Etain Hickey

West Cork Creates 2021

I never fail to come away on a high from this annual exhibition, and this year just confirmed that all over again! It is packed with swoon-worthy pieces, like Paddy McCormack‘s Whale Rider seat, above.

Mary Ffrench, Embroidery on Monoprint

The divide between ‘art’ and ‘craft’, although useful in some ways, can pigeonhole work that does not fall neatly into one category or the other. This annual juried exhibition gloriously transcends any artificial dividing lines and instead celebrates all that is best in the West Cork visual arts scene.

Brendan Ryan, Raku, The Old Mill; Bernadette Tuite, Sculptural Stoneware, Brow Head

Take a look at the website for bios of and statements by each of the artists. There’s a dizzying variety of approaches, materials and visions, but all are responding this year to the theme of Home Ground – and it’s not hard to relate, as we have all become so much more aware of our own patch of ground, and have taken to exploring all that it has to offer.

Greenwood chair by Alison Ospina with fabric by Mary Palmer (and in the background large jugs by Etain Hickey and Jim Turner; Kira O’Brien and her ceramic and hand-printed fabric piece ‘You+Me=Home’

It’s all for sale, too, with some very keen prices, so if you are looking to bring home a piece of West Cork, this is the place for you. The most lustworthy painting in the exhibition, to judge from the reaction of everyone who comes in the door, is Christine Thery’s Vanishing Island (below), a large oil painting of her beloved Heir Island.

Helen O’Keefe’s terroir is another Island – Long Island – and she captures the sometimes nostalgic emptiness of it all in her paintings, although the large one below shows her responsiveness to its vibrant colours as well.

Lots of jewellery too – Here is one of Michael Duerdon’s gorgeous brooches – Garden Shed. (If a particular person out there is wondering what to get me for Christmas…just saying.)

And glass! As someone who studies and writes about stained glass, I was delighted to see such a variety of glass this year, from classical stained glass, to fused creations.

In descending order: Deirdre Buckley Cairns stained glass inspired by the Calf Islands; Angela Brady’s witty ‘Ant Colony’; A vibrant kiln-fired plate from Trish Goodbody; Maura Whelan’s West Cork Wall, and a detail from that piece

Jim Turner and Etain Hickey each have their own ceramics in this show, but they have also collaborated on several items, including beautifully decorated large jugs (above, upper). Etain has been inspired by her lockdown walks this year to produce a set of wall plates in glowing reds and blues, all angles and arcs, illustrating the agricultural life around her (above, lower).

Geoff Greenham is one of my favourite local photographers and I love his approach to the theme this year – juxtaposing the old and new in his series on Skibbereen. Below is ‘Bollard’. Although the exhibition space, in the O’Driscoll building by the River, is superb for exhibiting, it’s not great for photography, so my apologies to Geoff and others for the reflections in some of my images.

Geoff Greenham and Sonia Caldwell were standouts for me last year, when West Cork Creates was solely online, so I will finish with Sonia’s sculpture in this year’s show – another one of her thoughtful, brooding figures which showcases her mastery of technique.

I have only shown a tiny fraction of what’s in the Exhibition. It’s on for another two weeks, until the 28th, so make sure you get there!

Bohemians in Ballydehob!

My first visit to Ballydehob wasn’t until around 1990. I remember being struck by how busy a place it was then – I only wish my memories from nearly 30 years ago were clearer. I now know, of course, that this vibrant little community has a history of being a cosmopolitan creative hub of the arts going right back to the middle of the last century. It’s a fascinating story, and Ballydehob is celebrating it by establishing an Arts Museum and permanent collection, with the first exhibition opening this week in Bank House: please come!

Above: two batiks by Nora Golden. Left – The Rock of the Rings (rock art at Ballybane West) and right – detail from a work depicting Loughcrew-type passage grave art. Nora and her partner, Christa Reichel were early arrivals on the arts scene in Ballydehob. In the 1960s Christa bought a farmhouse and set up the region’s first studio pottery in Gurteenakilla then, with Nora, opened the ‘Flower House’ in the centre of the town: you can see it illustrated in the exhibition flyer at the bottom of this post. All this is well documented in the excellent book by Alison Ospina (herself a talented furniture maker) ‘West Cork Inspires’ (Stobart Davies, 2011).

