The Creative Well: This Must Be The Place
The Creative Well arts and well-being project is delighted to announce it will be in residency with This Must Be the Place at Riverbank Arts Centre throughout 2017.
The Creative Well and Riverbank Arts Centre will open the McKenna Gallery to explore the permeable nature of the gallery as a space and place for making, discussion, encountering and exhibition.
The Creative Well visual arts programme of work aims to build and support well-being and rich life experiences by encouraging adults to engage with their creativity through visual art. In a friendly social space, we welcome people with all levels of abilities and life experiences, providing opportunities for everyone from complete beginners, to practicing artists and all in between!
In 2017 the McKenna art gallery at Riverbank Arts Centre will be utilised not only as a place to see wonderful artworks but also a place where people can engage with their own creativity directly through a series of visual art workshops and artists talks open to all. We will also offer a series of opportunities for practicing artists to develop their work by using the gallery as a studio space for short periods in 2017. Building on our successful curatorial project last year we will also work with a number of local organisations to select contemporary artworks for showing in the McKenna gallery.
The Creative Well open studio will continue throughout 2017 providing space on an ongoing basis for individuals to develop their own arts practice and a specific project. Open studio participants have been working with the Creative Well for a number of years however spaces are available for further participants in 2017.
To enquire about the open studio contact:
Carolann Courtney thecreativewellkildare@gmail.com or Phone: 0831709589
Riverbank Box Office boxoffice@riverbank.ie or 045 448327
Programme of work 2017
WORKSHOPS
LIFE DRAWING WORKSHOPS – This Must Be the Place for Trying
September – November: Facilitated Life Drawing Workshops
Schedule:
Day: Saturday
Dates:16th / 23rd / 30th SEPTEMBER
Time: 11.00am – 1.00pm
Day: Monday
Dates: 9th/26th/23rd October
Time: 7.30pm – 9.00pm
We have limited space and booking in advance is essential.
To book: Riverbank Box Office at boxoffice@riverbank.ie or 045 448327
Pricing: €50 for 6 sessions / €30 for 3 sessions / €15 per workshop.
These facilitated workshops will offer you a chance to draw from live models in different spaces in the arts centre. This will be a unique opportunity to learn a new process, refresh your technique and get experience of anatomical drawing. A schedule of models and facilitators will be announced in August so stay tuned!
For queries: Carolann Courtney (Arts and Wellbeing Specialist for Co. Kildare) at thecreativewellkildare@gmail.com or 083 1709589
SHARED OPEN STUDIO
SHARED OPEN STUDIO – This Must Be the Place for Making
The Creative Well Shared Open Studio is an inclusive, shared and supportive space at the Riverbank Arts Centre for adults interested in visual art.
At weekly Shared Open Studio sessions, participants are supported to follow their own creative journey by engaging in the visual art activities that interest them most and working in whatever experimental ways they wish. An experienced facilitator is on hand to offer encouragement and some new skills.
Attending the Open Studio are complete beginners, practising artists and those in the middle. We invite you to book a session in the studio. We cater for people of all abilities and mobilities!
This is an open and ongoing visual arts project that allows all participants to attend when their schedule allows.
Come along for a taster session and meet the facilitator’s Dominic Thorpe and Emma Finucane to see what it is all about.
Dates for 2017
Monday 11th September – 16th October (Block 1)
Monday 6th November – 11th December (Block 2)
*Please note we will be closed on public & bank holidays and for school midterm and holidays.
Booking essential
The Creative Well Shared Open Studio is an inclusive, shared and supportive space at the Riverbank Arts Centre for adults interested in visual art.
At weekly Shared Open Studio sessions, participants are supported to follow their own creative journey by engaging in the visual art activities that interest them most and working in whatever experimental ways they wish. An experienced facilitator is on hand to offer encouragement and some new skills.
Attending the Open Studio are complete beginners, practising artists and those in the middle. We invite you to book a session in the studio. We cater for people of all abilities and mobilities!
