26/09/19
Panel discussion: The Politics & Ethics of Relational Aesthetics
For her exhibition Our Celestial Sphere, visual artist Kerry Guinan presents the art methodology ‘relational socialist realism,’ which has been a year in development with the support of the Arts Council of Ireland’s Next Generation Award 2018. Guinan is proposing relational socialist realism as a contemporary style that recognizes the economics of social relations, the socialist potential of these relations, and the manner in which capitalism obscures this potential from view. Cues from orthodox socialist realism and contemporary relational aesthetics are merged, perhaps contentiously, to offer an ideological art strategy for the 21st century. The resulting three-part series of ambitious works engages workers from across the world in an incriminating critique of globalized capitalism and the uncertain role of contemporary art within it.
Event
WRAP UP IN CULTURE—Culture Night 2019 at Pallas
Thursday 26th September, 6 pm
Kerry Guinan, Ann Ryan and Dr. Kieran Cashell
To coincide with her solo exhibition Our Celestial Sphere, the artist Kerry Guinan will take part in a panel discussion with artist Ann Ryan, chaired by Dr. Kieran Cashell, to discuss their divergent approaches to relational art.
Biographies:
Kerry Guinan is a visual artist and researcher based in Limerick and Dublin. Her site-specific interventions critique the interplay of art, place, and capital under neoliberalism. Guinan is a 2018/19 recipient of the Arts Council of Ireland’s Next Generation Award and is also currently supported by Fingal County Council. Recent projects include The Limerick Soviet Shilling Project (2019), a public intervention curated by Ciaran Nash, STALKER (2019), an international retreat with Franko B and a/political, and Presenting the Cultural Quarter (2017), a residency, intervention and exhibition with A4 Sounds, Dublin. Kerry Guinan is the curator of this year’s TULCA Festival of Visual Arts: TACTICAL MAGIC, in Galway.
Ann Ryan is a socially-engaged artist and recent graduate of MA in Social Practice and Creative Environment at the Limerick School of Art and Design, 2018. She has been an activist for over 25 years working on a variety of political and social justice campaigns. Her recent project Continue in Their Refusal involves a long term collaborative project with the Limerick Youth Service to re-imagine The Limerick Soviet for its centenary year in 2019.
Dr. Kieran Cashell lectures in Critical and Contextual Studies at Limerick School of Art and Design (LIT) and is author of Aftershock: The Ethics of Contemporary Transgressive Art (IB Tauris, 2009). He is currently completing a monograph on Richard Billingham.