These denizens of 1970s Ballydehob are not a Heavy Metal band (to my knowledge) but in fact four important artists who had settled here: John Verling – artist, ceramicist and architect,  Pat Connor – ceramic sculptor, Brian Lalor – artist, writer and printmaker, and David Chechovich – watercolourist. They are wearing the uniform of the time. Here’s Brian Lalor in his studio today (photo by Finola) – you can certainly see the similarity . . .

Brian still lives near Ballydehob, and is the mastermind and Curator of the new collection. And, if you can begin to see it all fitting together, John Verling (on the right of Brian in the exhibition poster above) took over the Gurteenakilla Pottery with his wife Noelle and together produced striking ceramics, examples of which are in the header photograph.

Gurteenakilla is lived in today by Angela Brady, an artist who works with fused glass. She is also an architect. And – she’s performing the most important task of opening the first exhibition in our new Arts Museum on Friday. Finola wrote about Angela and other artists who contributed to the 7 Hands show on the pier in Ballydehob two years ago: have a look at her post and see if you recognise any other names.

Beautiful stoneware goblets by Pat Connor, who is well represented in the collection. His maker’s mark is a memorable graphic. Another well known West Cork ceramicist represented here is Leda May, who with her husband Bob found Ballydehob in the late 1960s when they were invited by Christa Reichel to set up a pottery behind her own shop. Leda is still working in the area today, producing very fine painted porcelain ware (an example of which is shown below).

Above, from the exhibition – two earthenware mugs by Etain Hickey and Jim Turner, Rossmore Pottery 1983 and two Raku lustreware pieces by Jim Turner 1982. There are more stories to be told – to add to Alison’s comprehensive volume: the rise and fall of the Cork Craftsmans Guild, establishing the West Cork Arts Centre, exhibitions in far-flung places including Zurich, enigmatic repousee work – as yet we can’t trace its history . . . But all that is for another day, once the Ballydehob Arts Museum (BAM) is under way.

Below, posters by Brian Lalor and Repousee work by Shirley Day.

So here’s yet another reason to come to West Cork! This ‘taster’ exhibition starts on 10 August and continues through Heritage Week and Ballydehob’s Summer Festival until 26 August. We have to commend our Community Council in Ballydehob who are giving us the space in Bank House – right in the town centre (the former AIB Bank building) which they acquired for the permanent enjoyment of the local community. Also we have benefitted from Cork County Council who have given us a grant under the Creative Ireland Programme to help get the whole project off the ground. And most of all we have to thank local people who have freely donated pieces for the permanent collection – all will be acknowledged when the Museum is up and running.

Bohemians in Ballydehob! opens at 6pm on Friday 10th August at Bank House, Ballydehob

 

How Are You Keeping?

Mind yourself, now

That’s how people greet each other in West Cork. Lovely, isn’t it? And when we say goodbye we always add Mind yourself. Mind yourself – it’s like being told to be careful, to look after yourself, and not to forget to take time to have a cup of tea and a nice sit down occasionally, all rolled up in one.

Directions 1

It’s been a while since I’ve written a post on how to speak like you’re Irish (scroll to the end to see a list of the previous posts) but I’ve been keeping notes all along, so here is my latest primer so that you can feel like you’re getting the hang of West Cork Speak.

Besides my own images, I’m illustrating this post with cards from Conker Tree Studio. Justyna, from Poland but now living in Ireland, has designed a line of cards and magnets with directions and phrases that she has come to, er, appreciate in the everyday talk around her. Look out for her cards anywhere you go in Ireland, or buy them online.

Directions 4

Directions 3Sure it is!

