Ireland's Eye: An Exhibition of new art, from Ireland

Five artists, Orla Comerford, Myfanwy Frost-Jones, Michelle Malone, Mandy O’ Neill and Lucy Peters explore critical questions of climate change, globalisation, social inequality and rapid technological change, from the unique perspective of an island perched between the European and American continents. This island of Ireland has made significant contributions to the worlds of knowledge, culture and entertainment, a unique vantage point to shape an independent and creative vision.

 

In this exhibition, there are important questions around what constitutes our individual, communal and national identities. What defines us? Is it the clothing we wear, manufactured on the other side of the world or is it the equally globalized digital content we consume? Could it be our intimate family histories which are intertwined with social histories, or is it found in our attitudes towards inward migration and the acceptance of new communities.  Are we paying enough attention to the subtle changes in our environment which will impact our ability to produce food in an unpredictable world climate in the future.

Mata Irlandia, or ‘Irelands Eye’ is an exhibition casting a critical ‘eye’ on an increasingly connected, yet polarised world. The island of Irelands recent history has much in common with Indonesia’s journey to independence. In Ireland, the revolutionary poets helped to imagine the new nation into being, while in Indonesia the visual artists envisioned a singular nation from the myriad colonial and archipelagic histories and cultures of Indonesia.

Today, the island nations of Ireland and Indonesia share in common a deep sense of cultural and artistic identity that is manifested in many forms, from music, crafts, storytelling, film making and urban arts.

 

These five artists bring a nuanced, social, technological and interdisciplinary approach to the questions of individuality, globalization and how artists make work about themselves and the places they call ‘home’ in the 21^st century.

 

These artists are graduates of the Institute of Art, Design and Technology www.iadt.ie , Dublin City University www.dcu.ie , Technological University of Dublin www.tud.ie  , Technological University, Shannon www.tus.ie  Limerick, National College of Art and Design www.ncad.ie  and Munster Technological University www.mtu.ie in Cork.

 

University education in Ireland has its roots in the medieval scriptoria of Irish monastic communities, where canonical Latin texts from southern Europe were transcribed and co-mingled on vellum with the wild beasts of our northern Celtic imagination. Beginning in the 16^th Century with Trinity College, and through its National Universities and Technological Institutes, Ireland has the highest rate of university graduation in the EU