“Through my work I try to create a sense of place without a specific location in mind. A process of layering invokes the elements of land, sea and sky. Derived from memory and emotions I am bringing them back together in my paintings, holding on to the chance accidents and spontaneous marks which are integral to my technique without losing the overall compositional intention, I balance between habitual mark making and recognising happy accidents when they occur.
This process of layering is not only physical – there is a darker edge to my paintings, a deeper meaning that lurks in the shadows. They are not only abstract landscapes but “inscapes”, bringing the outside and inside world together, merging places with emotions and letting the viewer follow me on my emotional journey while experiencing their own that is what my art is about.” Ken Browne
In these highly evocative works, landscape becomes the vehicle through which the artist explores the realms of human emotion and the subconscious.
These meticulously crafted abstract paintings were inspired by the artists’ experience of different Irish landscapes. These are not specific landscapes but a synthesis of natural scenes that the artist has beheld in the past and which have left an indelible mark on his imagination. The upper zone of each painting is dominated by skilfully-rendered, turbulent skyscapes. While these skies are impressively Turneresque in their grandeur, they are also unmistakeably Irish. They vary as only an Irish sky can vary, grey and misty one moment, warm and burnished the next.
However, to uncover the true emotional and psychological depth of these works, a more prolonged viewing is necessary. If the upper area of the work is defined by exuberant skies, then the lower area is defined by layers of dark and shadowy colour, suggesting that beneath these energetic skyscapes there lurks something foreboding. As the painting descends there is a gradual abandonment of realistic description in favour of areas of darkness where something deeper, more powerful, and perhaps more sinister dwells. With their blacks and browns, deep reds and golds, these lower zones are admirably reminiscent of some of the greatest practitioners of tenebrismo such as Caravaggio or Velazquez. Here we are truly in the realm of the subconscious, the implication being that one’s experience of nature is inextricably linked to deep-rooted emotional and spiritual processes lying dormant inside us all. These works go even further by suggesting that the human senses are inadequate when it comes to perceiving natural elements, that only when they operate in tandem with these intuitive emotional/spiritual processes does one begin to comprehend the natural world.
It is this interplay between bright skyscapes at the top and shadowy realms at the bottom that marks these out as truly original works. Viewers are advised to take their time with these paintings, to let the eye gaze back-and-forth between these beautiful zones of light and dark until the work awakens an instinctive emotional response to the experience of the Irish landscape.
Donal O’ Sullivan
Exhibitions & Residences
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2018 The Doorway Gallery,Dublin
2015 Greenacres Gallery.Wexford Invited Artist, solo show with John Behan RHA
2014 The Doorway Gallery, Dublin
2013 Shelbourne Hotel , Dublin
2013 Cill Rialaig Art Center,Kerry
2011 Origin Gallery, Dublin
2009 Urban Retreat Gallery, Dublin
2009 Greenacres Gallery, Wexford
2008 Signal Arts Centre, Bray
Selected Group Exhibitions:
2018 Boyle Arts Festival (Invited)
2018 The Doorway Gallery summer show
2017 Greenacres Gallery,Wexford Opera Festival (Invited)
2016 Greenacres Gallery,Wexford Opera Festival (Invited)
2015 Greenarces Gallery,Wexford Opera Festival (Invited)
2014 Lime Tree Gallery,UK. The Doorway Gallery London
2013 Catherine Hammond Gallery, West Cork
2013 Mckenna Gallery, Omagh
2013 Greenacres Gallery,Wexford Opera Festival (Invited), The Doorway Gallery London
2012 Royal Ulster Academy 131st Annual Exhibition
2012 Elements. Touring Exhibition,OPW
2012 Peppercanister Gallery. Dublin
2012 Mckenna Gallery,Omagh
2012 Greenacres Gallery,Wexford Opera Festival(Invited), The Doorway Gallery London
2012 Cill Rialaig Art Center,Kerry
2011 Oliver Sears Gallery, Dublin.Black and White Show (Invited)
2011 Greenacres Gallery,Wexford Opera Festival (Invited)
2011 The Lyndsay Gallery,Dublin
2010/11 Kilkenny Arts Festival
2010 Cill Rialaig Art Center,Kerry
2010 Leinster Gallery ,Dublin
2008/9 Greenacres Gallery,Wexford
2008 Leinster Gallery
2007/08 Cill Rialaig Arts Center
Collections
OPW
Wexford Opera House
Coombe Hill Golf Club. London
Residence Private Club, Dublin
Wish Architects, London
Key Capital. Dublin
Fox Linton Associates, London
Christina Noble Children’s Foundation
Capella Hotel and Spa, Cork
Radisson Hotel, Cork
Residencies
May 2007 Cill Rialaig Project ,Co Kerry
September 2007 Cill Rialaig Project ,Co Kerry
February 2008 Cill Rialaig Project ,Co Kerry
September 2009 Cill Rialaig Project ,Co Kerry
July 2013 Cill Rialaig Project ,Co Kerry
Recent Award
Meath Bursary for Tyrone Guthrie Centre 2013