Sure can be used on its own, but it’s more usually heard in combination with other words in phrases that convey an endless variety of responses useful in almost every circumstance. Take Ah, sure, j’know – use it to express sympathy, along with an exquisite understanding of the circumstances being related. Ah, sure, look is similar although it’s pronounced with a more world-weary air and perhaps without the underlying implied slight cynicism of Ah sure j’know.

Sure, we can't complain

Ceramics by Stefanie Dinkelbach, at Etain Hickey Collections (or here)

The auld arthritis is killing me but isn’t it a grand day?  Sure, we can’t complain. 

I bought it off a farmer and it runs great. But I just discovered it has no seat belts. Ah sure, what harm. 

I paid my water bill, like an eejit, and now I hear the lads who didn’t pay won’t get penalised.  Ah sure, j’know. 

I was hoping to get the silage cut today but would you look at the rain, ’tis coming down in sheets. Ah sure, look.   

Sure aren't we all having a grand time?

Sure, aren’t we all having a grand time?

Don’t be bold!

Around children, it’s good to tune in to the specialised vocabulary adults use for their behaviour. Being bold has nothing to do with bravery – to be bold is to misbehave. If a child is being annoyingly but not nastily bold, he might be just acting the maggot. Or she might be a bit giddy. In any case, the proper response of any right-thinking adult in the vicinity is to give out to them. Giving out means rebuking or reprimanding. The other thing adults like to do with children (and other adults) is to put manners on them. This is a very handy phrase that can be used in all kinds of ways.

No acting the maggot

Nobody’s acting the maggot here!

Sinead, stop acting the maggot. Ah, Mammy, don’t be always giving out to me.

The eldest was put into Miss O’Brien’s class this year.   She’s strict out – that’ll put manners on him.

In the stocks

That’ll put manners on him (Elizabeth Fort, Cork City)

Assent and agreement.

Perhaps because it’s considered bad form to say no (even if that’s what you mean) we have developed a plethora of ways to say yes. No bother is a universal favourite, but perfect has lately been making significant inroads. Y’know yerself, however, is the ultimate form of both eliciting and delivering concurrence.

I think the clutch has gone but I need it desperately for tomorrow.  No bother.

I’ll have the Full Irish, but no meat, extra mushrooms, gluten-free toast, a large cappuccino…no wait, I’ve changed my mind, add the black pudding back in and change the cappuccino to a soya latte. Perfect!

Breakfast at Budd's

The full Irish at Budds of Ballydehob – all local ingredients

They’ll all be down for Christmas, there’ll be nine of them including the grandchildren all wanting mince pies and home made scones and mountains of mashed potatoes, but y’know yerself, like…

How are you? Ah sure, y’know yourself.

So now – off you go and do a biteen of practice. You know yourself, like, that it’ll take a while before you can make a good fisht of it, like Justyna from Poland. But if you don’t get around to it, no bother. Life is busy, in fairness. Mind yerself, now.

Ah sure, all in their own time

This is the fifth in a series. Previous posts:

West Cork Speak: Lessons 1 and 2

West Cork Speak: Lessons 3 and 4

West Cork Speak: Lessons 5 to 7

You’re Grand

Skibb men

How are ye keeping?

Celebrating Irish Design in West Cork

7 Hands crafts

2015 was the Year of Irish Design. In celebration there were exhibitions, events, talks and programmes all across the country. RTE aired a four part documentary, Designing Ireland, introducing us to the history of design in this country. Hosted by Angela Brady and Sandra O’Connell this fascinating series took us from our roots in vernacular design and use of materials, through the dawn of modern design in Ireland via innovative architecture and fashion designers, to the heady days of the Kilkenny Design Centre and into the digital era where computer-based planning is married to mastery of materials by engineers, architects, fine crafters and designer-makers to produce products that can stand with any in the world.

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Alison, Angela and Sandra at the 7 HANDS Exhibition in London, with Alison’s greenwood chairs*

Artists and craft people gravitated towards West Cork throughout the second half of the 20th century for the light, the distance from civilization, the beauty of the countryside, the affordability of land for studios and housing and for the support of a community of like-minded individuals. Alison Ospina, in her book West Cork Inspires, describes this period  and profiles many of the practitioners who discovered this unique area, drew inspiration from it and made their home here.

