Work in Progess at Scoil Mhuire Girls National School Ballincollig
We are creating a wall piece based on 6th class girls’ interpreation of the School Crest
See blog post here
For the first decade of the milennium much of my work was in ceramic, I made ritual vessels in my studio and I worked on large scale participatory works with communities which took the form of form of ceramic and cement play sculptures in schools and public places.
Yin Yang The Glen
For Cork Capital of Culture I proposed a kind of beautiful /graffiti project for the community to leave their mark in in the Glen Park. On residency I worked with local schools and community groups, we bought a kiln which we housed in the basement of the St Brendan’s Church. Our workshops revolved aroung sharing stories and doodling elements form these stories onto tiles, based on the idea of a ceramic “tag” there were names of heros, pictures of fairies and caterpillars, a cosmic egg, a globe, all kinds of birds and beasts. People from the age of 4 to the age of 60+ took part. One visiting young woman from Liverpool suggested we create the form in the shape of a yin yang sign to celebrate and promote Peace and understanding. We created a version of this form and the sculpture has become known locally as “the Snake”, “the Dragon” or “The Crocodile”, Children ofen take some of their first steps walking the serpants back.
Yin Yang the Glen
aka The Snake and sometimes “The Dragon” or “The Crocodile” appears as a Magic Healing Garden portal in a game app Harry Potter:Wizards Unite.
Crann Fiodh na gCaor St Senan’s School Enniscorthy
I won a % for art commission to work with the whole school community to create a play scupture in their yard. I was interested in how Vinegar Hill got its unusual name. I was also curious to hear about the childrens’ connections with the place. We talked all about Vinegar Hill and what it meant to each of us. There were historic scenes that involved pikes and battles and also more prosaic memories about falling down and grazing a knee or jumping into puddles. We found that the name arose from a phonetic mistranslation from Gaelic , Cnoc Fiodh na gCaor, meaning The Hill of the Berry Tree and so this suggested a tree form for the end piece which would hold our stories. Curiously, there was another understanding that it might have been “the Hill of the White Goat”.
Linked Pools, Spiddal
In Spiddal I worked with a gaelscoil , the commission was to celebrate the coming together of the girls and the boys national schools of Scoil Éinne and so we worked with meanings arising from our names, we researched the Gaelic meanings and invited parents to share the naming stories, sometimes children also made up their own stories and personal associations with their names.
The sculpture’s form is a serpentine shape and acts as a passive water sytem. There is a strong gardening ethos in the school, and the children needed a place to fill their watering cans. So we created a rainwater harvesting pool. We embedded the S and an E for Scoil Éanna, in our colour scheme with the E holding the upper pool where rainwater collects, in heavy rains the pool overspills and flows over the tiles into the soakaway at the bottom.
I was shortlisted to make murals for a retirement home and I used the traditional mineral colour palette from old majolica tiles – made from cobalt, copper, iron, and tin. The imagery is based on tattoos, pets and native Irish animals, I was thinking about a sailor’s arm and travel far and wide and of the return to domesticity, nurture and refuge of “home”.
I was invited to work with a local secondary school on a mural to celebrate their yellow flag celebrating diversity and friendship. The boys wanted to work with a them of flags to represent all the different nationalities in the school at the time. They made tiles to celebrate 15 different countries and explored other ideas connected with their native countries. The whole piece came together as a school flag with a big chocolate donut in the middle, food they said brings us all together.
Haunted Castle, Mallow
Was an intergenerational project invlolving all of the local schols and youth groups with elders from the community – discussing Hallloween now and in times past and creating spooky mobiles that tinkled in the trees.
A blogpost from recent work at Mallow Castle:
julforrester 