occupy space

8/9/2019 Occupy Space

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Occupy Paper2 Graduate Special 3

Occupy Space is one of Limericks newest exhibition

spaces, located on Thomas street. It has been set up tofacilitate an ever expanding need for artistic exhibition

spaces in Limerick. It is an artist led project, run by members

of Wickham Street Studios on a voluntary basis. OccupySpace is committed to delivering a relentlessly energetic

programme of exhibitions and events.

Our intention is that this space will be a central axis for ahuge variety of creative people to experiment and present

their work. The organization encourages openness andaccessibility to artists and the visiting public alike, and

aims to provide an open solid platform for the visual arts.Our program involves hosting exhibitions of emerging and

established artists, with a strong emphasis on exhibiting

those based in Limerick. Occupy Space also hosts otherartist led projects such as artists talks, seminars and

collaborative events with other creative practitioners andorganizations.

This new visual art journal is intended to expand on theexhibitions and events happening in the gallery as well

as provide a platform for critique and dialogue betweenemerging and established artists in Limerick and beyond.

Artists, critical writers and other art practitioners are invited

to submit to the journal and engage with it as a means oftesting, experimenting, developing and expanding on new

ideas and concepts.

Submissions

Occupy paper is a freeonline journal published

monthly or bi-monthly.We are actively looking

for contributors to write

articles, essays, and reviews.Occupy paper accepts

all submissions related tocontemporary art practice

from painting and printto sculpture, video and

beyond.If you would liketo be included in the focus

section please send a CV,5-10 images and a short

statement about your work.

All submissions should besent by email to :

[email protected]

Occupy Paper is a new onlinepublication for contemporary art,which will run alongside the visual artprogramme in place in Occupy Space.

CCUPY

Graduate Special

Aoife BarrettLimerick School of Art and Design 16

Evelyn BroderickLimerick School of Art and Design 18

Marie-Louise ClogherLimerick School of Art and Design 20

Aoife CoxLimerick School of Art and Design 22

Sandra HickeyLimerick School of Art and Design 24

Meagan HylandLimerick School of Art and Design 26

Aidan KelleherLimerick School of Art and Design 28

Suzanne van der LingenNational College of Art and Design 30

Tadhg McCullaghLimerick School of Art and Design 32

Lisa ODonnellGalway-Mayo Institute of Technology 34

Cian ODonoghue

Limerick School of Art and Design 36

Molly ODwyer

National College of Art and Design MFA 38

Orlagh SpainLimerick School of Art and Design 40

Jane SugrueLimerick School of Art and Design 42

Ian WalshLimerick School of Art and Design 44

CONTENTSIn the Gallery

Symbiosis

Group Show by Wickham Street Studio Members 04

FocusGerry DavisWickham Street Studios, Limerick 46


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In the GallerySymbiosisWickham Street Studios Group Show

Wickham Street Studios was set up in May 2009 to provide affordable studio spaces for

artists and an outlet for its members to be part of a wider artistic community. It currentlyhas 12 artist members, Ramon Kassam, Kevin O Keeffe, Tom Prendergast, Aoife Flynn,

Laura McMorrow, Aislinn OKeeffe, Paraic Leahy, Gerry Davis, Paul Rathigan, EmmetKierans, Noelle Collins and Sean Guinan. W.S.S has since become one of Limericks key

arts organisations and are responsible for the establishment of Occupy Space. Theshows title refers to the relationship between W.S.S and Occupy Space but also the

relationship between studios and galleries in general. Symbiosis provided the public withthe opportunity to engage with some of the processes and ideas being undertaken by

current studio members.

