Cork County Council’s Library and Arts Service to Host ‘In My Time’ Exhibition

sculpture depicting a chair, spade and miniature ladder balanced upon each other.

Cork County Council’s Library and Arts Service has announced ‘In My Time’, an exhibition of sculptural works by Denis O’Connor will open at Library Headquarters Gallery on the 28th of March. In part autobiographical, the exhibition reflects on elements of the artist’s own life, growing up in Ireland in the 1960s and now living between an agricultural rural area in Barna, West Cork and the quarrying district in Derbyshire.

Denis’ sculptures embody the effects that farming and excavation can have on our land. His explorations by kayak and bike along the coastline in West Cork contribute to his artistic expression. The sculptures in this exhibition are forged, hammered, welded and fabricated in different types of metal: mild, corten, stainless steel and bronze to create sculptures with repeated symbolic and structural forms, including ladders, boulders, chairs, boats, houses, shovels and pick axes.

Mayor of the County of Cork, Cllr. Frank O’Flynn welcomed the exhibition, 

We are delighted to present the work of Denis O’Connor. He is an award-winning public artist working with a variety of public spaces and audiences to create landmark sculptures. We are privileged to have Denis’ work available to us on a scale that will inhabit the LHQ Gallery in Cork County Library. I would encourage everybody to make time to see this fantastic exhibition of work.

Denis O’Connor was born in Dublin and brought up in Millstreet, Co Cork. He works and lives between Wirksworth, Derbyshire and Barna, West Cork. He trained at Limerick School of Art from 1978-82, and the University of Central England, 1983–84. His practice has been divided between working as lead artist with the public art company ‘Sculpture Works’ and developing his own sculpture work.

Over the last 25 years, Denis has produced large public art sculptures that can be seen across Ireland and in the UK, in both urban and rural sites within the private and public sectors. These include works installed in Andover, Ballyshannon, Belfast, Cardiff, Cork, Chesterfield, Clonmel, Derby, Dundalk, Leicester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Newtownstewart, Stoke-on-Trent and Waterford. 

The exhibition will be opened by Catherine Fehily, former Head of MTU Crawford College of Art and Design on the 28th of March at 6:00pm. There will be a talk with the artist as part of the opening event. The exhibition will be viewable from Monday to Friday from 9:00am to 5:30pm until Friday the 26th of April 2024. Admission is free.

A free ‘Artists in Conversation’ event about Public Art will be held on Thursday the 25th of April at 1:00pm. To register for this event, please email arts@corkcoco.ie