solo show

RDH: SEPTEMBER 2020

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01/09/20

Power is out.

02/09/20

The Rashomon Effect: When the same event is described in significantly different and often contradictory ways by people who were involved.

03/09/20

I do feel a little stuck with the Crimean Painting. Some sketchbook work - get back to the drawing board.

06/09/20

Death Masks: bottling the soul, bottling the trauma.

08/09/20

Very strange few days. ‘Taking Orders’ painting - just not sure where to go with it. Leaving it aside for now and having a look at adding a recent sketch and incorporating it into an old abandoned piece. The only good thing I can see in the failed ‘St. Lurach’s’ work is that weeping willow to the left. It should stay in some capacity.

Very lethargic for some reason.

Thoughts = NOT A REALIST PAINTER!!!

Lifelike/ reality isn’t what I’m aiming for in drawing or painting. Yes, sometimes a more realistic application or approach is required depending on what the image dictates. EG: ‘GO’K’ works in that it hints at realism but ultimately leaves the majority of the portrait minimal - barely any detail. This is not just limited to composition, but especially colour I think.

10/09/20

Belfast bound.

So good to get to the MAC for the degree shows from the Belfast School of Art.

‘Confessional’ reopening was great! It’s a show I’m very proud of.

12/09/20

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Some good progress on ‘The Voyage Home’. Less is more - even on this scale I think. Suits the image and composition well.

13/09/20

Finished!

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15/09/20

Halfway through September! HOW?!?!

Figuring out ideas for next steps and possibilities. Good to get some sketching done tonight. Forgot how accessible sketching smaller than A4 is.

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18/09/20

‘The Week in Art’ podcast.

Guston and de Kooning - both developed making works with a ‘formula’ able to commercialise work / work that could be made in their sleep and sell no problem. Both rejected this formula and started again.

Integrity.

‘Elizabeth’ and ‘Mary Ann’ studies - the looser the better.

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20/09/20

Detail of ‘Elizabeth Study’ - work in progress

Detail of ‘Elizabeth Study’ - work in progress

I think I’m coming close to a mini burn out as far as studio work is concerned. Might be good to take a step back, read and research for a few days and see where we are.

22/09/20

Finished the little portrait studies. Really different approach but that’s no bad thing. Started some new canvases.

“Art is a wound turned into light.”

Georges Braque

‘Elizabeth Study’ and ‘Mary Ann Study’

‘Elizabeth Study’ and ‘Mary Ann Study’

23/09/20

Research - that’s about it.

24/09/20

Some good progress in the studio today.

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25/09/20

Got scared very easily.

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Sketchbook work.

26/09/20

Five canvases on the go at the minute. Best to focus on one or two at a time. First up., ‘Waiting Room’. It’s been a while from I attempted this image.

Seats / Symbols?

‘The Waiting Room’ - detail

‘The Waiting Room’ - detail

27/09/20

What was light at the end of the tunnel has turned into a dark abyss. Shrug it off and keep going.

28/09/20

Sketching

29/09/20

So the past few days have seen a real drop in productivity and drive. Reasons or not —> focusing on work will help. Taking a mini break will also help. Easy to fall into old, procrastinating habits.

Meaty questions.

30/09/20

Studio all clean and tidy!

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RDH: MARCH 2020

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01/03/20

Focus turns to show opening.

03/03/20

Spend a little time looking and you might find a way in. Now at that limbo stage with “No Remorse”. Compositionally solid but colours and painterly gestures are off.

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Surprising bound forward on “Self Portrait with Sketchbook”. Face is mask-like (maybe a good thing?)

05/03/20

Nervous as hell. First stop - Ursula Burke in the Ulster Museum. Wonderful scope and the wall mural is stunning. A quick jaunt into town - in GT’s “Dissolving Histories” I especially liked Stuart Calvin’s work. Great to see Dougal McKenzie’s project space show “More Bad News”. Beautiful little touches.

Next onto the MAC for Mark Garry’s “Songs and the Soil”. Placed over the three galleries, the work is immersive and stunning.

Helped with the last little touches to the show prep. Great turnout for Late Night Art and the feedback has knocked me back - in the best possible way. Really not good at taking compliments. Marcus Keeley came by for a chat in the store room for his “Instant Feedback” podcast.

06/03/20

Wee stay with Jane. A beautiful house and a beautiful soul. Finally got to visit QSS for “Four Female Painters” exhibition. Amazing space and great work. Alana Barton’s piece “Blossom” made me cry and not even ashamed to say it. It struck a nerve. The delicacy of the child’s little fingers touching the adult’s hair. Beautifully painted.

