Land-shape Dreaming

Welcome to my recent collection of land and seascape paintings.  The purpose of these paintings for me is to share memory and sensory based connection to the land and sea.

Exhibition details | View the virtual exhibition

Whilst I may have specific stories and thoughts attached to specific paintings, I would very much invite you to consider your own response and connection to the presented images, what they raise for you, and encourage conversations about land based human memory.

I have added a short description on a few paintings here but not all and would welcome any questions or ideas you have. You can contact me through my website or in person at the opening launch.

Artworks in this exhibition are available through this website or you can purchase directly at the exhibition.

Paintings List (reading right to left)

1. Side wall on entrance

‘A temple for trees’, oil on canvas, £840/€985

This is a dream-based painting around an imagined reality where trees are on the brink of extinction and are gathered in geo-domes, to be cared for.  The notion occurred to me during painting this piece, that perhaps this is a place where people come to take the air for their health.  A Tree Templum, where once again we acknowledge the importance and sacred nature of trees, that they are worthy of awe and respect.

‘Moonlight falling and Fairy thorn’, oil on canvas, £840/€985

There is an Irish word for a circular group of fairy trees, or thorn bushes, Blackthorn and Hawthorn.  That word is sceach and has a rich Irish folklore significance.

I’ve always had a fascination about being in the woods at night.  Trees take on a different form, unseen in daylight.  I talk more of this in relation to my painting ‘Night-time trees in a blue satin dress (Crainn oíche i ngúna gorm satin)’, but here’s a flavour…

In the dark, I walked through fields, over stone wall and fairy stream.  In the dark of night we went, to be amongst trees.  Their glowing beauty and strange energy that enthralled me.  To the ‘Fairy ring’ mouse and me.  We ducked through sheep-made tunnels and twisted maze, then hunkered down and ate my bread.

I had this feeling of complete and utter freedom…there was such an elemental power in it…to feel at one with that world, beneath the trees in the corner of this field in the night.

2. Facing wall (stage door)

‘Tidelands’, mixed media on canvas, £640/€750

Heavily influenced by several books I’m reading at the moment about the old byways and seaways.  Ancient Celtic roads of land and sea used for centuries and remembered in oral tradition. The folklore of many shared maritime histories.

Books I would recommend ‘Listen to the land speak’ by Manchán Magan, ‘Wild Atlantic Women’ by Gráinne Lyons, and ‘The old Ways’ by Robert MacFarlane.

‘Sand dunes and mirrored skies’, oil on paperboard, £460/€540

‘This Island’, oil on canvas, £580/€680

3. Green room wall

‘One hill further’, oil on canvas, £460/€540

4. Staggered Wall (Reading top to bottom, right to left.)

‘Time and tide greet the sky, towards the Isle’, oil on paper board £280/€330

‘Lakes, like twins, once sacred’, oil on canvas, £280/€330

‘Elephant Sky’, oil on paperboard, £260/€300

‘Skylines I’, oil on paperboard, £140/€160

August Moonlit laughter’, oil on canvas board, £220/€260

‘Skylines II’, oil on paperboard, £140/€160

‘In the company of foxgloves’, oil on paper board, £300/€350

‘Light across the Foyle, memories of legends told’, oil on paper board, £320/€375

‘Skin prickling, watching with the smell of rain heavy in the air’, oil on canvas, £400/€470

‘I return, like the tide, to feel your embrace’, oil on canvas board, £220/€260

5. Female Wall

‘Cloudscape I’, oil on wood birch panel, £520/€610

‘Cloudscape II’, oil on wood birch panel, £520/€610

‘Cloudscape III’, oil on wood birch panel, £520/€610

6. Window Wall

‘Land-shape dreaming’, oil on paper board, £460/€540

This painting inspired the title of my exhibition.  It is a view looking across to the Isle of Doagh from Knockamanybends, where you can see many small coves. Some of these you cannot reach unless you camp out, are awake and running at 5.30am with the sun as the tide goes out.  Here are those grassy cliff faces I’ve climbed with my bare hands as a child, and the weather…always the weather.

Please feel free to leave any comments via my email [email protected]