2023-07-06—2023-07-18
6th-18th July 2023, Cill Rialaig Artists Village & Iveragh Peninsula, County Kerry
As part of Pallas Projects' ongoing international exchanges with artists and curators in Croatia and Austria we are happy to present Staring at the Sea. This residency at the Cill Rialaig Artist Village is one section of a multi-part project which began as 'Stone Walls' led by Josip Zanki, exploring dry wall stone techniques as a tool for artistic expression and site-specific practice at Kožino, Privlaka, National Park Paklenica, Velebit Mountain, Fortica at the Island of Pag, Paška Vrata, Croatia in 2021; and continued as 'Wood and Stone', led by Luise Kloos, which extended the materiality of the project to include an exploration of natural materials, interventions, sited objects and performances in the natural environment of Grafenbergalm, Styrian Alps, Austria in 2022.
We are delighted to welcome artists to the Cill Rialaig village at the generosity of Dr. Noelle Campbell Sharp and the Cill Rialaig Project. This pre-famine village (c.1790) set high on a cliff at the very edge of Western Europe has been rescused and rehabilitated as the perfect retreat for artists, poets, writers, film makers and composers of national and international repute.
This symposium will foreground studio activity, reflection and group work alongside exploration in the open landscape. The combination of stone, sea and artistic retreat resonates with the ancient practices associated with the drystone beehive huts that were built in the region for meditation and reflection on the expanse of the Atlantic Ocean. Presentations from Aoibheann Lambe a local archaeologist with a speciality in the Iveragh Peninsula, and curators from each region will be supplemented by visits to Skellig Michel, ancient clocháin - beehive huts in Glenfahan on Slea Head, Loher Stone Fort and Beach, and Valencia Island.
We welcomed from Austria curator and artist Luise Kloos with artists Gerlinde Thuma, Silvia Maria Grossmann, arts manager Tanja Gurke and art historian Marie Maierhofer; from Croatia curator and artist Josip Zanki with artists Laura Stojkoski, Ivan Fijolic, Dorian Pacak and anthropologist Nikolina Durutt; alongside Irish artists Bernie Colhoun and Ellen-Rose Wallace. The project is curated by Mark Cullen & and administrated by Eve Woods.
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A special thanks to Dr. Noelle Campbell Sharp and the Cill Rialaig Project for hosting and welcoming us to the Iveragh Peninsula.
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Artwork details:
1. the line
Utilising quartz markings on stone to draw an artificial tideline, covering 200m of beach reaching from castle ruins towards the Abbey. Collaborative work - all artists
2. Kulaf, spatial intervention by Josip Zanki
Spatial intervention was created on the Atlantic coast. Etymology of the term Kulaf comes from the Dalmatian coast of Dugi otok and it is a term describing the open sea of the Adriatic (kulaf=gulf). I used stones found on the rocks and positioned them to follow the line and structure of nature.
3.Cup and Map, by Mark Cullen, Eve Woods, Ellen Wallace, Bernie Coulhoun on Toor Beach
Placed where a stream meets the sea, this intervention took inspiration from the Neolithic cup and ring motif found on rocks around the peninsula. Sized up, using sandstone and quartz the ring also maps the cardinal directions as well as Orion's belt, Bellatrix and Betelgeuse, Rigel and Saiph. A bridge was formed to allow the natural flow of water to pool within the central quartz before flowing to the sea.
4. Dry stone walling skills utilised to create a protective enclave and point towards the sea. Collaborative work by Luise Kloos, Gerlinde Thuma, Silvia Maria Grossmann, Tanja Gurke and Marie Maierhofer
5.Collaborative work by Josip Zank, Laura Stojkoski, Ivan Fijolic, Dorian Pacak and Nikolina Durut mapping mans evolutionary journey from sea to land.
6. Green sandstone and quartz double ring with central stacking stones marking distant constellations. Collaborative work by Luise Kloos, Gerlinde Thuma, Silvia Maria Grossmann, Tanja Gurke and Marie Maierhofer
7. Collaborative work by Josip Zank, Laura Stojkoski, Ivan Fijolic, Dorian Pacak and Anthropologist Nikolina Durutt.
8. Detail of Cup and Map
9. Detail of Cup and Map
10. the line
11-13.Breaking the Vawes, spatial intervention by Josip Zanki, Dorian Pacak, Laura Stojkoski and Nikolina Durut
We used wet sand as primary installation material and by its conversion to dry sand we included elements of light/colour. According to Goethe, colour origin is on the border between light and darkness. Transforming sand-dark into the sand-silver we follow traces of the Atlantic waves.
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Biographies
Curator: Josip Zanki (HR) was born in Zadar, on 14th March 1969. He grew up in the village of Privlaka, North West of Zadar. He graduated from the Graphic Department of the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb in 1994 (class of Professor Miroslav Šutej) with a thesis entitled “Mysticism in the Artistic Practice of J. Beuys” and an experimental series of etchings New Machines, a remake of the research conducted by the Croatian renaissance scientist Faust Vrančić. In 2016 he completed his Postgraduate Doctoral Studies in Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb. He received his PhD with a thesis entitled “Anthropological Conceptualisation of the Space in Thangka Painting and Contemporary Art Practices“ (supervisors Suzana Marjanić, and Leonida Kovač) on 11th February 2016. Since 1986 he has been working on the field of graphic media, film, video, installations, performances, and cultural anthropology. He has received numerous prizes for his artistic work. He has realized numerous exhibitions and projects in Croatia and abroad. He taught at the University of Zadar 2009 to 2017 and at Vytautas Magnus University in Kaunas 2016 and 2017. Since 2017 he has been teaching at the Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb. Since 2018 he has been vice president of the Croatian Association of Fine Artists, oldest and largest institution of its kind in Croatia and the entire region, established in 1868. He has been a member of the European Cultural Parliament since 2011. He lives and works in Zagreb.
