'Thick, turgid and lacking in soothing oil' ORMSTON HOUSE, Limerick

    Vanessa Donoso López, 'Mama, threads are not just for sawing'.



"Thick, turgid and lacking in soothing oil"

Winter Members' Exhibition curated by Joe Duggan and Mike Fitzpatrick Preview:
Thursday 24 January, 8-10pm Exhibition dates: 25 January - 16 February 2013

Please join us for the preview of our Winter Members' Exhibition featuring works by John Burke, Angela Darby, Vanessa Donoso Lopez, Levi Hanes, Ramon Kassam, Emmet Kierans, Bartosz Kolata, Chris Leach and Frances Leach on Thursday 24 January, 8-10pm.

At the request of Mary Conlon, London-based artist Joe Duggan and I selected this year’s OHM exhibition and we must apologise for several reasons, firstly for not selecting the 100 plus other members. And there are many other reasons for APOLOGISING for what we selected! Too much thick turgid painting, the use of brown paint in particular and some of it, just plain messy and more so works which are deliberately not beautiful. We are also responsible for selecting tiny ‘big’ drawings, why couldn’t they have been bigger? We accept the blame for the inclusion of specific stylistic ‘neo-contemporary’ figurative works, some of which are rather wonderful silent screaming paintings, depressing yes, but in that rather charming film noir cropped manner.

One large print work represents the making of old symbolic money (slightly different from the current IOUs we are allowed to use) weaving a lost cause Lady Lavery genuflecting to a past nostalgia. Handmade symbol of wealth left out in the rain. Sure we all know that wet damp feeling, afraid we are going to seize up in a country lacking in soothing oils or lacking any oil. There are also installations of works including bunting, brains and lampshades. Finally we included a video work which shows plastic bags billowing with air created by blowing wind out of a dustbin, empty but evocative.

Ormston House, the exhibition space conceived and brilliantly directed by Mary Conlon, with the assistance of a group of present and past LSAD students, are currently hosting their Winter Members' Exhibition. Conlon came to Limerick as the third Shinnors Curatorial Scholar, the collaboration between Limerick City Gallery of Art and Limerick School of Art and Design, LIT. She brought the space into being as part her on-going PhD curatorial research with the help of the Creative Limerick initiative of Limerick City Council which allows underused commercial spaces to become sites of cultural activity. Ormston House have developed a significant reputation over its short history. There is something highly energetic and smart about how the space is curated and organised on a minuscule budget with voluntary labour. One is struck by how this space demands standards that seem way beyond its means.

PS: A must-see show, with some of our best, brightest and unabashed artists, who just really enjoy making work that some of you will love.

Mike Fitzpatrick

Ormston House Gallery, 9-10 Patrick Street, Limerick City, Ireland

info@ormstonhouse.com

www.ormstonhouse.com

Ormston House is open Wednesday-Saturday 12-6pm or by appointment



HIGHLIGHTS OF THE YEAR 2012, The Irish Times Aidan Dunne

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/features/2012/1227/1224328176466.html

Empty pockets, but rich pickings in art

'

     Vanessa Donoso López. 'It never rains to everybody's taste'

    Queen Street Studios and Gallery, Belfast.2012  

    Photo; Tony Corey
   

                           

