• Saol na Páirce – Taispeántas Ealaíon ar fud Pháirc San Anna, Ráth Eanaigh
• Arna bhainistiú ag Claire Power
• Na healaíontóirí atá páirteach ann: Aideen Barry, Carl Giffney, Niamh Jackman, John Jones, Maria McKinney and Beth O'Halloran
• Dátaí: Dé Luain 27 Iúil  - Dé Domhnaigh 23 Lúnasa 2009
• Uaireanta Oscailte an Taispeántais: Luan – Domhnach :  12pm- 5pm
• Cead isteach saor in aisce
• Camchuairteanna ar an dTaispeántas: Dé Domhnaigh 2 Lúnasa, Dé Domhnaigh 9 Lúnasa, Dé Domhnaigh 16 Lúnasa, Dé Domhnaigh 23 Lúnasa ag 3pm.  Ní gá áirithintí a dhéanamh roimh ré.

Críoch

Notes to the Editor

Parklife is a temporary exhibition of visual art by six Irish artists set in the unique environment of St. Anne's Park, Raheny, from Monday 27th July-Sunday 23rd August.  The exhibition is commissioned by Dublin City Council Arts Office under a new pilot award to support Emerging Curators.  Claire Power, the recipient of the inaugural award, invited six contemporary visual artists to respond to the landscape of St Anne's Park, its vast acreage, its wild and not so wild life, and its treasured history.  Parklife is part of Dublin City Council's: The Red Stables Summer Art Programme and is presented in association with the Open Spaces programme. 

Parklife borrows its title from the 1994 popular song by Blur, chosen to evoke associations with the mid 1990's when Ireland had a more optimistic economic outlook.  The exhibition celebrates the idea of 'park-life' and implicitly, the park, as a free civic space for recreation and enjoyment.  Six artists will present new work that prompts complex questions about the historical, social and natural world of St. Anne's Park in ways that are engaging, playful and fun.

Aideen Barry's Visual Fictions is an iPod animation tour of St. Anne's Park created in response to the history, flora and fauna, and mythical urban legends of the park.  The artist invites the public to download to iPod the animated video tour from the Dublin City Council Arts Office website www.theredstables.ie   and her own website www.aideenbarry.com  The animations will also be presented in the exhibition space at the Red Stables or can be downloaded to a computer.

Carl Giffney's Supreme Court: Imperial Measurements responds to the cultural background of St. Anne’s Park.  The artist uses the idea of lawn tennis, as an activity that traditionally expressed class, wealth and heritage and plays with it to a ludicrous scale. 

Niamh Jackman's installation, Flower Bed: Dreaming of Immortality beneath the Trees, evokes sentiments of the Romantic era and the tradition of Japanese water colours.  The bed, made from stone symbolising durability and cherry blossoms drawn on canvas signifying temporality, invites the park-goer to rest a while and dream under the watchful figure of the dreamer. 

John Jones' Study Room recreates an architectural space once occupied by the inhabitants of the old Guinness estate house.  Study Room is an attempt at bringing a once vital element of St. Anne's past back into the present day and so becomes a kind of relic or reminder of time departed.

Maria McKinney's Triadic Suspension/Trolley Disco, a complex installation within the landscape, is an approach to drawing in a physical space.  The shopping trolleys signify the consumerism of the twenty-first century, as the favourite new pastime.   McKinney's installation is a playful take on the subject and has a fairground appeal.

Beth O'Halloran's The Common is a series of soft textile sculptures of various birds and wildlife indigenous to St. Anne's park.  The sculptures have a rough, worn aesthetic conveying the artist's environmental and wildlife concerns for green areas in Ireland.

Additional Notes

The Open Spaces initiative seeks to explore the possibilities of innovative contemporary arts practice in the city's urban and suburban open spaces, presenting arts projects, talks and seminars by national and international practitioners.

