"Fields of Vision" ; Cross Border Arts Project in Collaboration With Ten Schools From Leitrim and Fermanagh

Organised by the Leitrim Sculpture Centre, Manorhamilton, Co. Leitrim, Fields of Vision explores the diversity of the border landscape in terms of its cultural and physical geographies and their mutual influences and interactions.

Four Irish artists, Andrew Dodds, Diane Henshaw, Seoidín O’Sullivan and Moira Tierney, each with particular interests in landscape representation and environmental arts practice, worked with ten schools from different border areas and cultural backgrounds.

Their joint exhibition features new works commissioned for the event and includes ‘End Times’ by Andrew Dodds; ‘Mapping Flight’ by Seoidín O’Sullivan; ‘Border Lines’ and ‘Drawing Music’ by Diane Henshaw and the filmwork ‘Are We There Yet?’ by Moira Tierney.

Artists Bio’s and Information

Andrew Dodds is a Belfast-born artist, now based in London. His work is exhibited and commissioned widely at major public galleries, artist-run spaces and sites beyond the gallery. Dodds consistently engages and acknowledges others in the imagining, production and reception of his artwork, often questioning received structures and certainties within and beyond the art arena. He is particularly noted for his context-specific works exploring our historical and cultural relationship with ‘nature’, the ‘voice’, and the shared potentialities of public space. He has a Masters in Fine Art from the Slade School of Art and has received awards from the British Council, University College London and Arts Council England among others.

Recent exhibitions include Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2009), Azad Art Gallery, Tehran (2010), The Architecture Centre, Bristol (2009), Gallery 400, Chicago (2007). He is currently undertaking a series of residencies in Iran supported by Visiting Arts, London; writing an article for Frieze on Fakes and Forgeries at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London; and continuing his long-standing interest in the talking budgerigar Sparkie Williams with a publication by art publishers ‘information as material’.

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Diane Henshaw
Biography

Diane Henshaw graduated with her Degree in Fine Art from the University of Ulster in Belfast in 1995 and with her Masters in Fine Art from UUB in 2000.

Originally from Islandmagee in County Antrim, Henshaw practised in Belfast at Queen Street Studios Artists Collective, for just under a decade before moving to Tempo in County Fermanagh.

Henshaw has exhibited both Nationally and Internationally over the past decade and has worked as Artist in Residence at The Hooger Institute for Fine Arts in Antwerp, Belgium; The Chitraniketan Art Residency in Kerala, India; The Tyrone Guthrie Centre at Annaghmakerrig in Monaghan (multiple visits), The Sanskriti Kendra Artists Residency - New Delhi, India and in ‘08 at The Arts Council of Northern Ireland’s Residency in the Queens Borough of New York City. Her work is in many private collections both nationally and internationally.Henshaw’s work has travelled as far as China, New Zealand, New York, Las Vegas, Mexico, France, Belgium, Bosnia, Georgia and many other International venues over the past 15 years.

Henshaw will be artist in residence in November at the Arts Council of N. Irelands residency programme in NYC. Diane will exhibit in Tokyo in Nov 10.

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Seoidin O’Sulivan
Biography

O’Sullivan’s practice investigates socio-political and ecological narratives which she re-presents in critically engaged and poetical ways through a variety of media. Recent concerns involve an interest in ideas of ‘the commons’ and the notion of shared assets. What if we recognized ‘the commons’ as belonging to all of us? What would happen if we put a renewed interest in our inherited and publicly owned commons?

O’Sullivan’s case studies focus on people joining together in action to protect or develop an aspect of their local commons. Her practice supports sustainable models within various ecological contexts and addresses issues of land use, lost knowledge and bio diversity.

Seoidin O’Sulivan grew up in Kitwe, Zambia and later lived in Durban, South Africa where she completed a degree in Fine Art in 2000. She completed a Masters in Fine Art at the National college of Art and Design, Dublin (2005- 2007) where she researched the cultural challenge environmental sustainability poses to contemporary art. Her practice both collaborative and individual have received numerous awards and she have been exhibited widely. She currently teaches an elective at Dublin Institute of Technology that she designed called ‘Cultural Practices and Ecological Debate’.

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Moira Tierney
Biography

Moira Tierney graduated with an honours BA from University College Dublin and went on to study fine art at l’Ecole Nationale d’Arts de Cergy-Paris, graduating in 1997 with an honours Diplome Nationale Superieure d’Expression Plastique. She was granted an Arts Council film award and a Fulbright Scholarship (to Anthology Film Archives in New York) in 1998 as well as a grant from the Irish Taoiseach’s Department for her film project ‘Matilda Tone’. Since moving to New York Moira has completed 14 short films as well as the half-hour documentary ‘Matilda Tone’; her films have screened internationally at venues such as the Fondation Cartier in Paris, the Rio Film Festival, the London and Edinburgh Film Festivals, the Rotterdam Film Festival and the Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid, as well as participating in numerous touring programmes and gallery shows. Anthology Film Archives in New York and Les Inattendus Film Festival in Lyon have screened retrospective programmes of her work. Her films are distributed by Third World Newsreel and the Film-Makers Co-operative in New York and the Collectif Jeune Cinema in Paris.

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Participating schools included: St Clare’s, Manorhamilton; St. Mary’s Brollagh, Fermanagh; Killyhommon NS Boho; Kiltyclogher NS; St. Mary’s, Killesher; St. Martins, Garrison; Gaelscoil Chluainin; Florencecourt Fermanagh; Drumlease NS and St Hughes, Dowra.

Curator

Sean O’Reilly; Leitrim Sculpture Centre

This project has been funded by the Peace III Programme through the European Union’s European Regional Development Fund which is managed by the Special EU Programmes Body.