AIDAN DUNNE

Despite a lack of funding and reduced support in 2012, artists rose to the challenge and created brilliant work
Early this year, two important positions in the Irish art world were filled after prolonged speculation. Sarah Glennie took over as director of Imma, following the highly successful tenure of Enrique Juncosa, and Sean Rainbird took the reins at the National Gallery, following the retirement of Raymond Keaveney, long a steady hand in one of our most closely watched, jealously regarded national institutions.
Glennie and Rainbird took on formidable challenges, some overlapping. They both had to face directly into talks about the startling, Twilight-like resurrection of the plan to amalgamate Imma, the National Gallery and the Crawford Art Gallery. Both of them are dealing with very difficult budgets, with serious implications for programme planning, acquisitions and staffing. And their two galleries are undergoing significant renovation and refurbishment, necessitating the closure of Imma’s main galleries and a large proportion of the National Gallery at Merrion Square. Encouragingly, the signs so far are that they are more than up to the challenges.
Not everything in the garden was rosy, however. Opened in 2009, Carlow’s Visual National Centre for Contemporary Art ran smack into the recession from the word go. The board’s decision not to renew director Carissa Farrell’s contract, despite praise for her programming, signalled a rethink about how it functions.
Visual is a large-scale venue and there’s been comment that its scale is at variance with its location. To build an audience commensurate with the scale of the galleries would take time and thoughtful work, and the town may have nursed unrealistic expectations, perhaps based on the enthusiastic response to the annual Éigse festival. But while audiences can be relied upon to flock to festivals, they are less likely to attend regular exhibitions.
Interestingly, Athlone has taken a different tack with its recently opened Luan Gallery. It is capacious but modestly scaled, in a carefully adapted and transformed, widely liked building, centrally positioned in the town. A studio residency schedule and arts workshops were in place a year in advance, and the gallery is linked to another tourist amenity, the adjacent castle. Expectations seem realistic.
Andy Warhol’s aphoristic equation of art with business is not unrealistic or unreasonable if you consider the international art market and headline news stories. People routinely equate art and market value, as though it’s like winning the lottery. By that reckoning, monetary value is the bottom line. But long before the auction houses, the oligarchs and the headline writers get there, art is born out of passion and conviction far removed from the profit motive. There are perpetual efforts – so far not entirely successful – to keep it outside of that domain completely.
In the middle ground, we have “commercial” galleries, mostly run by people who are, indeed, passionate and committed. If they weren’t, we would not have anything like the number of galleries that currently survive here. In the new Ireland, everybody owes money or is owed money and artists and gallerists are no exception. Year on year, the art market is struggling. Routinely, artists subsidise their art. They make work because they feel compelled to, but it costs rather than earns them money.
While we have a public gallery infrastructure, generally within the framework of regional arts centres, they are under pressure because national and local funding has been squeezed, and unfortunately artists are at the bottom of the food chain. If that sounds bleak it’s because the situation is quite bleak. Witness Visual and the cash-strapped Letterkenny Regional Arts Centre, or the question over the future of Galway’s 126 artist-run gallery, which has lost its very modest funding.
Against this background it is perhaps surprising that the contemporary art scene is so lively. Limerick, for example, was a centre of activity, and not alone because of the return of Eva and the continuing vitality of the Limerick City Gallery of Art with new director Helen Carey. In the absence of money, the city has incentivised cultural enterprise in other, imaginative ways, aiding such initiatives as Ormston House and Limerick Printmakers. Other projects, such as Askeaton Contemporary Arts and Belltable’s revived visual arts programme (Michelle Horrigan is the link between the two) lend depth to contemporary arts in the region. Similarly, Belfast seemed quite energised this year, with innovative venues operating in tandem with more established galleries and the MAC.
Perhaps surprisingly, it was a very good year for exhibitions, though there were fewer of them; it may be no harm that runs are longer. Some of the impressive large-scale shows countrywide included Merlin James’s survey at the Douglas Hyde Gallery, David Mach’s blockbuster biblical sculpture and collages in Precious Light at the Galway Arts Festival, and Paul Mosse and Hans Op de Beeck’s equally superb exhibitions at the Butler Gallery in February and August respectively.


Summer treats
The work of the great figurative sculptor Hans Josephsohn, who died during the year, was ideally located at Lismore Castle as its summer exhibition. Simon Norfolk’s Crawford Gallery show was a fascinating dialogue with the work of the 19th-century Irish photographer John Burke, whose steps he retraced in Afghanistan.
Making Familiar at Temple Bar Gallery was a serious attempt to consider the state of contemporary painting, curated by Robert Armstrong and James Merrigan. Among many solo shows of note were Jennifer Cunningham at the Galway Arts Festival, Sam Keogh’s Terrestris, his fantastic contribution to Conjuring for Beginners at the Project in July, Charles Tyrrell at the Taylor Gallery, Willie Doherty and Callum Innes at the Kerlin, Mary Lohan at the Hamilton in Sligo and, with David Quinn, at the Fenderesky in Belfast, and Vanessa Donoso López’s It never rains to everyone’s taste at Queen Street Studio’s gallery. And The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, a set of scrolls based on the oldest work of Japanese prose fiction, newly restored, made a stunning exhibition at the Chester Beatty Library in the summer.
It was a little disappointing, in May, that Ireland’s favourite painting – beating off Vermeer, no less – turned out to be Frederic William Burton’s Hellelil and Hildebrand, the Meeting on the Turret Stairs, at the National Gallery. It is undeniably and enduringly popular with gallery visitors, as postcard sales attest. At the same time, it is a stolid rather than an outstanding or exciting piece of work, and in terms of subject matter and treatment it is a prime slice of Victorian schmaltz.
Sadly, two great artists died this year: Louis le Brocquy, a towering figure in 20th century Irish art, and Paddy Jolley, one of the most ambitious and brilliant younger artists to have emerged in years.
5 best shows of 2012 Skating in Wyoming, snipers in Sarajevo and a new era for Eva
The Josef Albers show at the Glucksman in April was a landmark. Made possible through the commitment of The Josef Anni Albers Foundation in the US, and particularly director Nicholas Fox Weber, the exhibition was a richly textured, remarkably well-rounded survey of the life and work of one of the most celebrated abstract artists of the 20th century. The only flaw was the presentation of Albers as the Sacred Modernist and a Catholic artist. The work suggested these were peripheral concerns.