The show previewed Thursday 10th of June 7-9pm and ran until 26th June


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Aoife Flynn

Symbiosis

My recent work has evolved from previous work, which soughtmemory, lost time, and hints of the absent-present in landscapes,people, and objects. Working from a base of imagery culled frommemory, photographs, mass media and my surroundings, I aminterested in creating multiple connections and relations rather

than xed and isolated pieces and which concern the perceptionof our reality.This project takes its inspiration and title from thePhilip K Dick novel Time Out of Joint. In it the main character, anordinary man leading an ordinary suburban life, begins to suspectthat the world around him is an illusion, constructed for the expresspurpose of keeping him docile and happy. As the novel progressesthe protagonist suffers from a breakdown of his idios kosmos orpersonal reality and the objective, shared reality (koinos kosmos)emerges more clearly, exposing him to the reality he has createdto shield himself from the brutal truth of a world out of control. It isthis conict of realities that interests me, trying to account for the

diversity of worlds that people live in. The format of the book createsa one-dimensionality that the protagonist perceives in the world andasks us to look beyond this.

Gerry Davis

Gerry talksabout his

practiceand recentexhibition inthe Focus

section onpage 37.

Ramon Kassam

Ramon Kassams practice sites itself within the ideathat any element that is part of the make up of a

painting practice can call to mind certain degrees

of suggestibilities. This in turn creates multiple

mythological parallel universes for painting tosituate itself within. By utilizing and exploiting thesenotions, Ramons objective is to establish a means

of expression that is appropriate for grand themes,could express the experience of contemporary

society and comprehend some of the differentkinds of complex realities that exist within it, through

something as absurd as a painting practice. In concept,the practice focuses on art history, painting critique, notions

of the painter, but importantly it investigates how we make

sense of paintings in relation to how we understand them tobe categorized, in accordance to what we already know or

take for granted about them or similar looking devices.Hegoes about this business by mostly making paintings much

akin to answering a question with another question, furtherhighlighting the absurdity of the practice and institute of

painting and art making.

Tom Prendergast

Tom Prendergasts work explores landscape

through mediums such paint and collage.

Laura McMorrow

Laura McMorrows work is inviting yetunpredictable. Her diverse combination of

materials gently leads viewers to unexpecteddiscoveries. These deceptively simple works

present humorously profound situationsher simplicity in reinventing found objects

creates a complex pictorial space, and

raises questions about subject-objecthierarchy, and combinative logic.The scale

of the work tends to be small and aims toprovoke curiosity in the viewers, encouraging

them to look closer and examine the piecesas if they are artefacts in a museum. The work is

concerned with the processes of collecting, andappropriation in an attempt to understand such issues

as orientation, perception, place and belonging.


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Sean Guinan

My practice is comfortable with the idea

that painting is a matter of subjectiveaesthetics. The wrong can be right and the

right can be wrong, as is the case in much ofmy work. I am interested in notions of good

painting and bad painting, and how these

can be manipulated to form engagingpeculiarities, including ambiguous stylistic

variations and allusive conveyance. Mywork isnt quite sure what it is or what it wants

to be. It is almost searching for a way out ofperplexion, ambivalence, inconsistency and

contradiction.


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Emmet Kierans

Emmet Kieranspaintings revolvearound a cast of

characters, theirenvironment and the

factors inuencingtheir lives. These

ctional charactersare used to explore

current ideological

theories throughmetaphor and

allegory. Middleclass housing estates,

parasitic worms,

pharmac eut ic a l sand charactersin a state of

metamorphosis are

the subject matterof the current work.

A range of stylesand techniques are

utilized so that eachpainting is carried

out in a manner

appropriate to thecontent.

When I was working

in the NationalGalleries of Scotland

I watched a womanwho was standing

before a self portraitby Rembrandt.

Though the glass wassupposed to be non-

reective, she begin

to x her hair andeven try to check

her teeth in theglass.I am interested

the archetypes andmemes of traditional

art practices, wheremotifs have become

dominant truisms,

and I attemptto revaluate

their situation inc o n t e m p o r a r y

painting practice.I am currently

painting about thelandscape. I use

generic horizontalline 1/3 up from

the bottom of

the picture planewhich is ratio 2:1

(sometimes 16:9). Anawkward feature is

then placed withinthat landscape to

offset the literal,traditional reading.

Varnish is poured for

a reective gloss.Landscape is a

subject so pregnantwith meaning and

relevance, moretopical with each

passing year yetredundant on the

picture plane. I am

interested in anexhausted depiction

of a constantlyr e i n v i g o r a t e d

subject and theconsequences in

that argument.

