Arts and Humanities Commons^™

The Meaning Of Dark, Light And Shadows: Inferences In Art, Materiality And Cultural Practices, Frank Prendergast

Book/Book Chapter

Our visual awareness relies on light acting on the eye to perceive materiality and colour. Medieval thought wrestled to articulate and comprehend its nature. The notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci, for example, included his descriptions to define light and make comparisons so as to differentiate between light and shadow. His focus was on the illumination of surfaces from the perspective of a painter, seeing shadows as ‘the diminution of light by the intervention of an opaque body’ and ‘the counterpart of luminous rays’. In his mind, a shadow ‘stood between light and darkness’, with darkness being ‘the absence of light’. …

James Mahony (C.1816-1859): The Illustrated London News, Niamh Ann Kelly

Books/Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

The North Sky And The Otherworld: Journeys Of The Dead In The Neolithic Considered, Frank Prendergast

Book/Book Chapter

The majority of Irish passage tombs (c. 230) predominantly date to the Middle Neolithic (c. 3600–3000 BC). A small number of summit cairns may also contain passage tombs because of their round form, proximity and intervisibility. The island’s passage tombs and related cairns share distinguishing characteristics – elevated siting, visibility and long-range views of distant horizons in varying directions of the compass. This chapter presents the findings of the first scenic analysis of the horizon and views at these sites recorded at an island scale. The method uses measured orientations of horizon sectors related to observed variation in horizon range. …

Mapping The Light Fantastic At Newgrange, Frank Prendergast, Clare Tuffy, John Lalor, Claire Breen, Sinéad Gargan

Articles

THE WORLD HERITAGE PROPERTY of Brú na Bóinne attracts thousands of visitors from Ireland and around the globe, many drawn by the remarkable winter solstice phenomenon, when the rising sun’s rays illuminate the burial chamber. During 2020 it became clear that public health measures to combat the global pandemic were going to preclude visitor access to the chamber of the Great Mound of Newgrange, including during the annual winter solstice celebrations. When the government agencies OPW and NMS discussed how to manage Newgrange and the solstice during the restrictions, Clare Tuffy, Manager of Visitor Services at Brú na Bóinne, suggested …

Botanical Tour Of Christian Art At The National Museum Of Ancient Art (Lisbon, Portugal), Luis Mendonça De Carvalho, Francisca Maria Fernandes, Maria De Fátima Nunes, Miriam Lopes, Maria Vlachou, Paula Nozes, Ana Maria Costa

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Christian works of art, from the middle XIV to early XIX centuries, were studied in order to contribute to a new perspective of the cultural history of plants in Portuguese and European art displayed at the National Museum of Ancient Art (NMAA). The symbolic use of trees, leaves, flowers and fruits in painting, sculpture and tapestry were compared with theological data from the Bible, Apocrypha Gospels and codes of symbols from the XVII to XX centuries, as well as pictorial data from academic literature and photographic databases. We found 40 botanical taxa used as symbols that aimed to reinforce moral …

Relocated Pilgrimage: An Artistic Via Dolorosa In The Heart Of Amsterdam, Lieke Wijnia

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The route of the iconic Stations of the Cross is not only connected to physical locations of the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem, but is also manifest in Catholic churches, processions, and passion plays, as well as heritage sites and shrines around the world. A twenty-first-century relocation of this pilgrimage is the international project Art Stations of the Cross. With the aim to offer artistic reflections on social injustice, each station is represented by an artwork especially located in a heritage site. Presented as a journey of contemplation, the 2019 edition took place in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. In this article, participant …

Famine In Art - Imagery, Influences And Exhibition In Mid-20th-Century Ireland, Niamh Ann Kelly

Books/Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

Imaging The Great Irish Famine: Representing Dispossession In Visual Culture, Preface & Introduction, Niamh Ann Kelly

