An ongoing series of audio & visual footnotes
available on youtube.com/@grilsegallery732
Print Works
25 April – 24 May 2026
A group show featuring 12 print makers: Dorota Borowa, Lucy & Robert Carter, Eileen Ferguson, Claire Forward, Debbie Godsell, Austin Ivers, Eimearjean McCormack, Niall Naessens, Rachel Parry, Robert Russell, Gerda Teljeur, Charles Tyrrell. A recording of the introduction by Niall Naessens is available here . . .
Rebecca Peart, Mariner
14 March – 12 April 2026
This vibrant and exuberant exhibition of abstract paintings, frequently inspired by the Kerry coast, was introduced by landscape architect James Shields. A recording of James' introduction is available
here . . .
Kerry Select
29 November – 21 December 2025
A curated exhibition of an informal collective of contemporary Kerry-based artists, previously exhibited in Killarney and Cork, showing a wide range of media including painting, printmaking, sculpture and photography. Participating artists include: Regine Bartsch, Dorota Borowa, Lucy & Robert Carter, Kathy Cronin, Fermoyle Pottery, Lisa Fingleton, Laura Fitzgerald, Karen Hendy, Austin Ivers, Darragh Kinch, Holger Lönze, Rochelle Lucey, Deirdre McKenna, Poppy Melia, Aran Mulvihill, Úna Ní Shé, Niall Naessens, Ciara O'Connor, Alan Raggett and Christopher Steenson. A recording of the introduction by broadcaster Joe McGill is available here . . .
Joe's programme,
Saturday Supplement, on Radio Kerry on 6 December featured interviews with Ciara, Lisa and Niall;
catch up here . . .
the slot starts at 56 minutes 49 seconds in (on larger screens a scroll bar is visible).
Bernadette Cotter & Áine Ryan, Beirt le chéile
18 October – 22 November 2025
Bernadette's and Aíne's works were introduced by Lisa Fingleton in an uplifting call to solidarity in the arts, feminism and the environment: she closed with a beautifully sung rendition of 'The Last Hug'. Some visitors' recordings are available here . . .
Ryan’s practice ranges from object making to site-specific land interventions. She creates primarily sculptural pieces with cast glass, mixed media and found objects. Her frustrations, anxieties and personal history act as catalysts in her work. Ryan draws from nature and her farm upbringing to interrogate the social construct of feminine identity and to examine the role and value of women within the rural patriarchal space.
Meditation, religion and catharsis are central to Cotter’s practice. Whether in drawings, textiles, performance or installations, the level of detail in Bernadette’s work is astonishing:
‘I can’t seem to get away from it . . . the drawings are made up of thousands of little units. Either little dots or words or the same gesture in the work, repeated over and over. I suppose it’s a kind of meditation.’ Bernadette performed Deargfhlaith, draped in organza and 30 necklaces of her own hair, collected each year since 1995. A 33-minute excerpt from her one-hour performance is available here . . .
Dorota Borowa: In Search of Presence
19 September – 12 October 2025
Rather than depicting nature, Borowa seeks to collaborate with it, exploring her relationship with the natural world. She works with water as an active collaborator in the creation of an image, setting up physical conditions that allow water to shape the work – such as filling a pool, or building a raft and installing it along the shore. Different states of water – rain, ice, seawater and glacier water – form a unique vocabulary in her work. Dorota's site-specific installation was introduced with a conversation with broadcaster and art critic Cristín Leach: a recording of which is available here . . .
Dorota was also interviewed by Joe McGill for Radio Kerry, broadcast on Saturday 4 October and available here . . . (the interview starts at 68 minutes 35 seconds into the programme: there is a thin grey & yellow scroll bar – just above the kinetic wave form – which you can advance to the relevant time)
Tadhg McSweeney: Saoirse
2 August – 31 August 2025
McSweeney was an exceptionally individual artist who found extraordinary beauty in the absolutely ordinary, in the landscapes, animals and everyday objects of his home surroundings. The exhibition was introduced by Tadhg’s friend and film-maker, Vivienne Dick: a recording of her remarks can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/0-Z8mj2TiLk
David Lilburn: Borderlands
14 June – 13 July 2025
Lilburn (1950–2021) was an Irish artist and printmaker, publisher, designer and teacher. He studied history at Trinity College Dublin, and art at the Scuole Istituto Statale D’Arte, Urbino, and Limerick School of Art and Design. The exhibition was introduced by the poet Tony Curtis and the architectural historian Judith Hill; the recording of which can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/7Ay5C9mdErY
Kerry Art Now!
28 March – 18 June 2025
The Department of Culture, Communication & Sport in Killarney hosted an exhibition of 20 professional Kerry artists: Regine Bartsch, Dorota Borowa, Lucy & Robert Carter, Kathy Cronin, Clodagh Edwards, Lisa Fingleton, Zoë Green, Laura Fitzgerald, Michael Flaherty, Cathy Giles, Karen Hendy, Darragh Kinch, Holger Lönze, Rochelle Lucey, Deidre McKenna, Poppy Melia, Silke Michels, Aran Mulvihill, Niall Naessens, Ciara O’Connor, Alan Raggett, Úna Ní Shé and Christopher Steenson. On 7 May Joe McGill of Radio Kerry interviewed four of the artists: Lisa Fingleton, Christopher Steenson, Rochelle Lucey and Robert Carter. The broadcast conversation can be heard here:
https://www.radiokerry.ie/podcasts/saturday-supplement/saturday-supplement-may-17th-2025-435384.