Paraic Leahy Kevin OKeeffeRelying on childlike or

adolescent content,my work aims to

create absurdotherworldly scenes.

By juxtaposingimages together

from a variety ofsources, I aim to

create curiosity inthe viewer through a

series of imaginative

c o m p o s i t i o n squestioning the

notion of the real.Dealing with

space within thework is important.

Leaving areas of

the work untouchedheightens that the

artwork is not aboutmastering the form

of the surroundingnon-forms but

more areas of smalldetails and the

artists judgmentAttempting to

reconcile ideas

of dichotomy adivision between

two things - Thereal and unreal,

the tenable anduntenable - trying

to create a conictwithin the work

Paul Rathiganspaintings explore theidea of landscape

using glass andenamel paints that

give a lustrous mirror-like nish.

Paul Rathigan


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My current work is concernedwith exploring the loss of

childhood innocence, andat the events, people and

societal conditioning whichshapes the individual from

childhood. I am exploringthese themes through

some of the themes in

Lewis Carrolls Alice inWonderland books, while

using images of myself takenfrom family photographs

as the Alice gure in thepaintings. Material and

colour are used to conveymemory and emotion. The

images are often layeredand ambiguous reecting

the uncanny nature ofmemory and the way in

which the mind attempts to

organise information andevents and make sense of

them. The mixed media usedin the pieces are domestic,

everyday materials muchof which are objects and

materials I have used in myown life at one time or other.

These are used to bringa personal and relatable

element to the work, whilesimultaneously fusing parts

of the real, outer, physical

world with the imaginary,inner world of the mind

Aislinn OKeeffe

Material and colour are

used to convey memory and

emotion.

The pieces Im currently

working on address theideals and expectations

that inuence our lifestyledecisions. Conformity,

identity, the domestic and

absence are some subjectspresent in my work. A curiosity

about the previous tenantsin both my apartment and

studio sparked an interest

in the achievements

accomplished by many in lifeand the habits we develop

as individuals that are alsocommon throughout society.

These topics inform the

selection of images and theirtreatment through collage,

painting and illustration.

Noelle Collins

Conformity, identity, the domestic andabsence are some subjects present inmy work.


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Graduate SpecialA selection of 2010 student shows


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My studio practice has involved researching

different dwellings and architectural

domestic spaces as well as concepts ofpublic and private boundaries. My workcombines and layers 3-D architectural

installations, photography and prints,exploring, reecting the home as container

and symbol for our actions, experienceand memories. The various forms of

architectural representation shown in my

work reect concepts of oppositions suchas containment and openness, interiority

and exteriority, transparency and opacity,order and disorder. Images of houses that

cannot be reached or got into, stairs that go

to nowhere, houses with no doors, houses

piled on top of each other; all these thingsreect the constraints and conventions ofsociety as well as representing the obstacles

one meets in life. The main focus of my workis the marginal society: the shantytowns,

favelas or townships. All materials workedby human hands recount something

about themselves and about us, to whereconnected ideas emerge. My work uses

the cast-offs of society to construct the

unregulated yet vibrant expressiveness ofthe human being to personalise space.

Everyonehas a

publicworld, aprivateworld anda secretworld.

PaulaRego

Favela,Wooden Houses,

Various Dimensions

City of Prints,Mixed Media,Various Dimensions

Favela, Wooden Houses, Various Dimensions

Limerick School of Art and DesignAoife Barrett


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Evelyn BroderickLimerick School of Art and Design

My work stems from afundamental interest in

observing banal objects.Sitting

on a mantel piece or hangingon a wall, the frame holds a

reminder to the past. I wasthinking of captured moments

conned in a space, containedneat and tidy within a frame.