West-Cork-Inspires_JACKET-FRONT-high-res

Last  summer in Ballydehob the 7 HANDS Group harkened back to this golden era of West Cork Design with a stunning exhibition of contemporary fine craftwork by seven local artists. The exhibition moved on to Dublin and London where it was well received, although I cannot imagine the settings there could rival that of our tiny pristine Haugaard Gallery on the Pier in Ballydehob.

Kieran Higgins is a master woodworker *

The exhibition was supported by a series of artists’ talks and it was quite magical to listen to Brian Lalor talk about the detail and precision of his etching process, compared to Alison Ospina’s approach to her greenwood chair building in which the material reveals the ultimate design to her.

Angela Brady walked us through the making one of her luminous glass creations (those gorgeous beetles!) and Paddy McCormack spoke about the fiery furnace in which his wonderful chess set was forged.

We came away with our own little souvenir – yet more hares for Robert, this time by Etain Hickey.

Etain Hares

The 7 HANDS group has larger ambitions. They want to re-establish West Cork’s place in the Irish design and craft pantheon. With this, their first exhibition, they have made an excellent start.

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Patrick Connor’s quirky portraits *

6_liffey with cranes

The extraordinary intricacy of Brian Lalor’s ‘Liffey with Cranes’*

*A special thank you to Angela Brady for some of the photographs in this post.

West Cork Creates

We were bowled over by the latest exhibition to open in Skibbereen on Saturday: West Cork Creates. It shows collaborations between local craftspeople, visual artists, photographers and designers – combining their skills and expertise to produce exciting, original work.

test pieces

Top picture – The Great West Cork Obelisk (see below) is featured by the entrance to the gallery; above – fired test pieces from the obelisk project

Here’s a riddle: what’s the difference between an artist and a craftsperson? If you have a definitive answer please tell me, because this is a debate that will last forever… Grayson Perry contributes to the discussion in this Guardian piece, starting provocatively with:

…I see the craft world as a kind of lagoon and the art world in general as the ocean. Some artists shelter in this lagoon, because their imagination isn’t robust enough to go out into the wider sea…

Grayson Perry makes pots, so is he an artist? Well, presumably the British art establishment thought so as they gave him the Turner Prize in 2003, the first time it had gone to a ‘ceramic artist’.

More from the obelisk project and – right – Brian Lalor, one of its creators

Where does that leave us? Is someone who makes flowerpots an artist, because a flowerpot might be an attractive object? Where do you place something like the Book of Kells? It’s a functional object – the four Gospels lavishly illuminated – created in medieval times by many different hands. Yet it’s unique, overflowing with stunning visual images, beautiful and priceless. It’s a wonderful example of collaboration between the functional craft of the scribes who penned the texts and the minds of the (undoubted) artists who produced the decorations around those texts: perhaps they were the same hands.

Left – metamorphosis of two of Alison Ospina’s Greenwood chairs and – right – Dee Forbes, President and Managing Director of Discovery International, formally opening the exhibition

What about Finola’s subject for today, Harry Clarke – artist or craftsman? Stained glass is not ostensibly functional (except, perhaps to change the quality of the light coming through a window) yet the making of it is a craft requiring a lengthy apprenticeship and a garnered knowledge of specific materials and their use. I have no doubts: walk into St Barrahane’s Church, Castletownshend, and be dazzled by the Clarke windows there. They are inspired: true art. Harry Clarke designed and made these windows, so he was artist and craftsman rolled into one.

book of printsArtist and printmaker Coilin Murray with The Big Book

For me West Cork Creates (part of the Taste of West Cork Food Festival) demonstrates conclusively that you can’t differentiate between art and crafts. As you enter the gallery you are immediately presented with an iconic piece – The Great West Cork  Obelisk – which stands almost three metres high. It is a collaboration between two minds and two sets of hands: Brian Lalor and Jim Turner. Brian we have met before in the pages of our blog: he is a true polymath. He writes (prolifically), he produces art (prolifically), he has been an architect and an archaeologist. Jim is a ceramic sculptor of renown. Egyptian ‘obelisks’ are commemorative monuments of the Pharaohs and they usually carry a lengthy inscription praising the deeds of some significant individual.