This is an open and ongoing visual arts project that allows all participants to attend when their schedule allows.
Come along for a taster session and meet artist Emma Finucane to see what it is all about.
At the moment there is no cost to attend these sessions.
You must be over 18 years old to attend the workshops.
Contact Carolann Courtney, Kildare’s Arts and Wellbeing Coordinator for more details: thecreativewellkildare@gmail.com or 083 1709589
To reserve your space: Riverbank Box Office at boxoffice@riverbank.ie or 045 448327
ARTIST LECTURE SERIES – This Must Be the Place for Talking
Monica de Bath
Thursday September 14th 8.00pm – 9.00pm – Artist Talk with Monica de Bath
Artist Bio
Monica de Bath lives and works between the Bog of Allen and the Gaeltacht,
Ireland. A Fine Arts graduate of the National College of Art and Design
Dublin, she has an M.A. in Visual Arts Practices from Institute of Art,
Design and Technology, Dun Laoghaire. Her ongoing project PLOT / CEAPACH operates within sites of ecological tension. PLOT has been presented to:
Nordic Irish Studies Network, Tromso Norway; ‘Molkfabryk Arts Space’ Fryslan, Netherlands, Collective Contemporary Art, Dublin; Solo Shows;
Ground Up Artists Collective. The current phase in the PLOT series
investigates diverse engagements between ecology and arts practice related
to land use. She has received awards from the Arts Council of Ireland,
Kildare County Council, Laois County Council, and from Molkfabryk Arts Space’ Netherlands.
PLOT / CEAPACH frames a series of work that explores peoples’ relationship
with land, with sea, with each other and with the urgent need to make a
living at critical and contested sites. Such sites include the Bog of
Allen, the Atlantic Blanket Bog, and coastal areas in the West of Ireland.
Painting acts as a ‘thinking’ space where traces of diverse views are
pulled together; it can establish a position from which to look at things
differently. Echoing the ‘contrapuntal thinking’ of Edward Said, PLOT
attempts to reveal the many distinct voices around each Site of Tension.
Since 2006 de Bath has had a temporary studio within Ballydermot Works, an
industrial peat excavation site on the Bog of Allen – by 2009 she had got
access to a plot of partial cutaway where thirty blueberry bushes were
planted and still grow amongst the bracken. This site action brought her
into contact with Dr. Catherine Farrell, who at the time was developing
Bord na Móna’s first Biodiversity Action Plan. PLOT then moved west to
explore acts of land rehabilitation. Here, the return of a miniscule plant
to a vast area of cutaway was the lens through which she thought / painted
and conversed with a fragile space in the west of Ireland. PLOT now moves
between the seaweed on the west coast and the piles of woodchip and palm
oil kernal back on the bog of Allen.
More information can be found at: http://monicadebath.wix.com/monicadebath
These talks are free but booking is essential: Riverbank Box Office at boxoffice@riverbank.ie or 045 448327
Marta Golubowska
Thursday October 19th 8.00pm – 9.00pm – Artist Talk with 2017 Emerging Artist Marta Golubowska
Artist Bio:
Marta Golubowska is originally from Poland. She has arrived to Ireland 10 years ago and settled down in Kildare Town where she lives with her husband and two children.
Marta started her artistic education as early as secondary school which was art profiled, from which she progressed into Academy of Fine Arts in Gdansk, in Poland. She received her Master’s Degree majoring in Sculpture in 2006.
Marta exhibited her paintings in Kildare and Dublin and before she came to Ireland she had showed her works in Poland.
In 2016 she received the prestigious Emerging Artist Award from Kildare County Council, for work ‘Be-longing’ about growing roots and looking for identity in a foreign country. This becomes her first solo show in Riverbank Art Centre in Newbridge in Autumn 2017.
Apart from making her own art, Marta always enjoyed sharing her passion for arts with people of every age. She believes that everybody can think creatively and they can experience art on a rewarding level at any stage of their live. She also believes that everyone should have an access to participation in arts. She works facilitating arts workshops within the community arts practise, within the school settings, and on various arts panels.