I read that Everything in theworld exists in order to endin a book Today everythingexists to end in a photograph-

Mallarm Susan Sontag OnPhotography. I was intriguedby this idea and feel that in

todays society our lives aredocumented visually, selected

few important memorable

images are then placed in frames. I wantedto distort this traditional function of the frame,

and then the idea of framing an emptyspace came to me. Image is unnecessary, as

it is the boundary which encloses the imagethat interests me.The edges of the rectangleare a boundary, the end of the picture. Thecomposition must react to the edges andthe rectangle must be unied, but the shape

of the rectangle is not stressed the partsare more important, and the relationshipsof colour and form occur among them -Donald Judd Specic Objects Intrigued

by this statement, I began to look at the

frame as a unied form, I wanted to stress

the importance of colour and form and bymaking multiples I felt that I could achieve

this. I made two silicone moulds from whichI was able to reproduce over 200 frames. I

used a range of materials-plaster, jesmonite,resin and wax. The wax enabled me to add

wax pigment and painting pigment,which

allowed me to focus on colour. No two arethe same as I did not use equal quantities

of pigment. I arranged a oor installation ofover 200 wax and resin frames which creates

a delicate tension in the space. An aura ofpresence and absence is evident as the

empty space is framed.

Everything in the world exists inorder to end in a book. Todayeverything exists to end in aphotograph. Mallarm- SusanSontag On Photography.

239Wax, Resin,and Pigment.


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The basis of this project was the subject of the city and our

interpretation of it. I drew upon my ever-expanding

interest in lm and took three of my favourites that useda city as a character and also as a storytelling tool. I then

documented the city of Limerick photographically andcompared and contrasted my experiences there with those

in three particular scenes from the lms chosen throughphotography and typography. I wanted to show that you

can feel the same way about these romanticised andidealised cinematic scenes as you do about the place you

actually live in, no matter how small, insignicant or remoteit may be, its still yours.

Marie-Louise ClogherLimerick School of Art and Design

The City on Film

The City on Film


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Aoife Cox

Reecting the process the human

body undertakes to attainprociency of physical abilities and

techniques; my practice involves

creating a process which is bothphysically and mentally repetitive

throughout its progression. By

utilizing the forms created bydynamic body movements, I seek

to created objects which portray

the rhythm and ow of energy

and movement in the body, whileemphasizing the way a body

utilizes the space which it inhabits,

to challenge the way we perceiveand contemplate time, movement

and space.

Limerick School of Art and Design

to challengethe way weperceive andcontemplatetime,movementand space.


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In these works Im portrayingcolour in a similar way as is

used in advertising, rich reds,purples and warm oranges

are used to promote the

sex sells momentum.I have chosen to focuson the mouth as a subtle

sexual orice because

it is the part of the bodythat is continually used in

adverts using the sex sellsmotive. These colours are

used to illustrate the peakof desire, the moment of

stimulation and lust whenused in a dramatic way.

These colours are also

linked to that of health, ahealthy body, youth, when

applied in a subtle way butwhat Im trying to do in my

paintings is to use thesecolours and apply them in

such a way that it cancelsthat out, I wish to make the

viewer think of rot, disease,infection, decay, unease

when presented with

these colours, and changethe viewers association

with these colours or at

make the viewer think of rot, disease,infection, decay, unease when presentedwith these colours,

least question why those colours are sooften linked to these qualities. Ive been

concentrating on the mouth/ chin area of

the face and Ive tried to link it to thoughtsof sexuality, sensuality,a subtle symbol

of seduction. Ive focused on the mouthas a sexual orice and nothing more, an

object thats sole purpose is for pleasure,by removing the eyes from these portraits,

and cropping the image so the mouth isthe main focus, it becomes just an object.

The colouring is very important in the work,the use of luscious reds, warm oranges, rich

purples are to symbolise the peak of desire,to symbolise the stimulation of genital. Many

of my portraits are cropped, and falling off

the canvas. By accompanying the imagerywith large open voids of empty space, Im

trying to draw focus to the tension betweenthe image, falling from its setting and the

open space it leaves behind. I wish to drawattention to the beauty of the raw canvas,

and show the workings of the drawing thatlies beneath.

Sandra HickeyLimerick School of Art and Design

the mouth isthe main focus,it becomes

just anobject

They come in different shapes and sizes, Oil on black sheet plastic, 25cm x30cm

Ravenous, Oil on Canvas, 2 x3


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Meagan HylandLimerick School of Art and Design

www.meaganhyland.com

My work is broken down to acycle of knowing what I want

straight away,researching theidea, loving the idea, and then

slating it, starting over, tryingevery other idea under the sun

before coming back to theoriginal idea. Usually this takes

anywhere between a day to

four weeks but for the most partthis method has worked for me.

