Opening reception Thursday 21 July, 6 – 7:30pm

This exhibition – the first such show to take place at the Douglas Hyde Gallery since 1990 – is an informal gathering of Irish paintings that have been inspired, in various ways, by landscape. Intended to have an air of lightness and ease, it is also a reflection of darker, more ambiguous, moods and currents in the world.

I invited artists to take part in this summer exhibition in much the same way as I might put together a list for a party. Some are old friends; others are acquaintances; a few are people I don’t really know but whose work I find interesting for one reason or another. Unfortunately it wasn’t possible to make the gathering more comprehensive or all-embracing.

To give the exhibition a particular focus, artists were asked to propose two or three works that might throw some light on the idea of ‘liminality’ – in-between places, edges, thresholds, points at which something is transformed – and I chose the final image from their suggestions. It has been an interesting and enjoyable process, and I thank all the artists for their enthusiasm and generosity.

John Hutchinson

Artists taking part in the exhibition:
Michael Canning, Fergus Feehily, David Godbold, Patrick Hall, Elizabeth Magill, Eoin McHugh, Stephen McKenna, William McKeown, Paul McKinley, Nick Miller, Ciaran Murphy, Gavin O’Curry, Mairead O’hEocha, Kathy Prendergast, Marc Reilly, Tony Swain