Limerick’s Eva embarked on a new era. The exhibition After the Future opened in June under the auspices of new director Woodrow Kernohan. Guest curator was Dutch-based Annie Fletcher. Together, they produced an impressive, international event. Fletcher had in mind art that articulated alternative ways of dealing with contemporary, often oppressive realities. Outstanding highlights included Pilvi Takala’s inventive take on corporate life (documenting her experience as a trainee in Deloitte ), Adrian O’Connell’s dramatic Library and Ailbhe Ní Bhriain’s poetically surreal video installation.

Brian Duggan’s Everything can be done, in principle, the centrepiece of Éigse at VISUAL in Carlow, involved building a rollerskating rink in a facsimile of an 1890s Wyoming timber bar in the gallery, and providing skates for visitors. For everyone, including curator Helen Carey, it was a huge undertaking. The inspiration was Michael Cimino’s cult 1980 film, Heaven’s Gate, which went famously and ruinously over budget. Duggan’s work is fascinated with the idea of failure, and the notion of community, each and in combination very relevant to Ireland now.

Anri Sala’s 1395 Days Without Red, at Imma, Earlsfort Terrace, in June, is a collaboration between Sala, New York-born composer and conductor Ari Benjamin Meyers and French filmmaker Liria Bégéja. Set during the Siege of Sarajevo, from April 1992 to February 1996, it ingeniously charts the progress of a woman – actress Mirabel Verdú – on her way to work (with the Sarajevo Symphony Orchestra, which never gave up through the siege), as Serbian snipers fired at will.

Imma’s Alice Maher survey, Alice Maher: Becoming, at Earlsfort Terrace, from October, is a triumph, striking a lively balance between older and new work. The title indicates Maher’s fascination not just with metamorphosis, but also with how, as individuals, we carve out personal identities in the midst of institutional conditioning. Don’t miss it.

'it never rains to everybody's taste' Queen Street Studios and Gallery, Belfast

   Installation shot. Queen Street Studios and Gallery, Belfast.

Opening - Thursday 1st November 2012   18-21hrs

Artist Talk - Thursday 1st November 2012 at 17hrs

Exhibition Dates - 01.11.2012- 01.12.2012

 

Vanessa Donoso López  practice is committed to explore concepts of transicional phenomena and 'objecthood'. 

The original notion of this concept whas used by the psichoanalist Donald Winnicott to describe the intermediate area of human experience between inner reality and the outside world. Within this field the basis of play and culture forms. Through play, Donoso López creates transitional objects while exploring how extreme alterations of context can modify the understanding, content and perepcion of transicional phenomena.

Videos related to this works hosted in www.vimeo.com

Hard working needle; https://vimeo.com/54372086
Fugitive Dolls; https://vimeo.com/54373279
Experiment #3; https://vimeo.com/54370123
Belgian bag; https://vimeo.com/54368451
Four; https://vimeo.com/53550791
My neighbours upstairs...; https://vimeo.com/54312712

'Hard working needle'.

Queen Street Studios and Gallery, Belfast.

    Installation Shot. Queen Street Studios and Gallery, Belfast.

     Installation Shot. Queen Street Studios and Gallery, Belfast.



 

Late Night Opening - Thursday 1st November 2012   18-21hrs

Artist Talk - Thursday 1st November 2012 at 17hrs

Exhibition Dates - 01.11.2012- 01.12.2012

Gallery Open Tues-Thurs 10am - 5pm or by appointment

Queen Street Studios Gallery  

3rd Floor

37-39 Queen Street

Belfast

BT1 6EA

tel; 00 44 (0)28 90 24 31 45

email;gallery@queentstreetstudios.net | web; www.queenstreetstudios.net

www.vanessadonosolopez.com

www.vanessadonosolopez/blogspot.ie

METAMORPHOSIS, PS2, Belfast

Stephen Brandes (UK),Vanessa Donoso López (ES), Priscila Fernandes (PT), Cainneach Lennon (IE),

Tom Molloy (IE), Ann Murphy (IE), Magnhild Opdøl (NO), Andrea Spencer (UK).

Curated by Rowan Sexton.

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally

breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on

according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most

b e au t i f u l and mos t wonde r f u l h ave b e e n , and a re b e i n g , evol ved.