This particular piece was froma brief called The City where

I was asked to interpret the city

in my own way. I chose to lookat the idea of how someonecan be in love with a city they

have never been to, in my caseI chose New York and decided

to portray the others ways you

can visit the city through othermedias like music, books, and

lms.


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The devices created through my work are

based around the production of an image

and the users of the machines receivesomething as a result of their interaction,

specically a physical piece of art produced

from a particular machine. The workproduced is a combination of electronicsand engineering, and the materials used

are often found disregarded mechanicalcomponents or purpose built pieces. This

work is my interpretation of Experimentalprintmaking. I began studying interaction

design, which is the study of devices with

which a user can interact. The idea behindit is that designers/artists, create interfaces

with devices that make them eaiser andmore enjoyable to use. However through my

practice I decidedthat if I were to create

interactive devices that I didnt have to

make them either enjoyable or easy to use.

Resulting from this I began studying differentstates of emotion and ways of evoking

them, this led me to Robert Plutchik, who

during the 80s created a list of the basicemotions, Joy, Trust, Fear, Anger, Disgust,Anticipation, Suprise and Sadness. I am using

this list as a basic guidlines for the productionof my machines. This research has been the

main driving force behind this project. Forexample, a machine created as part of this

work, designed to evoke fear was conceived

by rst researching an accurate denition ofwhat fear meant and researching different

ways that people could be agitated by thepresence of danger. Through the research

it came to my attention that to stimulate

this particular emotion,the

user would need to feelthreatened by the possibility of

something bad happeningto them and this would have

to be embodied physically in

the device. In this case, theinterface was designed as

motor controlled pulley systemthat would move a stylus over

a page creating an image.To create the feeling of and

the image of this fear, twoelectrodes were attached to

the controllers which are setto randomly administer an

electric shock. As the electric

shock is random, and theuser remains aware of this, a

sense of danger and tension isgenerated.

the userwould needto feel

threatenedby thepossibility ofsomethingbadhappeningto them

Aidan KelleherLimerick School of Art and Design

aidankelleher.weebly.com


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A historical materialistcannot do without the

notion of a present whichis not a transition, but in

which time stands stilland has come to a stop.

For this notion defnes thepresent in which he himself

is writing history. Historicism

gives the eternal imageof the past; historical

materialism supplies aunique experience with

the past. The historicalmaterialist leaves it to others

to be drained by the whorecalled Once upon a time

in historicisms bordello.

He remains in control of his powers, man enough to

blast open the continuumof history.

(Walter Benjamin, Theses on

the Philosophy of History)

My interests lie in the coincidences

between (cultural/historical)signication and the perceptual

experience. Taking inspirationfrom Walter Benjamins notion

of historical materialism, mywork proposes and facilitates

individual experiences ofobjects rather than advocating

dened historical narratives. In

this specic body of work, I usemy own maternal relationships

to explore the notion of theother in photographic and

time-based media. Basing mywork on archival footage of my

grandmother, I play with ourrelationship to spark a dialectic

between tenses and physicalidentity.

Suzanne van der LingenNational College of Art and Design

the notion ofthe otherinphotographicand time-based

media.

www.suzannevanderlingen.com


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Tadhg McCullaghLimerick School of Art and Design

My evolving practice is informed by research into the dominant ideologies which dictateour societies. These ideologies appear as inevitable, but are insidiously bolstered by those

who benet from them the most. This exhibitions focus is a meditation (space) on therelationship between the individual constituents of society, i.e. the citizens and society as a

whole. Accessibility is an important issue in my practice.