Nikolina Durut (HR), art historian and cultural antropologist, University of Zadar
Laura Stojkoski (HR)
Ivan Fijolic (HR)
Dorian Pacak (HR)
Curator: Luise Kloos, born 1955 in Judenburg/Austria, lives and works in Graz.
She works with graphics, paintings, video, installations and performances and has a broad international network. Since her studies at the University of Graz / Architecture and the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna her work is focused on subjects like society, human conditions and cultural background.
Since 2009 she is continuously studying Tibetan Art at Thangde Gatsal Studio of Master Locho and Sarika Singh in Dharamsala/India.
Luise Kloos is founder of next – Verein für zeitgenössische Kunst, a contemporary art association based in Graz carrying out international artists in residence projects (www.nextkunst.at). She is member of the cultural advisory board of the city of Graz and chairwoman of the children`s museum in Graz. Furthermore Luise is a member of the European Cultural Parliament. Since 2016 Luise Kloos is organizing the Erasmus+ Program Croatian Students are volunteering Styrian Artists.
Silvia Maria Grossmann (AUT/CHE), Studium an der Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien (unter Franz Xaver Ölzant); Skulptur, Land Art
Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (under Franz Xaver Ölzant); sculpture, Land Art
silvia-grossmann.at | facebook
Tanja Gurke (AUT), Kunsthistorikerin, Geschäftsleitung Grazer Kunstverein; kunsthistorische Begleitung
Art historian, management of Grazer Kunstverein; art-historical support
Facebook
Luise Kloos (AUT), Studium an der Universität Graz und an der Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien, Leitung next – Verein für zeitgenössische Kunst; Konzeption, Projektleitung, Land Art, Curator
Studies at the University of Graz and at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, head of next – Verein für zeitgenössische Kunst; concept, project management, Land Art, Curator
luisekloos.at | nextkunst.at | drawing-impulses.com | facebook.com/luise.kloos | facebook.com/next
Marie Maierhofer (AUT), Kunsthistorikerin, Studium Germanistik Universität Graz; Projektassistenz
Art historian, study of German Philology University of Graz; project assistance
https://www.facebook.com/marie.maierhofer.376
Gerlinde Thuma (AUT), Studium an der Akademie der bildenden Künste Wien (unter Maria Lassnig); Land Art
Studies at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna (under Maria Lassnig); Land Art
gerlindethuma.at | facebook.com/gerlinde.thuma
Ellen-Rose Wallace (IE) is a visual artist working with lens-based media, 3D animation, sculpture, and sound art. Developing from an early interest in folklore, her practice is concerned with how we conceptualise history, legacy and narrative. Her work is interested in how during times of societal upheaval, our experience and depictions of reality and temporality are altered.
Ellen-Rose graduated from Limerick School of Art and Design in 2021. Upon graduating, she was awarded the Ormond Studios Graduate Residency Award, which culminated in her first solo show ‘Ascend | Recede’. She was shortlisted for the RDS Visual Art Awards and was a runner up for the Screaming Pope Prize at K-Fest 2021. In 2022, she won the open call prize for her work in the show ‘you breathe differently down here’ at Draíocht Gallery.
Most recently, Ellen-Rose has been selected as a member of the Douglas Hyde Student Forum 2023, and has received the Arts Council Agility Award, which she is using to develop a body of work through the medium of traditional dry stone walling. Recent group shows include ‘Belonging and Displacement’ at Rua Red and ‘The Lord Hath Commanded’ at Sailor’s Home, Limerick.
ellenrosewallace.com | @ellenrosewallace
Bernie Colhoun (IE) primarily works in print and sculpture, creating abstract, geometric and minimalist works. Initially inspired by mineralogy and its unseen processes during her time working in the jewellery trade, in the years since she has pursued ideas surrounding geologic time and our human interaction with it. Her work is a meditation on the physical essence of time and creation. “How can we perceive the expansive timescales of our past when geologic time itself equates to eternal change and progression, nearly incomprehensible in our organic lifetimes.” By manifesting snapshots of immensely vast timescales and infinitesimally brief moments she reveals the often unseen world below our very own feet. Using reclaimed objects where possible is also an important aspect of Colhoun’s practice, elevating waste materials and assigning a sense of permanence to them. Colhoun is a fine art graduate from Crawford College of Art & Design and has exhibited nationally, she was a founding member of ‘ Sample Studios ‘ in Cork City. This year she has been awarded a residency at Pulled Print Studios in Sligo and has been invited to be part of this year's Land Art & Reflection Symposium “Staring at the Sea”. In September she will also begin undertaking a diploma in Gemmology course at the University of Galway.
berniecolhoun.com | instagram.com/bernie.colhoun/ | facebook.com/BernieColhounArt
Aoibheann Lambe is a Kerry-based archaeologist who specialises in prehistoric megalithic-era mark making - particularly carvings in open air contexts on boulders and rock outcrop. In Ireland, such carvings are generally referred to as ‘rock art’, a moniker which encompasses paintings, carvings and mark making iof any kind of any type on any rock worldwide. In her fourth career to date, Aoibheann recently took Ip the position of Community Tourist Officer for the South Kerry Gaeltacht and relishes using Irish, a language which is a direct link to Ireland’s cultural past, in her everyday working life.
Facebook/Instagram: Rock Art Kerry. Facebook: Irish rock art. Facebook and Twitter: Irish medieval graffiti
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