Younger Irish Artists from the IMMA Collection comprises 27 works in a variety of media including DVD, video and installation by Irish or Irish-based artists who have come to prominence in the last two decades. Many of the works have been acquired by the Museum since 2000 and are shown here for the first time. The exhibition looks at the challenges facing these artists who are working at a time of significant social and demographic change. 
 
Works range from Martin & Hobbs Frieze, where painter Fergus Martin and photographer Anthony Hobbs, have collaborated for the first time to produce a 21st- century version of a medieval fresco, to Clare Langan’s Trilogy, which reveals human figures isolated in strange mysterious worlds created by the artist’s innovative use of coloured lenses and her feelings for the sublime, while Dust Defying Gravity by Grace Weir deals with the passing of time by focusing on the sands of time themselves, each dust molecule subject to the artist’s scrutiny.  
 
Time and the changes it brings are again referred to in New Sexual Lifestyles by Gerard Byrne. Comprising a series of DVDs and photographs, this work looks at our attitudes to life and sexuality by contrasting contemporary views to the views held in earlier decades. Contemporary lifestyles are again examined in David Timmons work There is no Estrangement between you and the Machine, an mdf structure painted with glossy car paint to evoke the atmosphere of the salesroom rather than the gallery while the accompanying title points to something far more mysterious.
 
The fantasy world of childhood is dealt with by Andrew Vickery and Alice Maher. Vickery’s Do You Know What You Saw? questions the relationship between real events and our recollection of them, while Maher’s The Axe (and the Waving Girl) evokes memories of childhood fairytales and the pleasures and fears associated with them.
 
The plight of refugees and economic migrants features strongly in the work How to Make a Refugee by Phil Collins, an issue particularly relevant in contemporary Ireland given our long experience of emigration and our more recent experience of migrants coming to Ireland seeking the same assistance which our emigrants once sought. Cultural and religious differences are referred to in Janet Mullarney’s Alpha and Omega, a sculpture of bronze cows inspired by the memory of a cow, bedecked with its ritual ribbon, emerging from the River Ganges, while the complexities of personal identity are dealt with by Isabel Nolan’s Sloganeering 1-4, reminding us of the difficulties that surround our sense of self in a world of mass advertising and communication.
 
Commenting on the exhibition Catherine Marshall, Head of Collection at IMMA, said: “The title of the exhibition, Tír na Óg, refers to eternal youth rather than a chronological state.  The artworks in this exhibition, in their newness and freshness, keep us all in a state of anticipation that denies age and stimulates original attitudes to age-old experiences.”
 
An exhibition guide, with an essay by Catherine Marshall, accompanies the exhibition (price €3.00).
 
Tír na nÓg: Younger Irish Artists from the IMMA Collection continues until 28 March 2005.
 
Admission is free.
 
Opening Hours: 
Tue – Sat    10.00am – 5.30pm
Sun and Bank Holidays,  28- 31 December, 1 January 12 noon – 5.30pm
Mondays, 24 – 27 December  Closed 
 
For further information and colour and black and white images please contact Monica Cullinane or Patrice Molloy at Tel : + 353 1 612 9900, Fax : +353 1 612 9999, Email : [email protected]
 
8 November 2004