UPCOMING
29 August – 21 September 2024
Thursday 29 August, 5.30-7.30pm. Opening reception with special guest Louis Mulcahy, ceramic sculptor, potter and poet
Saturday 14 September, 3pm: Meet the artists (tea served), followed by Movement performance by Haru (Kanako Nakajima) with live sound accompaniment by Harry Moore.
Cork-based artists Deirdre Frost and Seiko Hayase collaborate in producing a cross-cultural exhibition Civilisation Blooming / 文明開花, a project that will see the two artists venture into new media and establish a synergistic practice.
文明開花 means ‘civilisation’ in Japanese and is written using characters that mean ‘blooming culture’. ‘Bloom’ can be considered a positive, when something has flowered, is in its prime or at its peak. However, an algal bloom for example can be considered a negative event, a sign of ecological imbalance. Looking at the idea of peak humanity in this Anthropocene age, with the potential collapse of multiple organisational systems looming globally, the artists consider the idea of civilisation blooming.
Hayase looks at this through the lens of addictive behaviours, and considers how much of our world functions by exploiting human addictive tendencies. This is evident in social media, advertising, the types of food, drink and other substances and lifestyles that are marketed to us. Through sculpture, the artist has produced a large-scale work consisting of constant slow drips of water from sculptured brains, with this liquid interacting with salt and blooming as crystals.
Frost’s new body of work includes ceramic sculptural vessels developed and made at Louis Mulcahy Pottery on the Dingle Peninsula. These pots are reminiscent of vessels of past civilisations that held contents that were valued. These pots have been opened up and painted in oil paint on their insides. By depicting a range of scenes of flora based on themes of play, nourishment and research/work on the interior of these pots Frost signifies the value of this flora. The misshapen, tilting and functionless form of these vessels highlight our current civilisation’s fragility in the face of climate change and biodiversity loss. The buildings in Frost’s new 2D paintings draw on a palette of nudes – soft pinks, tans and browns to point to the human inhabitants of these manmade spaces. The crisis facing humanity is shown through this skin colouring found amid the collapsing buildings and beautiful wild plants that burst forth.
A key part of this collaborative project is a stop motion animation piece, Civilisation (3:53), that further develops the narrative element in the artist’s 2D and 3D works through collaborative storyboard development. Set in a world reminiscent of Frost’s paintings, Hayase’s brain character navigates a collapsing world that draws on Hayase’s use of horror and humour as characteristic agents of her work, along with Frost’s evocative scenes of beauty and collapse in the human environment.
Deirdre Frost holds a BA (Hons) in Fine Art from MTU Crawford College of Art & Design (2020) and spent part of her studies on Erasmus in the University of Art & Design, Cluj-Napoca, Romania. She is currently supported by a Cork City Council Individual Artist Bursary 2024 and was recently awarded Arts Council Agility Award 2024. Her work is represented in the collections of UCC Glucksman, OPW State Art Collection, Dublin City University and Cork City Council. Frost was artist-in-residence for Kilkenny Arts Festival 50 year anniversary with solo exhibition Big Crush (2023). Her work was included in Generation 2022: New Irish Painting, Butler Gallery, Kilkenny (2022). Graduate awards included Lavit Gallery Student of the Year, MTU CCAD Class of 2020 Valerie Gleeson Development Bursary, the Joan Clancy Gallery Solo Exhibition Award, Sample Studios Residency Studio Award, Backwater Artists Group Ciarán Langford Memorial Bursary and MTU CCAD Graduate Residency Award. Commission projects include ‘Your Collection, Your Choice’ DCU, Glasnevin (2022) and ‘Memory of Place’, Glucksman, UCC in collaboration with Cork City Partnership (2022). Upcoming solo exhibitions in 2025 include Kevin Kavanagh gallery, Dublin, and Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA), Waterford.
Seiko Hayase was born in Shiga, Japan and is now based in Mallow, Co. Cork since 2018. She holds BA and MA in Fine Art Oil Painting from Nagoya University of Arts, Japan (2011, 2013). She works with painting, sculpture and installation and collaborative socially engaged projects. Studio: Sample-Studios, Cork (June 2020 – Present), National Sculpture Factory, Cork (Feb – May 2022), Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre, Skibbereen, Residency Studio 3 (1st March to 26th March 2022). She has volunteered with Cork Community Art Link (February 2020) and Helium Arts (Assistant Artist 2022). Exhibitions include Cork Midsummer Festival (2023), K- FEST Killorglin, Co. Kerry (2023), Solo exhibition with Sample-Studios in The Lord Mayor’s Pavilion (2023). Awards include Cork County Council Creative Artists Bursary Scheme (2023), Visual Arts Bursary Arts Council Ireland (2021), The Radical Institute at Studios of Sanctuary Programme : Support (2021), The Department of Culture, Cork County Council and LLPPS scheme for Creepy Parade with Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre (2021), Arts Council Professional Development Award : Support (2021), Carlow Arts Festival – Wedge Funds Micro-bursary : Support (2021), Arts Council Agility Award Round1: Support for Creepy Parade (2021) Upcoming solo exhibitions include LHQ gallery, Cork (November 2024), Rua Red, Dublin (2024), Ballina Arts Centre, Co. Mayo (2025). Past exhibitions include Rua Red’s ‘Displacement and Belonging’– Home.’, Dublin (2023), “Tonnta/Wave” members exhibition Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre (2023), Creepy Parade, Trash Culture Revue at KINO, Cork (2022), Creepy Parade, Macroom Food Festival, partner Cork Circus Factory (2022), Solo exhibition “Unnatural Ordinary”, CSN Coláiste Stiofáin Naofa, Cork (2022), Group exhibition Re:Group ‘Fragments In Constellation’, Skibbereen (2022), K-FEST Killorglin, Co. Kerry (2022), World In Between: Solo exhibition with GOMA gallery, Waterford (2022), K-FEST Killorglin, Co. Kerry (2021),”Creepy Parade” collaborative street performance, Opening celemony of Skibbereen Arts Festival (2021), Annual Members’ Exhibition, Lavit Gallery, Cork (2021), Cahoots – The Space Between Curated by Nicola Anthony, Sample-Studios TACTIC Visual Arts Programme (2020-2021), Sample-Studios winter’s members show (2021), All In! – Catalyst Arts members exhibition – Online, Belfast (2021), Annual Members’ Exhibition, Lavit Gallery, Cork (2020).
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