Dublin City Council’s The LAB Gallery is pleased to present its latest exhibition What does it mean to know? This new exhibition is by Irish artists Ethna Rose O’Regan and Sinead McCann (working in collaboration with writer and sociologist Louise Brangan).
It takes place at the LAB Gallery, Foley St, Dublin from 12th of June – 26th July 2025. The exhibition will be open to the public Monday to Saturday, 10.00 am to 6.00 pm.
The LAB was established by Dublin City Council in 2005 as a municipal arts hub, housing gallery, rehearsal and incubation space for a range of art forms.
The LAB Gallery supports emerging art practices and delivers a year round programme of free events for all ages. In addition to Dublin City Council, the LAB Gallery is supported by the Arts Council.
Magdalene Laundries are closed now, but their legacies linger. This new exhibition asks, as Irish people, have we reckoned with this painful past? McCann and Brangan’s unique collaboration comprises two new artworks: No babies were born there, a large scale sculptural text work, and I’m still there, a light and sound installation. We do not present the Laundries as some kind of historically sequestered event that took place far away, back then, and over there. Instead, both works invite people to consider some of the narrative and statistical fictions that guide how we make sense of the Laundries today. We ask the viewer to reflect upon the question: What does it mean to remember?
O’Regan’s photographic series, ‘After Magdalene’ (2006-2009), was made in the last of the Magdalene Laundries on Sean McDermott Street, which officially closed in 1996. O’Regan first gained access in 2006. The sense of despair and isolation which was palpable everywhere, seemed to permeate the very wallpaper and floorboards of this building. Her images of the remnants and detritus that were left behind, evoke a feeling of an indescribable sadness of so many lives disavowed. With this work, she wishes to create a space for reflection and urge people to never forget our past so that this abuse of power towards Irish women will never happen again.
Dublin City Council is aware of the sensitivities of this exhibition and its connection to the Magdalen Laundries.
During this exhibition at The Lab, the artists involved and the Dublin City Council staff at the Lab will be sensitive to and supportive of any patron who may find the exhibit or experience distressing in any way.
***Attached please find an image by Ethna Rose O’Regan featured in the exhibition***
Opening night discussions
4.30pm - 6pm
Introduction
Margarita Cappock, the Lab Gallery
Panel discussion with booking through Eventbrite see Dublin City Council Arts Office
What does it mean to remember? Louise Brangan, academic and author of the forthcoming The Fallen:The Magdalene Laundries and Ireland’s Legacy of Silence, who will be in discussion with Derek Scally, Irish Times journalist and author of the best-selling The Best Catholics in the World.
What role has the arts in recovering this past? A discussion between the artists Sinead McCann, Ethna Rose O’Regan, Evelyn Glynn and Alison Lowry.
Funded by Dublin City Arts Office, Economic and Social Research Council, UK, and Arts Council of Ireland.
ENDS