- Charles Darwin,

The Origin of Species, 1859.

Metamorphosis alludes to the process of transformation, where a profound change of form,

structure or substance occurs. This exhibition aims to establish clear associations between art and the natural sciences, and to contextualize these dual frameworks, where significant cultural

common ground exists. The biological mechanisms of growth, change and evolution are examined

in tandem with material, philosophical and conceptual concerns within the visual arts. Highlighting

the mutual elements in these distinct disciplines opens up a discourse, which emphasizes

experimental overlaps, perception and interpretation, in an historical and contemporary context.

At its core, Metamorphosis aims to explore the dynamic relationship between art and the natural

sciences. Each of the artists involved has a unique approach to the dual topics under consideration,and their diverse interpretations encompass a multitude of styles and methodologies. The exhibition encourages a deep integration between both disciplines, and incorporates artworks that investigate experimentation, hybridity, physiological studies, psychoanalytical models, musical interpretation, the historically traditional métier of taxidermy, the specialised craft of glass blowing and sculptural interventions within the space.

Opening Reception at PS2, Friday 19 October, 6 – 9pm.

METAMORPHOSIS continues 19 October – 10 November 2012.

PS2, 18 Donegall Street, Belfast BT1 2GP |

Open: Tuesday - Friday: 1-5pm, Saturday: 11am-3pm.

    Vanessa Donoso López 'Soakers, from B to B', 2012

'THE RAIN IN SPAIN FALLS MAINLY ON THE PLANE' Barcelona

‘the rain in spain falls mainly on the plane’

‘the rain in spain falls mainly on the plane’ its a popular saying that people from english speaking countries learn through their childhood and often, irish people use it for quickly ‘show off’ their knowledge on iberian meteorology.
This peculiar proverb turns into a connecting bond of my Worlds; on one hand, the lenguage, the anglosaxon culture and the chilidlike content of this saying and, my mother tongue, culture and playfullness caracter of my own work on the other hand.
In 1951, the English pediatrician and psychoanalyst Denis W. Winnicott introduced the concept of transitional object based on a phenomenon commonly observed: early adoption and fiercely possession of children to an object.
According to his theory, this object occupies a space between what he calls "inner psychic reality" and "external reality" of the child. Over time, their importance declines and ends up losing meaning for the child. Still, Winnicott argues, what it repressents remains and stays unconsciously present in every one of us.
An other "transitional phenomenon" occupies the "potential space" between inner subjectivity and external objectivity. This playful space of possibilities is, in fact, the "cultural field." Within this field the creative behaviour appears and in the case of my work seems to insist on activate and intermix games, memories, experiments and systems of my own past and present.

All of us have learned to relate to our family environment, material, social and cultural development through play, and play wants to be the common thread of this exhibition. The games presented here are some of those I learned from TV, -mostly from McGyver-, from school, from here and there…, but the game more present among them all is the game of the translation of words and cultural references wich I submit daily.
In parallel, with the sole intention of playing ‘just for the craic‘, the group BlackTulip collaborates in this show with a NOMIC session , a
game created in 1982 by philosopher Peter Suber in which the rules of the game include mechanisms for players to change the rules, usually starting with a voting system.
The result, a Dadaist and bizarre text worthy of any school playground.
Hoping to be a way of understanding the exhibition from the glimmer of our own childhood ... Let's start connecting the dots.

Videos related to this works hosted in www.vimeo.com;Hard working needle;
https://vimeo.com/54372086Fugitive Dolls; https://vimeo.com/54373279Experiment #3; https://vimeo.com/54370123Belgian bag; https://vimeo.com/54368451Four; https://vimeo.com/53550791My neighbours upstairs...; https://vimeo.com/54312712


　


'The rain in Spain Falls Mainly on the Plane', Installation Shot


　‘the rain in spain falls mainly on the plane’
‘the rain in spain falls mainly on the plane’ (la llúvia en españa cae mayormente dentro del avión) es una frase popular que la gente de países anglo parlantes aprende durante su infancia y que muchos irlandeses usan enseguida para "fardar" de sus conocimientos de meteorología ibérica. Finalmente, este dicho casi se ha convertido en una descripción del momento en el que se encuentra mi trabajo. Este peculiar refrán se convierte así en un vínculo conector de mis mundos; Idioma, cultura anglosajona y el carácter lúdico infantil del dicho por un lado, y mi lengua materna, cultura , y el contenido juguetón de mi propio trabajo por otro.

