I like to make people stop using their eyes so much and pay more attention to the other senses like sound and touch. Touch is mostly noticeable as a sensation on your skin or your body when you are walking through a space, how you feel in a space. This is also the way you feel in a landscape. Sound can makes this more obvious. When you can’t see well because of low light levels or when there is not much to look at, your peripheral vision takes over and you’re more aware of where you are. It just happens. Joan Edlis
While I have to admit I didn’t get a chance to see much of the recent Kilkenny Arts festival, I think some you know that I was involved in a group exhibition, the Shankill Castle International Arts Festival 2010 organised by Phoebe Cope at Shankhill Castle, Paulstown, Co. Kilkenny. Such a lot of great work was on display so here’s a few of my favourites below. My thanks to Phoebe, Reuben, Elizabeth and Geoffrey for inviting me to exhibit too and to directors Kevin Hughes and Pat Kenny for including my work in the film exhibition.
The UK based Centre for Recent Drawing had a great and varied exhibition – all centered on trees. I wish I had more time to look at all the works… Joan Edlis created something I wish I had thought of – a map book with a small video panel inserted and attached headphones. Putting on the headphones the simple installation transported you to a audio-visual walk in the forest that was marked on the map. It reminded me of the magic book in CS Lewis book The Voyage of the Dawn Treader where a character finds a book whose images come to life. What a great way to connect place at a distance with sound as well as images. Joan creates all manner of works here, in reference to landscape at www.joanedlis.com. Actually I’ve been trying to concentrate on sound more recently for my film work – I’ve been trying to walk along in wooded areas with eyes shut – there really is a racket going on in nature most of the time, although one has to be careful not to trip.
Below is was a wonderful short created by Reuben called Asspiration – donkey’s admire good art as much as we do, didn’t you know. The paintings of New York on the silage bales are Reubens too – it was part of a very imaginative installation with a variety of found and discarded objects that recreated New York in Paulstown. Can only hope that next year, this festival will be included in the official Kilkenny Arts Festival programme, I expect more would have enjoyed such fine film, installations and paintings – and the Castle and grounds are amazing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKOo-vIUhjM&feature=player_embedded
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