Took myself back to re-watch Mark Garry’s videos in the MAC. The close up recordings of the horses is haunting and strangely intimate.

08/03/20

Few days off but little updates online here and there.

11/03/20

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Sketchbook work

14/03/20

Scary times. Back to the looking phase. It seems to help.

Les Yeux sans visage

Self Portrait: face is still very mask-like. Reminds me of a still from “Les yeux sans visage”.

…knowing when to quit for the day is important.

15/03/20

Slow burning day but when I eventually got to studio and began making real progress, the power goes off!

Serves me right for getting ahead of myself.

“No Remorse” in progress

“No Remorse” in progress

16/03/20

The “In Conversation” that was to take place with the show in Atypical has rightly been postponed due to ongoing circumstances.

18/03/20

Have to self-isolate for 14 days. The worries mount.

22/03/20

Sketchbook work for the first time in 11 days. Feels like a lifetime.

Is there a better, more cohesive way to go about the drawing side of practice?

I think immediacy, or the notion of immediacy, is still important.

24/03/20

Transferred some recent drawings to acetate.

STEP UP!

25/03/20

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Studio time with Radiohead.

26/03/20

A bit of sketching but mainly organising imagery.

“There’s no point in worryin’ what ye can’t control.”

BAK

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“No Remorse” is finished. There are parts that still annoy but all in all pleased to it’s best to leave it and move on.

28/03/20

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Pushing and pulling with “Self Portrait with Sketchbook”. Frustrating but really fun at the same time!

29/03/20

Cleaning palette and studio up. Also stripped the background of “SPwS”. Too similar to the skin tones and made the canvas seem quite flat.

30/03/20

So bloody close!

31/03/20

Last day of quarantine.

Great to take part in the VAI online café and to get an insight into Tinka Bechert’s wonderful work.

“SPwS” finished. It is very wonky as it’s taken from a very wonky sketch from a few years ago but there’s something about the sketch that made me want to try and develop it into a painting for quite some time.

RDH: FEBRUARY 2020

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01/02/20

Detail of “Self-Portrait with Sketchbook” - painting in progress

Detail of “Self-Portrait with Sketchbook” - painting in progress

Right, get paint down! Started two little pieces today and “The Crown of Dionysus” is complete"!

“The Crown of Dionysus” on my very dirty studio wall.

“The Crown of Dionysus” on my very dirty studio wall.

02/02/20

The last palindrome day for another 111 years. Damn rugby is distracting!

“No Remorse” - background building up.

“No Remorse” - background building up.

03/02/20

Parcel.

06/02/20

“Religion decays, the icon remains; a narrative is forgotten, yet its representation still magnetises (the ignorant eye triumphs - how galling for the informed eye).”

Julian Barnes - ‘Géricault: Catastrophe into Art’

“No sooner do we come into this world, than bits of us start to fall off.”

Gustave Flaubert

09/02/20

Detail of body - “No Remorse”

Detail of body - “No Remorse”

Using storm Ciara to aid in the drying process.

10/02/20

Submission started.

Mobile installation?

11/02/20

…might be a little out there. Will sit on it for a while.

“Laziness is a sign of mediocrity.”

Voltaire

15/02/20

Visit by Jane and Hugh.

Victim / Perpetrator / Both

linking current work.

17/02/20

All pieces are wrapped and ready to go.

21/02/20

Slight change of plan.

23/02/20

Sketchbook work tonight.

Sketchbook work tonight.

25/02/20

Nerves are shredded already!

26/02/20

Work is on its way.

27/02/20

Well that’s it! Install complete I’m really happy with the exhibition and now it’s a waiting game for the opening.

29/02/20

Louis Fratino on Talk Art podcast.

Repeating motifs. mem: Like that odd shoulder loop that happens in drawings and then translates to paintings.

Made good progress in some areas of “Remorse” (bodies) but mostly have over painted to the point where I can’t put anything else down. Better to walk away now and go again another day than to push it over the edge today. Have reintroduced some rough drawing elements into the background.

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2019 in Photos

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JANUARY

FEBRUARY

MARCH

APRIL

MAY

JUNE

JULY

AUGUST

SEPTEMBER

OCTOBER

NOVEMBER

DECEMBER

Exhibition Highlights 2019

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Here are five of my favourite exhibitions I’ve attended this year. I’ve struggled to omit some exceptional shows for this list, namely Christopher James Burns’ ‘Limbo Land’ and the Golden Thread Gallery’s ‘Noise of Silence: Japanese Art Now’.