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Lisa ODonnellGalway-Mayo Institute of TechnologyMy work references the issues of

juxtaposition and balance in regards to

the physical make up of each work interms of the composition, color, medium

and also the abstract and gurativeelements used. The process of using often

random imagery is a way of working thatrepresents searching for a balance and is

inuenced by everyday life where we areconstantly bombarded by imagery and

it is difcult to nd a particular balance in

life and gure out exactly what you wantand are interested in. I work predominately

with painting as well as video and thecombination of different media is an

important element of this work. This bodyof work depicts a number of different

elements such as dazed gures pluckedfrom mass media and random clips from

newspapers, as well as other randomimagery of recognizable elements such

as rooms and dwellings. The gure/groundrelationship is important as the scenes which

emerge have recognizable elements fromeveryday life somewhat abstracted into

a strange and unreal space, reecting acertain space hovering between some

form of reality and a fantasy land. There isa kind of retro style that often appears in

the work which relates to how we always

look to the past for our inuences and forways of tackling the future.

a certainspacehovering

betweensome form ofreality and afantasy land.

www.Lisaodonnell.blogspot.com


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Cian ODonoghueLimerick School of Art and Design

He who ghts with monstersmight take care least he therebybecome a monster (part 2),1189mmx841mm,Lambda Print,Silicone Diamond Mount

I have been experimenting with the capacity of

photography printing mechanisms, animation andlighting to allude to the ambiguity of ephemerality within

the intrinsic symbolism of the moth and metaphysicalphenomenon of death

No one believes in his own

death. Or, to put the samething in another way, in theunconscious every one ofus is convinced of his ownimmortality Sigmund Freud,Interpretation of Dreams

He who ghts with monstersmight take care least he

thereby become a monster(part 1),

1189mm x 841mm,Lambda Print,

Silicone Diamond Mount


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Molly ODwyerNational College of Artand Design MFA

www.mollyodwyer.com

Vantage Point

Interdisciplinary in nature, my practice employs the useof mediums such as video, sculpture and installation. My

research revolves around an interest in the human condition

and its interaction with living space and everyday life,challenging the behavioural codes by which we live. The

boundary between public and private is examined throughexploring these concerns as an analogous parallel to the

physical and the psychological, the body being our primaryexperience of the world from the corporeal to the mental.

In performing for the camera, everyday objects and familiarlandscapes act as both material and prop for the exploration

of this terrain that exists between these two inseparable

forms of reality, as central to our perception of the worldboth internally and externally. Pathos and the tragicomic

implicate the viewer on a psychological and emotional levelthrough the use of simple bodily gestures with elements of

order and chaos through absurd actions performed for thecamera. Aspects of popular culture and the cinematic are

referenced in the work through a merging and co-existenceof ction and reality. My practice draws interests from lm

theory and the role of media in society asserting the use of

the video camera as core medium for the exploration of theissues in the work.


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Our society generates enormous quantities of waste;

wood, metal, information and symbols. This wastein turn creates a kind of sensory pollution, resulting in

the important and signicant becoming lost in a seaof irrelevance. For me the process, materials and

physicality of a work are as of much importance as theconcept. I choose to work with scrap wood and metal

because they are in essence the waste of society. Theystand as an antithesis to a world that places value in

the pure, new, and sleek. In the modern mind suchmaterials evoke a fear of disuse, entropy and ruin.

thewaste

of

society

Orlagh SpainLimerick School of Art of Design


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The complex relationship of the pains and joys of love andfriendship. I need my memories. As to be expected, with

time they sweeten, become more full by my remembering.They lose their grain of truth, and warm me with nostalgia.

My work grows from the duel between the comforting lieof memory and the harsh truth. In drawing, whilst my hand

touches the sheet, the touch does not know the differencebetween a drawn line and the blank paper. It matters little

what it touches, my nger is unable to tell the difference.That is the crucial essence of drawing; it is always so close

to the object but always separated from it. The lie and the

truth. Close but always comfortingly separate. My drawingsallow me to re-experience past relationships without the

trauma of fresh truth. They allow me to journey through thepast unafraid of what hurts, joys and pains I might nd again,

and become a kind of visual catharsis. Each is a means ofexpelling, of getting out of me, past emotions and states of

awareness.

The peculiar estrangement that oftenoccurs after sex between men and

women is a paradox that interests me.Intimacy and alienation.