The artist has said:
“Moving to Ireland in 2006 began my adult life. Being only recently graduated from college, I completely under-estimated the cultural aspect of leaving my own country, language, and heritage. After ten years of living in Ireland I no longer know where my home is. Searching for a cultural identity and a sense of belonging began to influence my art.
The inspiration for my artwork comes from the feelings of alienation and isolation that I have experienced as a result of moving away from the country of my birth. It is an exploration of the everyday experience of building a new identity and putting down roots in a country, language and culture that is unfamiliar and foreign to me.
I am particularly interested in the links between identity and people’s homes, their community and their language and how the boundaries of identity are altered when your affiliation with these fundamental elements is fractured.
My artwork is primarily collaborative and involves shared experiences with the people around me. This is not an accident, rather it is fundamental to my work as the act of creating my art is simultaneously an attempt to create a space for myself within my new social and cultural context”
Jennie Moran
Thursday November 23rd 8.00pm – 9.00pm – Artist Talk with Jennie Moran
Jennie Moran is a Dublin based artist who uses her practice to create opportunities for hospitality.
She has gathered knowledge through a degree in sculpture at the National College of Art and Design; international residencies at NES Iceland, Fondazione Ratti, Italy and Galleria Blanda, Buenos Aires. Her projects have been facilitated by Dublin City Council Art Bursary, Arts Council Project Award, Artist in the Community Award, Engaging with Architecture Award and a Visual Art Bursary.
Jennie Moran uses a subtle, tactical approach to respond to situations. She thinks about generosity and timing. Her work is an attempt to dismantle places into their basic the components and reassemble them so that they might function more poetically. It is usually light-hearted and energetic. Recently, however she has been considering the split second of despondency in this process, between the action of recognising unfortunate barren gaps in places, and filling them courageously. These gaps might be defined as absence of hospitality or ‘places in which one can no longer believe in anything’1; where stories are not allowed to accumulate. Before the sharp intake of breath that means we are ready to be strong, there is a poignant moment of sadness. Her practice is an illumination of this human frailty/vulnerability alongside a brave unyielding will to make better.
1 Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life, University Press, 1988, ppxii
IMAGE INFO:
So tired of all the darkness in our lives*
Giddy with despair, solo exhibition
Galway Arts Centre, 2011/12
Lighting installation occupying various rooms throughout the building
Vessels, 0.75 3 core flex, 15 watt incandescent bulbs, brass lamp holders, dimmer switches
Images courtesy of Tom Flanagan
* from Steppin Out, a song written by Joe Jackson, 1982, listen here
Throughout 2017 The Creative Well will continue to present artist talks free of charge and open to the public in The McKenna Gallery at Riverbank Arts Centre.
Our artist talks will be tailored to people who are new to contemporary art as well as those who have experience with contemporary art. So treat yourself! It is always enjoyable and rewarding to listen to an artist talk about their artwork, the art process they engage with and their thinking about art. These talks are planned to last for an hour with time for discussion at the end.
These talks are free but booking is essential: Riverbank Box Office at boxoffice@riverbank.ie or 045 448327
Curatorial / Exhibition Programme – This Must Be the Place for Leading
Continuing our successful curatorial programme, we will offer more new adventures in visual art in Kildare, bringing together participants from a number of organisations to curate a contemporary Irish art exhibition in their own locality.
1
Second Harvest
An exhibition of Irish Artists, curated by Newbridge Local History Group
Friday 25th August – Thursday 15th September
Opening of Exhibition with selected artists and the local history group curatorial team on Friday 28th at 7.30pm at the McKenna Gallery.
SECOND HARVEST
An exhibition of Kildare artists inspired by the Peat land Landscape.
Featuring the work of Monica de Bath, Pamela de Bri, Fiona Marron, Annette McCormack, Eileen Keane, Eamonn Keenan, Brian O’Loughlin and Conor Lane.
Curated by members of Newbridge Local History Group.