obelisk in context

The Great West Cork Obelisk

This one is constructed from four terracotta sections made by Jim in his Clonakilty studio and fired in a specially constructed kiln. The base inscriptions are all quotations, two from social philosophers and two from writers, all concerned with the state of society. Brian’s images derive from these, from the contemporary world and from the local environment. The artists’ statement says: Obelisks may be the new round towers of the landscape… (remember that Brian has written the standard work on Ireland’s medieval round towers). I agree: I’d love to see this work prominently displayed in a public place locally – and many more like it. The obelisk absorbed our attention for a good half an hour, delaying us from moving on to the rest of the exhibition: it’s a show stopper!

Alison Ospina and – right – one of her Greenwood stools painted by Etain Hickey 

There are chairs and stools: functional objects to be sat upon. But you’d think twice about sitting on these. They are initially examples of the work of Alison Ospina who uses coppiced hazel to make distinctive seating, but they have been transformed by others (painter, sculptor and felt maker) into works of art which will primarily be looked at and appreciated.

for sale

The gallery space includes a sales area where you can buy the work of the participating exhibitors

There are thirteen collaborations in the exhibition including stone sculptor and furniture maker; metal sculpture and photography; basketmaker and visual artist; painter and felt maker; painter and boatbuilder; cutler and jeweller, all based or working within West Cork… This is just a taster – we have to go back and catch up on the other genres and artists and perhaps write a further blog post. The exhibition runs for five weeks from 8 August to 10 September at Levis’s Quay in the centre of Skibbereen, and is open from Mondays to Saturdays between 11am and 6pm. Be sure to get there – you won’t be disappointed: watch out for the gallery talks, too.

Sculptor Helen Walsh collaborates with photographer Rohan Reilly

Once you have seen the exhibition, you might like to comment and add your contribution to the artist / craftsperson debate.

wooden sun

Hares in Abundance

exhibition poster

“And now, Sir Hare, good-day to you. God guide you to a how-d’ye-do with me…” (from the Middle English poem – Names of the Hare – translation by Seamus Heaney)

You may know that I am a Hare fanatic. Every day as I travel along through West Cork – driving, cycling or walking – I am scouring the fields and hedgerows in the hope of seeing one of these shy and elusive animals: very occasionally my watchfulness is rewarded. Last year I kept a Hare Diary… on the last day of December I counted up: I had seen only six, and two of these were in other parts of Ireland. Yet, when I first visited Ballybane West – just over the hill from here – back in the early 1990s I saw them on most days; one early morning then I looked out of the window and there was a whole luck of Hares running around the field beyond the house – at least ten of them.

felt hares

A luck of Hares by Christina Jasmin Roser, feltmaker

Where have all the Hares gone? I can’t answer that, but I can tell you that there are a whole lot of Hares in the Heron Gallery, Ahakista at the moment: Annabel Langrish and her husband, Klaus have mounted an excellent exhibition of art and craft works based around images of the Hare.

The exhibition brings together the work of several artists from the West of Ireland: paintings, drawings, feltwork, fabrics, papier mache, jewellery and ceramics. The whole makes a really attractive assemblage, but any one of the works on display – all of which are for sale – would be an elegant addition to your own art collection! I would readily bring them all here to Nead an Iolair but – as we already have numerous images of Hares around the house – Finola has put an embargo on further Hare imports (just for the moment).

Robert talking

Yours Truly was asked to say a few words about Hares at the exhibition opening: a wonderful portait of William the Hare by Sylvia Parkinson looks on

All the works in the Heron Gallery show bring out the magical qualities of this special animal. Mostly it is Lepus Timidus Hibernicus which is depicted: the Irish Hare. This belongs to the Mountain Hare species, related to Arctic Hares. Irish Hares don’t turn white in the winter but they do moult to a paler colour, and sometimes they have white patches then. There are also Brown Hares in Ireland: these were imported from Britain to add to the game stock on landlord estates from medieval times onwards.