The list below is in chronological order.

Porous Plane

Lennon

Golden Thread Gallery - 02/02/19 - 23/03/19

Lennon’s first solo exhibition in Belfast in twenty years saw the Golden Thread Gallery’s two spaces and connecting passage utilised to the full. The following is from the exhibition text:

Come and stand in front of artworks that are larger than you. Make time to fill your field of vision with Lennon’s innovation of ‘non image’ art, an art form he has dedicated his life to developing through rigorous research and experimentation since the 1970’s.

….

While the work has complex origins, no knowledge is required to enjoy the beauty of these paintings. Lennon’s paintings invites each of us to find ourselves and arrive at our own conclusions, from our individual viewpoints. For Lennon the “subject is always: how does it feel to be alive now knowing what we know”.

“PECHE MERLE FUGUE/AL13 MMVII x composite 2018” acrylic paint on aluminium, 14’6” high x 30’ wide approx.

“PECHE MERLE FUGUE/AL13 MMVII x composite 2018” acrylic paint on aluminium, 14’6” high x 30’ wide approx.

While painting on aluminium isn’t new, the layout and interconnection of the works was a first for me and truly breathtaking. Like Rothko’s notion of taking up the complete field of vision, it was a joy to get up close to these works and just be there as the artist intended. The paint looked as if it was almost scratched on and the colours shimmered on the metal and beside each other. There were also smaller monochrome works which helped you not to overload on colour and gave the eyes a breather between the larger installations.

Detail of Lennon’s painting in “Porous Plane” in the Golden Thread Gallery.

Detail of Lennon’s painting in “Porous Plane” in the Golden Thread Gallery.

Fragmented

Aimee Melaugh

An tSeaneaglais - The Glassworks, Derry - 28/03/19 - 10/04/19

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In a former 19th Century Georgian Church beside the Cultúrlann Uí Chanáin in Derry’s Great James Street - is the Glassworks - the stage for Aimee Melaugh’s first solo exhibition. This was the first time I had seen her work outside of the degree show in the Belfast School of Art. I’m an admirer of Melaugh’s use of painterly technique to conjure a sense of mood in her work and the stunning venue seemed to heighten this tenfold.

The work is a collective exploration of traumatic events which have taken place throughout history but there are also personal elements thrown into the mix with references of the her grandfather’s experience in the Second World War. This method of working is in line to where my own practice lies (why I may have a soft spot for it) but where we differ is in Melaugh’s beautifully rendered elements of realism mixed with stencilled numbers / dates that fire the imagination of the viewer - a kaleidoscopic narrative emerging from the coloured haze.

“Fighters Mix It Above “ by Aimee Melaugh - 38cm x 42cm

“Fighters Mix It Above “ by Aimee Melaugh - 38cm x 42cm

The C C Land Exhibition

Pierre Bonnard: The Colour of Memory

Tate Modern - 23/01/19 - 06/05/19

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To get to see one Bonnard would have been great enough but to get thirteen rooms filled with works was almost a sensory overload! While navigating the exhibition it occurred to me how blessed we are in NI to have time and space with the work we go to interact with. I went in the midway point of the show’s run and it was next to impossible to not say ‘sorry’ while bumping into other viewers who were also bumbling their way through the crowd.

“The Studio with Mimosa” Pierre Bonnard 1939-1946 Oil on Canvas

“The Studio with Mimosa” Pierre Bonnard 1939-1946 Oil on Canvas

Hung in more or less in chronological order, Bonnard’s subject was continuously shifted among topics of everyday life but what remained was the stunning innovational use of colour, forcing colours together that would not normally be seen in proximity to create beautiful iridescence on canvas.

Working a lot from memory gives the work a non realistic and dreamlike quality to the compositions. Even the self portrait titled “The Boxer”, which would normally be a study from a mirror has links to being worked from memory. Fighting the throng across this exhibition was definitely worth it.

“The Boxer” Pierre Bonnard 1931 Oil on Canvas

“The Boxer” Pierre Bonnard 1931 Oil on Canvas

“The presence of the object … is a hindrance for the painter when he is painting.”