The Red Stables were built by the Guinness family in 1885 as the estate stables for St. Anne's Park. This protected Victorian structure has been beautifully restored. As The Red Stables building is of historical significance, great care was taken by Dublin City Council in adapting the horse's stables to become artists' studios.  The size and shape of each of the studios is different depending on where the studio is located in the building. The building is Tudor-style, set around 3 sides of a courtyard. Many of the original features of the buildings have been retained.  The complex includes an exhibition/workshop space, a café/restaurant and a Saturday food market. The Red Stables welcomes the public to become familiar with the arts through exhibitions, participation in workshops, attending performances and engaging in special studio projects created by artists in the complex.  See www.theredstables.ie

Artists' Biographies

Aideen Barry is a visual artist working in a wide range of media.  In 2009, she exhibited at Galway Arts Centre, Mermaid Arts Centre and Limerick City Gallery and will exhibit as part of Futures at the RHA Gallagher Gallery in August.   Barry exhibited internationally at Moderna Museet, Sweden, Walter Phillps Gallery, Canada and will show at the Wexner Center for the Arts in Ohio in November.  International residencies include The Banff Centre, The Skaftfell Centre in Iceland and NASA Kennedy Space Centre,

Carl Giffney graduated with a BFA (First Class Hons) from National College of Arts and Design in 2007. Since then, he has been involved in many public projects, both internationally and in Ireland.  Conceptually, he is interested in belief structures, ways of explaining our surroundings, taxonomy and history.  Giffney attempts to negotiate these thematic concerns within the public domain; the outcomes often involve large scale physicality, interactivity and bemusing mistruths.

John Jones was born in 1981 and lives and works in Dublin. He studied Fine Art at the National College of Art and Design. Recent exhibitions include How Do You Know? Blankspace Gallery, California (2009), Summer Show 2009, Rua Red, Dublin, RHA Annual Exhibition (2009), House Warming, Rua Red, (2009), the VI International Biennial of Drawing, Pilsen, Czech Rep (2008-9), Dynamo Tells, The Berkeley Gallery, Kilkenny (2008), The Never Ending Telescope, The Back Loft, Dublin (2008)

Maria McKinney has been exhibiting since 2004 and included among her solo shows are the Context Gallery, Derry (2008) and O.M.A.C. Belfast (2007).  Group exhibitions include Resolutions at the Katzan Arts Centre, Washington DC (2007), Claremorris Open (2007) and Crawford Open 5 (2005).  She was the recipient of the Irish Artists' Residential Studio Award at Dublin City Council's The Red Stables (2008-2009).  She will exhibit in Futures at the R.H.A. in August 2009.  Her work is included in the Office of Public Works, Bank of Ireland and private collections.

Niamh Jackman is a graduate of the National College of Art and Design and is currently based in Dublin City Council's The Red Stables in St. Anne's Park.  She has exhibited widely, both nationally and internationally.  She has been the recipient of many awards and grants from bodies such as The Arts Council, Culture Ireland and UNESCO.  Jackman has participated in residency programmes throughout Europe including The Centre for Contemporary Arts in Prague. Her work is held in many public and private collections.

Beth O'Halloran lives and works in Dublin.  She received her MA in Visual Arts Practices from Institute of Art, Design and Technology (IADT) in 2006 and has a BA from National College of Art and Design and the Glasgow School of Art.  She has exhibited predominantly in Ireland and the U.S. but also in Japan and the U.K.  Recent exhibitions include Green Horizons at the Olin Museum of Art, USA, House Warming, Rua Red Tallaght, and Visual Fictions, the Fenton Gallery, Cork.

 Curator's Biography

Claire Power is the Studios Development Officer for Temple Bar Gallery and Studios and an independent curator.  In 2007, she worked as Public Art Programme Administrator for Dun Laogahire-Rathdown County Council.  Prior to this position, she worked as the press officer and studios administrator for Temple Bar Gallery and Studio, as the senior arts administrator for Graphic Studio Dublin and as art historian and researcher for the Officer of Public Works. She has a BA Hons in Art History and English from UCD (2000) and a MA Hons Cultural Policy and Arts Management from UCD (2002).