September 17–October 31, 2021
Artists: Adam Gibney, Vanessa Donoso López, Bríd Murphy, Seoidín O’Sullivan, Linda Quinlan
Graft has been developed by the Glucksman and the National Sculpture Factory curatorial team of Valerie Byrne, Chris Clarke, Tadhg Crowley, Fiona Kearney, and Dobz O’Brien.
Graft is a collaborative project that has commissioned five artists to create new temporary sculptural interventions in Cork city. Aiming to transform, disrupt and celebrate the existing built environment, Graft locates new artworks at key sites between the locations of the Glucksman and the National Sculpture Factory, creating a novel artistic experience for audiences in Cork city.
Adam Gibney’s installation comprises a series of 3D printed, solar-powered loudspeakers arranged in a network throughout University College Cork. Customised to emit words when triggered by precipitation, these speakers convey a sentence across multiple audible points, enunciating a phrase that audiences can follow from one speaker to another. By manipulating everyday objects and phrases, Gibney attempts to highlight the relationship between scientific uncertainties and the anxious state we sometimes occupy.
Vanessa Donoso López has produced a series of 100 kiln-fired clay “manuports”—stone-like ceramics embedded with intricate designs and patterns. The term denotes an object that has been carried one from location to another and, in her display of these works, Donoso López will cluster groups of the works along the banks of the River Lee. Over the course of Graft, the works will be intermittently submerged, partially visible through the water, as well as occupying embankments and outcroppings of land.
Bríd Murphy’s installation of four new films capture compressed bodies constricted to an overcrowded apartment. Highlighting the lack of suitable, affordable accommodation for young people due to Ireland’s ongoing housing crisis, and the need to share confined spaces at a time of lockdown restrictions, the films will be projected from inside the former Liam Ruiséal premises on Cork’s historic Oliver Plunkett Street, visible through the windows to the outside public. .
Seoidín O’Sullivan has produced a new series of swing-like sculptural works for Cork city centre’s Bishop Lucey Park. Suspended overhead from tree branches, these objects use copper-plated text to draw a range of connections between Cork and Zambia, copper mining, Afrofuturism, space exploration, and her own family background. They encourage viewers to gaze skyward, reading embossed quotations from the pioneering Edward Mukuka Nkoloso who created Zambia’s forgotten space programme.
Linda Quinlan engages with Cork city’s renowned English Market. Her painted designs of oysters, lemons, and other foodstuffs will adorn a series of customised aprons worn by the market traders of its various stalls and shops, and will be activated through their interactions with visitors and customers. In creating this new work, Quinlan captures the living vibrant spirit of the market and develops a sumptuous visual vocabulary that will appeal to both appetite and our senses; taste, smell and touch.
A dedicated series of online talks by the participating artists and a schools programme of tours, workshops, and events will accompany Graft.
Graft is supported by The Arts Council Ireland and Cork City Council .