Jane SugrueLimerick School of Art of Design

Attracted to eachother, a man anda woman connectthrough lust. Thec o m m u n i c a t i o n

joining them depends

on the nakedness oftheir laceration. Their

love signies thatneither can see thebeing of the other butonly a wound and aneed to be ruined. Nogreater desire existsthan awounded personsneed for anotherwound.Georges BataIlle

The Beatic Dream andJokes become Real


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Ian WalshLimerick School of Art of Design

Seventy-Nine Short Essays collects an assortment of rants andthoughts on the culture of graphic design through the eyes

of the well respected designer and design critic MichaelBierut. One essay ,The Real and the Fake, examines how the

city has lost its sense of reality and is being built around the

expectations of others rather than for functionality. Bierutuses the example of New York but this theory is applicable

to any city, from Paris to Dublin. The series of posters use acollage of well known buildings from Limerick City to in body

the hyper-reality discussed in the essay. The six pieces aredesigned around my own expectations of what I believe the

city to be or imagined it to be, drawing inspiration from the

ctional Gotham City to the non-ctional New York city.

The Real and the Fake

I dont know just when we lost our sense of reality or

our interest in it, but at some point it was decided that

reality was not the only option, that it was possible,permissible and even desirable to improve upon it.

The Real and the Fake


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Focus

OP:So Gerry tell us a bit about your academic background, did you have any inuential

tutors or peers?GD:Well I started out in Limerick Senior College and then moved on to LSAD to study

painting for four years. I denitely learnt a lot over that time and would say that all mytutors and peers were inuential in one way or another. Although I was taught alot about

the technical aspects of painting, it was really the energy and conviction of certainteachers that helped me build my own condence to keep working at art. At rst it

was kind of a surprise for me to see this whole world that focused on nothing other thanartmaking, but as the years went by it became more and more habitual and by the end, I

was well accustomed to the idea of working as an artist.

OP:What kind of themes and concerns are explored in your practice? The title of your new

solo exhibition suggests theres a duality in your work, what is the reason for this and howdoes it present itself?

GD:The title came from the idea that because I work in both digital and traditionalmediums, and both have progressed quite differently over the years, that the differences

should be acknowledged rather then trying to assimilate one practice into the other.Before I went to study painting I had an interest in digital imagery and was largely self

taught in the different software used. By the time I came along it was in fact more naturalto learn how to use photoshop as a kid then it was to learn traditional oil painting, as every

home had a computer and it was much easier to get into and much quicker to get results

out of.

Gerry Davis is a graduate of LimerickSchool of Art and Design and is currently

a member of Wickham Street Studios.Here he talks to Occupy Paper abouthis practice and recent exhibitions.

Duality, Gerrys solo exhibitionat Normoyle Frawley Gallery


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OP:You use a lot of close friends and relations in your portraits, is the sense of intimacy

that this creates important to the work?GD:I think it might come from growing up being very distant from anything related to

art. It was in lots of books etc but no one I knew as a kid had any interest in art, it wasntin my family at all and it was a very alien thing in my life until I was older. So in some

ways painting portraits of friends and relations now is a way to put my own stamp on it,or trying to rectify that circumstance.

OP:Did you strive to capture a kind of disconnection thatcomes through with the digital work, in that its not such a

physical process as painting and, I imagine, far less timeconsuming.What do you think about this contradiction?

GD:I think the sense of disconnection is denitely there, and

maybe thats why the digital work has such different imageryto the paintings, because I dont consider it as much of a

personal investment. That can be very liberating as wellthough, and Ive been able to come up with surreal pictures

I never would have been able to do with paint. It continuesto surprise me how the pros and cons of both ways of

working balance each other out, and Ive never been able toabandon one for the other.

OP:What can you tell us about your process in general? Give

us some insight into how you work.

GD:Well the starting point is generally a photograph. I havea large collection of photos on my computer stretching

back a few years. I look through it for a while and I mightfocus on one aspect of a photo or the photo as a whole if

its interesting. Recently Ive been trying to challenge myselfand have been using elaborate photographs as references

for some of the oil paintings in the Duality show. If Im workingdigitally then I would often throw a few different elements

from different photos together until an image eventuallystarts to emerge and then I work on bringing that out and

making it into its own believeable scene.

