To Never Look Away – TØN Gallery Dublin/ 7-31 March 2024 – Exhibition Opening
To Never Look Away at TØN Gallery, Temple Bar, Dublin
The artists: Rachel Fallon, Joy Gerrard, Claire Halpin, Myra Jago, Paul Mac Cormaic and Amna Walayat
The poets: Fióna Bolger and Nasouh Hossari
Curated by Claire Halpin
Opening conversation with Clíodhna Shaffrey, Director Temple Bar Gallery + Studios
We had an absolutely wonderful launch of the exhibition at TØN Gallery in March, with opening conversation by Clíodhna Shaffrey responding to the exhibitions themes, subjects, forms and materials. Inviting each of the participating artists to speak briefly about their work in the exhibition. It was very moving experience for many in the packed gallery. Many of the themes evoked poignant responses and very timely as we find ourselves in a time of war raging in Palestine and racist riots on our streets….as artists questioning our role as artists to bear witness….to never look away.
It was important for me as the curator to programme a series of different events, tours and conversations to reach a wider audience. The opening night was testimony to the artists and poets and the power and resonance of the work in the exhibition, the connections between the works and the opening up of cross disciplinary dialogue.
Huge thank you to Clíodhna Shaffrey for the opening conversation, to our guest of honour, Palestinian artist Emily Jacir and to all who joined the artists and poets to launch the exhibition To Never Look Away at TØN Gallery on 7th March 2024.
To Never Look Away at TØN Gallery, 25a Temple Lane, Temple Bar, Dublin until 31 March 2024.
To Never Look Away – TØN Dublin/ 7-31 March 2024
To Never Look Away
TØN Gallery Dublin
The Artists: Rachel Fallon, Joy Gerrard, Claire Halpin, Myra Jago, Paul Mac Cormaic and Amna Walayat
The Poets: Fíona Bolger and Nasouh Hossari
Curated by Claire Halpin
Exhibition: 7th – 31st March 2024.
Exhibition Launch: Thursday 7th March 2024/ 6-8pm
Opening Conversation with Clíodhna Shaffrey, Director Temple Bar Gallery + Studios
TØN Dublin is delighted to present the exhibition To Never Look Away which brings together six artists whose work and practice are politically, socially engaged and motivated. The themes and subjects in their work spans that of protest, labour, the migrant crisis, racism and matters of war, conflict and the media.
As artists – Rachel Fallon, Joy Gerrard, Claire Halpin, Myra Jago, Paul Mac Cormaic and Amna Walayat are images makers, using their individual visual language to mediate the saturation of media images, scrolled, liked and shared that we are somewhat inured to and to try and make sense of it through what they make. There is something about the artist sitting with the work, meticulous, painstakingly painting, making, mediating on these images.
As poets – Fióna Bolger and Nasouh Hossari were invited to contribute poems that respond to the exhibition. Their selected poems as texts and translations are installed as artworks, reflecting the prescient themes of language and memory in the exhibition.
There is an onus, the role of the artist as bearing witness, testimony – I was there, I saw, I recorded. It is tasked of the artist to ask important questions of society and the world around us. And to be cognisant of the artworks they put into the world. They have to matter.
For Claire Halpin, as curator – the aesthetic and what connects each of these artists’ work and practice is their engagement, commitment in using traditional materials and means from ink on paper, oil on gesso on canvas, gold leaf to cast iron. They are makers, hands on artists immersed in the tools and materials of their craft and trade. We are drawn into their work in a way that there is a familiarity and a luring in by the beauty of the painted surface, the hand drawn detail the cast material to realise there is a deeper meaning or message to their work.
The artists – Rachel Fallon, Joy Gerrard, Claire Halpin, Myra Jago, Paul Mac Cormaic and Amna Walayat – raise questions about how we remember the past; choose to record history – the veracity of painting, photography, and the media in documenting future history and the role of art and artists as bearing witness…to never look away.
“The trouble is that once you see it, you can’t unsee it. And once you’ve seen it, keeping quiet and saying nothing, becomes as political an act as speaking out. There’s no innocence. Either way, you’re accountable.” Arundhati Roy, Power Politics, South End Press, 2001.
Further information and images available on request.
TØN DUBLIN
25a Temple Lane South, Dublin 2, Ireland
www.tondublin.com tondublin@gmail.com @tondublin
Claire Halpin
Selected Curator for DLR CoCo/ OPW Collection Exhibition at DLR LexIcon
I am delighted to have been selected as Curator for DLR CoCo/ OPW Collection exhibition at dlr Lexicon Municipal Gallery. Over the next few months I will be working with a group of older people from Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County to select and curate artworks from the OPW collection for an exhibition in the Municipal Gallery at dlr LexIcon in November 2015.
The project is open to any older person from the County who has an interest in finding out more about the visual arts (painting, drawing, sculpture).
If you are interested in taking part in this project
please email mdavey@dlrcoco.ie or phone (01) 236 2756 for further details.
This project is a partnership between dlr Arts Office and the OPW
Further information: http://www.dlrcoco.ie/arts/
Claire Halpin Artist 