From the beach to the Triskel

Triskel Christchurch is preparing for a temporary takeover of its visual art offerings by John P Quinlan, the figure behind the establishment of the Vangard Gallery in Macroom in 1991.

It is a welcome return to Cork city for Quinlan, who curates a series of special exhibitions entitled ‘Calling Up the Vangard’, which gets underway this weekend.

Quinlan will be in-house at Triskel until May 2015, with nine exhibitions in total. And when some of Ireland’s well-known artists, including Michael Cullen, Martin Gale, Eilis O’Connell and Donald Teskey, respond to Quinlan’s call to arms, the occupation is most assuredly a friendly one.

The first exhibition in the series is entitled ‘Select’, where six members of the Royal Hibernian Academy have been invited by Quinlan to submit their own art work while also selecting a fellow artist they either admire or have affinity with.

Vivienne Roche, one of the RHA artists involved, is a founding member of the National Sculpture Factory in Cork. So does the energy emanating from Christchurch hint at an upturn in the art market?

“There is certainly a growing confidence in the Cork art scene,” says Roche, “and I think having somebody like John P enter into the market again is fantastic.”

This Friday 6pm we open our next exhibition SELECT. Launched by Minister @simoncoveney. All welcome pic.twitter.com/3Z3tcCpEkZ

— Triskel Arts Centre (@TriskelCork) September 8, 2014

The artist’s view on supporting growth in the art scene is acutely demonstrated by her selection of Bren Smith, who just this summer qualified from CIT Crawford College of Art & Design.

“I met Bren in his space after I had looked at his work and we just got talking and I was attracted to the work,” says Roche. “There was quite an affinity with what I was doing in my drawing”. The accolade continues as she suggests that Smith “is already showing the likelihood of being a strong artist.”

Since Roche is celebrated predominately for her sculptural work, it is an enticing prospect to consider how the interface between drawing and sculpture has shaped her themes.

“This is difficult to talk about,” she laughs, “as I’m just starting on a phase of work and I’m so reluctant to say what I’m doing without knowing myself, in that ‘if you speak about it you might not make it’ way.” !

She recapitulates, outlining that the work in ‘Select’ is in response to her environment. “I’m living by the sea in Garrettstown and naturally it creeps into the work. That’s a constant, no matter what other direction I go in.”

So what can we expect to see? “I have three sculptures, one of which is based on a seaweed form and two others which are part of the structures of groynes that were on Garrettstown beach.”

Roche was drawn especially to the deterioration of these coastal structures and how erosion changes the physical properties of objects and releases materials that ordinarily are enclosed or trapped. So iron from the groyne and cast bronze evoke this gradual transition through such titles as ‘Timepiece 1’, named because they are about time.

“Time has also made the forms and I worked upon what time has created,” says Roche.

Select is at Triskel in Cork from Saturday until October 4