(I’m Always Touched) By Your Presence, Dear, is an exhibition of works acquired by IMMA since 2003. Featuring 37 pieces, acquired through purchase, donation and long-term loan, the exhibition concentrates mainly, but not exclusively, on new media.

The exhibition includes film-works by Pierre Huyghe, Lu Chunsheng and Brian Duggan, an installation by Dorothy Cross, a painting by Hughie O’Donoghue and a photo work by Candida Höfer. The exhibition also includes William Scott’s Parallel Forms Orange, 1971 and Once,1986 by Sean Scully, acquired with a special subvention made available by the Department of Arts, Sport and Tourism in 2006.

(I’m Always Touched) By Your Presence, Dear grapples, both conceptually and visually, with issues of memory and sentimentality, and with the part which our own identity plays in the very process of being touched by an artistic “object of desire”. The title of the exhibition is taken from a 1978 song by the American punk rock band Blondie.