Maria Simonds-Gooding: What land and country is this?
19 April – 18 May 2025
Simonds-Gooding’s artworks, spanning four decades of practice, appear like maps of the landscape and more especially of agriculture. Her landscapes are occupied by humans by implication only: the human presence in her paintings, plaster works and prints is that of the artist herself and of her spiritual journey in search of encircling, protective boundaries. Maria and Poppy Melia introduced the exhibition; a video of their conversation can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3pFA3uBrUw
Paul Mosse: The Materialist
15 March – 12 April 2025
Highly inventive and idiosyncratic with his materials, Paul is inspired by the energy and chaos of the natural world around him. Using non-traditional materials (plastic pellets, polystyrene, sawdust, nails and screws) as well as paper, paint and wood, he manipulates and builds complex surfaces on his paintings and sculptures. He has exhibited nationally and internationally and was elected to Aosdána in 2008. The exhibition was introduced by renowned gallerist Catherine Hammond, and a video of their conversation can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XC9LLvx_bgI
Katherine Boucher Beug: People
16 November – 21 December 2024
Katherine has been drawing and teaching in West Cork since 1971. She draws every day, consistently experimenting while mixing writing, collage and painting. She shows her 'interior' journals as part of her exhibitions, valuing ‘the raw’ at least as much as ‘the cooked’. Her work is held in the collections of the National Gallery, the Crawford, the Arts Council, the Glucksman, in private collections in Ireland, the UK, Germany and America. The exhibition's introduction with Gemma Tipton can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/ynXr5M9skNQ
Poetry Cocoon: Emer Fallon, Nicholas McLachlan, Simon Ó Faoláin, Maggie Breen
with filmmaker John Kennedy, plus Mick Jones
Culture Night, 20 September 2024
West Kerry poets in a quiet corner / Éist le filí dhuibhneacha i gcúinne ciúin
Poetry on headphones / Filíocht ar chluasáin
Poetry films / Scannáin filíochta
Poetry fine-art prints / Clóanna filíochta
The poetry readings can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/SpyFnVpG9fE
Gerda's large-scale, abstract ink drawings mix concentrated energy with a profound sense of the importance of each mark. Her work is deeply meditative, adhering uncompromisingly to an abstract form of expression yet conveying a sense of the connections between humanity, the earth and the spaces around us. A video of the introduction by Catherine Marshall can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/vRBhNjkKjGs
Tim Goulding: Poetry, Prints & Paintings
4 May – 9 June 2024
Tim works in series, often spending three or four years on one theme. These series can be radically different in both style and content but are always a response to his visual and emotional lives: his modus operandi , 'see and play'; a combination of rhythm, colour and sensibility. A video recording of the opening talk can be found here: https://youtu.be/ukueaYQrVWM
Alan Raggett – Be Good if You Can –
16 March – 21 April 2024
Derived from vintage postcards sent from Kerry worldwide, Alan says of this series of oil paintings, 'about Kerry, made in Kerry and shown in Kerry’. The exhibition was introduced by auctioneer John de Vere White; a recording of their conversation can be seen here:
https://youtu.be/TmcHyubt9Rc
Geraldine O’Reilly, Mary O'Donnell and Na Cailleacha: Heroines
25 November – 24 December 2023
Mary was scheduled to introduce the exhibition but, due to illness, was unable to. In her stead Geraldine O'Reilly and Catherine Marshall talked of their own collaborative projects, and Lisa Fingleton read Mary's poem, 'Unlegendary Heroes'. The opening was a joyous and warm celebration of creative, experienced and insightful women. See https://youtu.be/XN11CXPT_JU
Niall Naessens: Ar Imeall an Iontais/The Edge of Marvellous
23 September – 22 October 2023
Introduced and appreciated by Charles Tyrrell: see
https://youtu.be/10Rne69fUS4
Land: 10 Irish artists
8 July – 13 August 2023
Poet Paddy Bushe delivered a crafted and inspiring interpretation of the exhibition: some of the artists admitted to an enhanced perception of their own work. Artists included Katherine Boucher Beug, Edwina Bracken, Audrey Fleming, Karen Hendy, Con Kelleher, Susan Montgomery, Noël O’Callaghan, Danny Osborne, Aisling Roche and Mary G Sheehan. Recorded by Donagh Long, Paddy's introduction can be heard here:
His observations on the work of Aisling Roche:
on the work of Con Kelleher:
on the work of Karen Hendy:
on the work of Audrey Fleming:
on the paintings of Mary G Sheehan:
on those by Edwina Bracken:
and of other individual artists:
https://spaintowerstudios.com/grilse-gallery.html Password 'Land'.
A series of audio-described works selected from recent exhibitions
Charles Tyrrell, G2.21, Indian ink on Canford card, 42 x 30 cm
Click this link for audio description: https://youtu.be/Sjgkr2kM_A4
Description written by Patrick Groneman, read by László Rózsa, and recorded by Lucia Capellaro on a Microtech Gefel M930 microphone in an untreated room
The Three She's, a poem by Catherine Byron, in a five-colour screen print on Fabriano rosaspina bianco 285 gsm, 70 x 50 cm, unique print. Designed by Lucy & Robert Carter, printed by Simon Tozer
Click this link for audio description: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6Og6juboJQ
Description written by Patrick Groneman, read by László Rózsa, and recorded by Lucia Capellaro on a Microtech Gefel M930 microphone in an untreated room