En 1951, el pediatra y psicoanalista inglés Denis W. Winnicott introdujo el concepto del objeto transicional basandose en un fenómeno comunmente observado: la adopción temprana y ferozmente posesiva de los niños hacia un objeto.
Según su teoría, este objeto ocupa un espacio intermedio entre lo que él denomina “la realidad psíquica interior” y “la realidad externa” del niño. Con el tiempo, su importancia languidece y acaba perdiendo significado para el niño. Aún así, Winnicott argumenta, que lo representado no desaparece y queda inconscientemente presente en cada uno de nosotros.

Otro “fenómeno transicional” viene a ocupar el “espacio potencial” entre la subjetividad interior y objetividad exterior. Este espacio lúdico de posibilidades es, de hecho, el “campo cultural.” En este campo el comportamientocreativo aparece y en el caso de mi trabajo parece que insiste en activar e intermezclar juegos, memorias, experimentos y sistemas de mi propio pasado y presente. Todos nosotros hemos aprendido a relacionarnos con nuestro ámbito familiar, material, social y cultural a través del juego, por lo que este quiere ser el hilo conductor de esta exposicíon. Los juegos que presento, son los que adquirí de la tele -sobre todo de McGyver-, del cole, de aquí y de allí, pero ante todo el juego más presente entre todos ellos, es el juego de la traducción de palabras y significados cuturales al que me someto diariamente.
Paralelamente y con la única intención de jugar por jugar, el colectivo BlackTulip colabora con una sesión de NOMIC, un juego creado en 1982 por el filósofo Peter Suber en el que las reglas del juego incluyen mecanismos para que los jugadores cambien dichas reglas, normalmente comenzando con un sistema de votación.
El resultado, un texto dadaísta y rocambolesco digno de cualquier patio de colegio.

Con la esperanza de que sea una manera de entender la exposición desde el resquicio de nuestra propia infancia... Empecemos a unir los puntos.


 

 'preparatory drawings'

   Installation Shot, Pardigmas Gallery, Barcelona.

the god of small things (part 1)

THE GOD OF SMALL THINGS (Part 1) Charles Brady, Maud Cotter, Michael Craig-Martin, Vanessa Donoso Lopez, Blaise Drummond,
Nathalie Du Pasquier, Gillian Fitzpatrick, Aoife Flynn, Cassie Howard, Alissa Kleist, Francesco Simeti.Curated by Rowan SextonRUBICON GALLERY RECEPTIONSATURDAY 25 FEBRUARY, 5-7PM
EXHIBITION CONTINUES UNTIL SATURDAY 24 MARCH 2012

The human world is not defined simply by the historical, by culture, by totality or society as a whole, or by ideological and political superstructures. It is defined by this intermediate and mediating level: everyday life. - Henri Lefebvre, The Critique of Everyday Life, 1961.
The exhibition, The God of Small Things (Part 1), examines the everyday, and the small things and surroundings that deeply affect peoples lives. A number of diverse artworks address the intersection between art and the quotidian in the domestic environment. This exhibition questions the social and cultural associations of domesticity in contemporary society. The everyday, commonplace undercurrent to the exhibition interrogates roles centred around ideas of anthropomorphism, tradition, and reflections on gender. It invites the viewer to question appearances, stereotypes and the social conventions and expectations that one readily associates within this familiar, prosaic landscape.This exhibition highlights the transgressive and dynamic aspirations of art, adopting and adapting conventional materials and objects, to create interventions with the familiar. The affiliate practices that contribute to the exhibition reflect on personal perceptions, commercial commodities, and domestic fixtures and features. By incorporating the underlying narrative presented in each piece, and the philosophical framework anterior to the creation of these multimedia artworks, the exhibition opens up a dialogue about urban sociology.The meaning of an artwork often arises out of the context in which it exists. In this case, the social and formal markers contribute to influencing how the work may be interpreted. Questions surrounding both cultural and personal identity have been central to art since the 1960’s, as have the impact of gender, feminism and post-colonial notions. By deconstructing the contextual framework of the pieces, an insight to the personal narratives that have informed the artworks becomes apparent.Text by Rowan Sexton, February 2012.www.rubicongallery.ie

Rubicon Gallery 10 St Stephens Green Dublin 2 Ireland

+353.1.670 8055 |
Tuesday to Saturday 12-5pm & by Appointment

GRANDE, FELIZ e INVENCIBLE, solo show at the KEVIN KAVANAGH GALLERY DUBLIN

The 30th of June 2011 I opened a solo show at the Kevin Kavanagh  Gallery in Dublin. The show was opened with a talk between Enrique Juncosa, Director of the Irish Museum of Modern Art 2002-20011 and myself. The exhibition was acompained by a catalogue of my work from 2005 to 2011 and it had an introduccion by Aidan Dunne.
Please, see below some installation  shots.