Ive beenable to comeup with surreal

pictures Inever wouldhave been

able to dowith paint


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OP:Are there any artists out there that you really admire and maybe inuence you?

GD:There are a couple of realist painters working today that I really admire, SeanCheetham and Kent Williams are two great american painters and Phil Hale is one in

england. Then theres also some great digital artists Ive followed over the years, DennisSibeijn, Dave Mckean etc. One great thing about Limerick is the whole spectrum of artists

that work there, an amazing amount for a small city, and since Ive lived there Ive met

some incredible artists too.

OP: You won the Normoyle Award at your degree show for a solo exhibition, did you nd

this benecial?Youve also been working in Wickham Street Studios since graduating, wasit important for you to keep working after college, to keep the momentum going?Is being

there arepros and

cons to both

digital workand painting,I dont think Icould chooseone over theother at themoment.

OP:You had a few important exhibitionsrecently, one that focused on your d igital

work and your rst solo exhibition, whichone did you enjoy more, as a matter of

fact, which aspect do you enjoy more, thedigital work or the detailed painted works?

GD:Yeah Hi-Res (the digital show) wasa great opportunity, I had known Ken

Coleman almost since the time I movedthe Limerick 5 or 6 years ago and as far

as we knew we were the only artists in

Limerick who made digital art in a purelyne-art context, as opposed to using it for

design etc. Then we met Billy Hayes andJohnnie Wong who had also been working

digitally and having a group show afterthat was the logical progression. It was an

enjoyable show to work on and getting tosee my digital pictures printed on a large

scale for the rst time was great. Duality(the solo show) was a little more strenuous

to get ready, but was equally enjoyable

and it was an excellent opportunity to seethe work of the last year hung together in

one place and I was able to look at it moreobjectively then I could in the studio. As I

say, there are pros and cons to both digitalwork and painting, and I dont think I could

choose one over the other at the moment.

OP:Youre a pretty accomplishedphotographer too, do you see that as an

integral part of your work?

GD:Photography is kind of a commondenominator between all my work, its the

starting point for both the paintings andthe photo manipulations and sometimes

I use them as standalone photos aswell. I hardly ever leave a photo without

some level of editing done to it thoughand I think that digital post production is

something that ought to be embraced byall photographers.

Scientia


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OP: You won the Normoyle Award at your degree show for a solo exhibition, did you ndthis benecial?Youve also been working in Wickham Street Studios since graduating, was

it important for you to keep working after college, to keep the momentum going?Is being

able to work alongside other artists important to developing your practice after college?Has the recession affected your practice at all?

GD: Winning that award was very helpful, as it gave me something to work towards forthe year and helped me to keep the ball rolling straight out of college. Being in Wickham

St was the biggest help, I cant imagine I would have kept going if I hadnt stayed aroundother artists, who Ive also found to be the soundest, nicest people too :D The recession

hasnt really affected my practice too much as I was in college during the good years so Idont know any better :) I nd that there are still some buyers for the work but I havent got

as many commisioned jobs as I used to.

OP: Any upcoming exhibitions?What are your plans for the future?

GD: No immediate plans yet, that last two shows came in quick succesion, so Im happy to

spend some time guring out what the next body of work will be like and making a start on

it. :)

I was incollegeduring the

good yearsso I dontknow anybetter

Dinner, 6x 4.5ft

Marisha, 2.5x 3ft


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CCUPY

[email protected]: Occupy Paper is free and makes no prot from the publication of any materials found therein. Occupy Paper

is a publication for the dissemination of artistic ideas and will not be liable for any offense taken by any individual(s)resulting from any material contained therein.All images in Occupy Paper are the sole property of their creators unlessotherwise stated. No image in the magazine or the magazine logo may be used in any way without permission of thecopyright holder.Submissions: All works submitted to Occupy Paper must be the sole, original property of the contributor(s), have theappropriate model releases, and cannot interfere with any other publication or companys publishing rights. OccupyPaper is edited by Aoife Flynn Occupy Space/Wickham Street Studios Limerick Ireland

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