Part of the Creative Well’s ‘This must be the place’ residency at Riverbank Arts Centre.
Peat lands are a significant and unique component of the environment of Ireland, and they have played a major role in the development of our art, our culture and our customs. Peat lands are places of solitude, reflection and retreat; places of sanctuary for endangered ecosystems; and places of employment.
This exhibition attempts to offer the community a “Second Harvest” from peat lands. An Artistic Harvest. The “Harvest” is presented in a variety of forms and media, as each artist has uniquely interpreted different aspects of peat lands, seeing them as a raw material, as a workplace, as a landscape, and as an inspiration.
2
Emerging Artist
Marta Golubowska
Be-Longing
Friday 22nd September – Wednesday 25th October
Opening of Exhibition on Friday 22nd at 7.30pm at the McKenna Gallery.
“Born in Poland, after 10 years of living in Ireland I don’t know where my home is. Be-Longing is the search for grounding and identification with this place”
The artist has made 144 ceramic houses reflecting the housing estate she lives in. She asked her neighbours-friends to glaze the ones that they inhabit. Together they created a visual map of the artists’ connections to the place through her relationship with the people around her. The artist has made a video of the process of glazing. This became the process of building a bond.
The artist also asked participants what life circumstances brought them to this place? What they think about this place? How long are they planning on staying at the estate? These interviews have been documented throughout the project allowing for a deeper insight into people’s stories.
Golubowska finds the design of new estates amusing visually. Her estate contains 144 identical houses. The repetitiveness that she experiences everyday became a reason for multiplication in her work. She designed a set of wallpapers with the front of the house as a main motif. Each of these breaks the pattern in some way fighting this visual boredom. The length of this wallpaper is exactly the same as the height of the walls inside the houses of the estate.
Artist Incubation Space
INCUBATION SPACE Part II – OPEN CALL
This Must Be the Place – (For Thinking) Artist Incubation Space
Tuesday November 7th – Friday December 15th
After our successful offering of studio space to artists this summer we are delighted to announce a Winter Incubation Space period to close our 2017 programme.
Do you need more space to develop your artwork? We are offering Kildare based artists or artists originally from Kildare with all levels of experience an opportunity to use the McKenna Art Gallery at Riverbank Arts Centre as their own studio for short or long periods of time throughout 2017. Artists can apply to use the space for 1 day to three consecutive days and up to four days a week for five weeks.
Please note: The availability of the incubation space will be dependent on application and we will be unable to offer any applicants the use of the space on Mondays during this time.
The deadline for all applications for the Artist Incubation Space: Tuesday 26th of September at 12 noon.
The incubation space may suit those who want to:
- Develop or continue a particular body of work
- Work in an art studio for the first time
- Have the space to reflect and think about their work
- Have the space or time to develop or improve skills
To apply please send:
- A brief description of how you would like to use the space and time, including why this is important for you personally and/or for your practice. (Maximum amount of words 250)
- An artist’s CV if you have one or a brief note describing how long you have been making art and anywhere you have shown your work or have done arts based activities, for example: workshops/projects etc.
- A number of images/example of your work (Maximum 10)
To discuss this opportunity further, please contact Carolann on 083 1709589 / 045 4488316
All applications can be either:
Emailed to: carolanncourtney@kwaras.ie /
Posted to: Carolann Courtney c/o This Must Be the Place, Incubation Space, Riverbank Arts Centre, Newbridge, Co. Kildare
The Creative Well is a Kildare County Council (KCC) Arts Service Arts and Wellbeing project currently in partnership with Riverbank Arts Centre as This Must Be the Place, an arts and health residency exploring the permeable nature of the gallery as a space and place for making, discussion, encountering and exhibition.
CONTACT DETAILS:
For any questions or enquiries contact Carolann Courtney, Kildare’s Arts and Wellbeing Coordinator
Email: thecreativewellkildare@gmail.com
Phone: 083 1709589
For Bookings:
Contact Riverbank Box Office
Email: boxoffice@riverbank.ie
Phone: 045448327