Three ceramic Hares by Annabel Langrish, from the exhibition

Although the Irish Hare has been ‘legally protected’ since 1930 – and is listed as a protected species under EU legislation – it can be hunted under license, and Hare coursing is still permitted. This seems anomalous to me: those who support Hare coursing claim that the animals do not suffer. They are captured from the wild, caged (usually for several weeks), and released onto a course where they are chased by muzzled Greyhounds. After this they are put back into the wild. As their name would suggest (Lepidus Timidus), Hares are nervous animals and there can be little doubt that they do suffer stress through the ordeal. Many die before being released. Coursing has been banned in the UK since 2005. There have been moves to have Hares fully protected in Ireland.

The Hare’s Revenge: Dean Wolstenholme’s painting of Greyhounds coursing a Hare (right), while in the medieval woodcut (left) a Hare plays a tabor. The tabor is the forerunner of the Irish bodhran: I am reliably informed that the best skin to use for a bodhran is that of the Greyhound!

bugs_bunny_by_nightwing1975The Hare is a most ancient animal. Fossils have been found dating from Pleistocene times showing that the Hare has not changed or developed in three million years: presumably it is just so perfectly integrated to its environment. It also occupies a prime place in our own mythology. Hare is the archetypal Trickster figure in many cultures – helping to create the world, to bring fire to humans, generally being mischevious and getting into hopeless scrapes, but always coming out on top: just like Warner Brothers’ Bugs Bunny in fact – who is, of course, a Hare! Bugs (my favourite cartoon character) is loosely based on the Br’er Rabbit stories by ‘Uncle Remus’ – collected in the 1870s by Joel Chandler Harris from the oral tradition of the plantation slaves in the Southern United States. Br’er Rabbit (in America Hares are known as Jackrabbits) has his origin as a Trickster figure in African folk tradition.

I have gleaned most of my Hare lore from this much thumbed edition of The Leaping Hare by George Ewart Evans and David Thomson – published by Faber – which I acquired when it first came out in 1972. If you have an evening or three to spare I will happily regale you with tales of Hares gathered from far and wide and recorded in these pages.

pendants

Jewellery by Alison Ibbs

When I lived in Devon, on Dartmoor, I was fortunate to have around me many examples of a symbol known as The Tinners’ Rabbits. Chagford was a Stannary Town – a place where refined tin was assessed, coined, and sold and there was a story that the symbol was a badge of the tin miners. It depicts three Hares (not Rabbits) in a circle: each Hare has two ears, yet there are only three ears in total. A bit of a riddle, perhaps – but one which has been found all over the world, as a project carried out by Chris Chapman reveals. In Chagford’s medieval church (and in several others in Devon and elsewhere) there is a roof boss carved with the image.

There doesn’t seem to be any real evidence to connect the Tinners’ Rabbits symbol to the tin miners – however, there is a surviving superstition in Cornwall and in Ireland that if you meet a Hare while on your way to the mine (or, in some places, when you are going fishing) you turn around and go home!

Some of Annabel’s Hares in the exhibition (left) and (right) our own view of the Hare in the Moon seen from Nead an Iolair last week

Part of the universal folklore of Hares reminds us that it’s the Hare in the Moon we are seeing above us, not the Man in the Moon. And… I know you thought it was an Easter Bunny that brings the chocolate eggs – in fact it’s the Easter Hare! The Saxon spring festival of Ēostre celebrated a hero-Goddess who had a Hare as a companion… Well, that’s one of the many interpretations you will find of this moon-based festival.

Hare eggs and Hare ceramic by Etain Hickey

It’s not Easter now – it’s July – but you can go and see this exhibition on the Sheep’s Head for the rest of this month, and enjoy the beautiful gardens there as well. If, like me, you are a Hare fan, then don’t miss it!

Looking on