This exhibition looks at Family and participating artists
use objects from both the Hunt Museum and Limerick City Museum as a reference point
in making a visual art response. 17 artists are taking part in this show and
their work is sited beside the objects that they choose.
Here are images and information about my responses.
 |
| Share, Oil on Canvas, 18 X 24cm |
Limerick Museum has a wonderful eclectic collection of
silver. In choosing an object suggesting
family, I was attracted to the cutlery. It
has shared food and touched lips through generations. It is formal, valuable
and yet ordinary too. It can be the inherited family silver or just the
handiest implement to stir the gravy.
Meeting and sharing food and conversation is part of the gel
of society. As families we catch up
around the kitchen table at dinner and silver’s surface reflects our lives back
on us. In this work the silver on a
check background reflects this union of formality and homeliness.
 |
| Choker, Oil on Canvas, 24 X 18 cm. |
Pearls have symbolically represented purity, wisdom and
wealth. Greek legend said they were
tears of the gods and Hindu folklore saw pearls as dewdrops. To keep their
lustre they must be worn regularly, as the oil from the skin feed them. This
makes them quite intimate objects passing through generations of families.
However, I see pearls today more as symbolising wealth and
conservatism. The pearls in this work act as decoration but also, more
threateningly, represent a noose of respectability that’s stifling the woman. The
painting is part of the ongoing conversation regarding the status of women in
the family and in society now.
