Current Trends - Past Prospects was the first Dublin ‘solo’ exhibition of the collaborative practice of then Leitrim-based artists Sarah Browne & Gareth Kennedy. Their collaborative practice develops ways of temporarily occupying particular architectural fragments and cultural texts. Often they create incongruous territories between ‘real’ and artificial; fact and fiction; politics and kitsch.

 The work in this exhibition is derived from sources that include a 1977 Hollywood film; a fragment of a script from TV show Dallas (1987); an advertising jingle Bringing Home the Oil – promoting the Gulf Oil company based in Bantry Bay (1969), and a Dáil debate (1985, after the Betelgeuse disaster). The actors in these texts are concerned with global economics and natural resources, and as a series, these obscure cultural artifacts begin to re-trace an alternative historical trajectory linked to contemporary concerns.

Biographies:

Browne and Kennedy both graduated from Sculpture at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin in 2003. Their collaborative practice was initiated during time spent working in Thailand as recipients of an Arts Council Travel and Mobility Award. Recent exhibitions of their collaborative work include: EV+A, Limerick, curated by Katerina Gregos; Space Shuttle, PS2, Belfast; Claremorris Open, Co. Mayo, curated by Jeremy Millar; and Cluster, organised by Katie Holten for Participant Inc. New York, and touring to Mexico City & LA (all 2006). They are based in Co. Leitrim where they are pursuing solo and collaborative projects.

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