Pierre Bonnard

Acts of Mourning

Doris Salcedo

IMMA - 24/04/19 - 21/07/19

“Plegaria Muda” by Doris Salcedo

“Plegaria Muda” by Doris Salcedo

Going to see this show, I was ill prepared. The first work that greets you is “Plegaria Muda” - an installation focussed on the loss of innocent life during civil war and it didn’t take long before I broke into tears. A few days prior the journalist Lyra McKee was shot and killed during unrest in Derry. I had met Lyra a few times and she was destined to be a voice of tolerance and reason in a divided part of the world. Blades of grass find ways to penetrate each upended table; life inevitably goes on and hope is still present.

Detail of “Plegaria Muda” by Doris Salcedo

Detail of “Plegaria Muda” by Doris Salcedo

“Plegaria Muda” is the first of six bodies of work by Salcedo strewn across the wing of IMMA. “Atrabiliarios” contains female shoes encased in the walls behind preserved animal fibre. You can see the remains of the human but it is blurred and out of reach. This work reflected on the cruel treatment of female victims in Columbia where shoes were relied upon to identify remains. I was struck by the personal connection with Salcedo’s work throughout all the projects included here. The empathy with victims of trauma and violence is universal and made for an emotional reflection on loss and remembrance.

“Atrabiliarios” by Doris Salcedo

“Atrabiliarios” by Doris Salcedo

On Refusal: Representation and Resistance in Contemporary American Art

The MAC - 25/10/19 - 19/01/20

From the exhibition text:

On Refusal brings together the works of Paul Stephen Benjamin, Elliot Jerome Brown Jr., Aria Dean, Troy Michie, Arcmanoro Niles and Sable Elyse Smith to explore a notable (re)turn to figuration in the practices of a generation of artists currently working out of the United States, and to investigate the political impetus for this (re)investment in the body and notions of embodiment as a subject of art in the context of contemporary America; an increasingly nationalistic and conservative terrain, in which certain bodies are privileged and protected, while others (those of black, brown, queer and other minority peoples) have been made more vulnerable than ever.

“Ojitos” Troy Michie 2018

“Ojitos” Troy Michie 2018

This is a thought provoking exhibition bringing together exciting artists form America to the MAC for the first time. There is a huge political pulse in this show and for good reason. With governance in NI at a three year standstill, Brexit looming ever closer and the choice to ignore or abuse human rights as political collateral . The UK government has thankfully now brought marriage equality and abortion rights into line with the rest of these islands since the exhibition’s opening but the reality of the topics covered in the works of these artists still remain.

What if?

“Out of Sight, Out of Mind” Troy Michie 2018

“Out of Sight, Out of Mind” Troy Michie 2018

What if there was another way to see ourselves? Troy Michie’s photographic collages are powerful works in this context. In “Ojitos” (‘little eyes’ in Spanish) we are looked upon but theres a hint at a duality in the figure that is concealed in the figure’s identity - the same arm and eye repeated twice as to not give anything away. There is a real power in the use of ambiguity in Michie’s work. In the larger and more complex “Out of Sight, Out of Mind” multiple images interconnect and dissect each other, figures of varying scales push forward for dominance in the composition. Colour is used well to highlight areas of the picture but you get the feeling that the need to be seen clearly is falling on blind eyes. Michie’s figures hide in plain sight and are isolated in the open. The ‘resistance’ here could be that they will not go away.

"When We Played as Kids" Arcmanoro Niles Oil, Acrylic and Glitter on Canvas 2016

"When We Played as Kids" Arcmanoro Niles Oil, Acrylic and Glitter on Canvas 2016

The large paintings of Arcmanoro Niles are colourful and heartfelt testaments to his childhood growing up in Washington DC. Faces are beautifully rendered in the surreal surroundings but there is always a hint of violence in the form of a little gremlin-like figure either hiding just around a corner or at the bottom of the canvas wielding a knife. The notion of the national image is not always far away but is far from the truth.

In a corner of the Tall Gallery is Paul Stephen Benjamin’s video piece “God Bless America”. Multiple screens with alternating red and blue lights surround a looped and edited recording of Aretha Franklin singing “God Bless America, My Home Sweet Home” for Jimmy Carter’s inauguration in 1977. Notions of black patriotism, American political ideology and the ongoing black lives matter movement ring loud and are beautifully tense when positioned close in Benjamin’s work. The space almost became like a place of worship in the rhythmic repetitions of Franklin’s audio.

Where all the work in this group show didn’t strike a chord with me, it was the works of Benjamin, Michie and Niles that made me come back twice more and I hope to visit again before the show comes down in January 2020.