Books/Book Chapters

‘Niamh Ann Kelly's lavishly illustrated book throws new light on the visual culture commemorative of hunger, famine and dispossession in mid-nineteenth-century Ireland. Located within the discipline of International Memorial Studies, the text and images both challenge and extend our understanding of Famine history. Examining the visual culture since the time of the Famine until the present, Kelly asks, how do we view, experience and represent the past in the present? To what extent does the viewer insert themselves in this complex process? Is there such a thing as ethical spectatorship? Kelly’s sophisticated yet sympathetic study of the “grievous history” …

Femagogical Strategies In The Art School: Navigating The Institution, Barbara Knezevic, Amy Walsh

Articles

This writing aims to define and examine ‘femagogy’ and the transformative potential for an inclusive intersectional feminist teaching practice in Fine Art education in the context of the contemporary Irish art school. This writing will trace the influence of linguistic power structures and the influence of broader institutional patriarchy in an educational setting and outline the inspirations and genealogies of femagogy. This writing provides situated embodied examples of femagogy in practice. It proposes the femagogical model of teaching as one that situates itself outside prevailing patriarchal models and proposes strategies to reimagine knowledge production and navigate the prevailing structural patriarchy …

James Joyce Run: Why Are We On The Move Again If It's A Fair Question?, Barry Sheehan

Academic Articles

I write a blog www.jj21k.com which looks at the works of James Joyce, the environment which he wrote about and changes that have taken place since he wrote about them. The blog posts are predominantly about Dublin.

During a time of injury, instead of running I was able to cycle. This blogpost describes the journey James Joyce made through houses in Dublin that he lived in whilst growing up. This is paralleled with a cycle I made and narrative I wrote.

You can see more background information and other posts on www.jj21k.com.

James Joyce, Bruce Springsteen And The Notion Of Exile: It's A Town Full Of Losers, And I'M Pulling Out Of Here To Win, Barry Sheehan

Academic Articles

“It’s a town full of losers and I’m pulling out of here to win.”

Bruce Springsteen (1975) Thunder Road, Track 1 of Born to Run [CD], Columbia.

“So it returns. Think you're escaping and run into yourself. Longest way round is the shortest way home.”

James Joyce (1998) Ulysses, p.309.

James Joyce was born towards the end of the nineteenth century, in Dublin, Ireland. He spent most of his life writing about Dublin while living in exile.

Born in the United States in the middle of the twentieth century, Bruce Springsteen has spent a career …

Enacting The Glastonbury Pilgrimage Through Communitas And Aural/Visual Culture, Kathryn R. Barush

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

The sacred sites of Glastonbury in Somerset, England have long been places of pilgrimage, connected to the legend of the journey of Joseph of Arimathea to the British Isles, and have fired the imagination from the Middle Ages to today - inspiring the Arthurian legends, folk-stories and song, and visual representations. In response to the question ‘What is Pilgrimage,’ this essay seeks to explore the conjunction of artistic representations and geographic journeys to and among the ancient topography and mysterious structures of Glastonbury, with a particular focus on how sacred travel, and especially an experience of communitas, can be engendered …

Concerning The Spectacular Austerities, Brian Bouldrey

International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage

Modern pilgrims are the updated versions of hermit athletae Dei, athletes of God, as the Desert Fathers are called by Dorotheus the Theban. Are the more ascetic of religious pilgrims going too far with their spectacular austerities?

Art In The Age Of Financial Crisis, Conor Mcgarrigle, Marisa Lerer

Articles

This issue addresses the long financial crisis of 2008 and the nature and diversity of artistic responses to it. This financial crisis is understood as a globalized result of late capitalism that nonetheless is experienced differently at local, regional, and national levels. It is multi- faceted in nature, a phenomenon that has historical roots and precedents that inform contemporary responses. Artists are not restricted to engage with the economy through one specific vehicle of inquiry or one type of medium and message. Therefore, the central question that this issue poses is: what is the artist’s role in finance, crisis, and …

Laboratoire DéBerlinisation: Art, Finance, And The Legacies Of Colonialism In Contemporary African Art: An Interview With Mansour Ciss Kanakassy, Conor Mcgarrigle, Marisa Lerer

Articles

Mansour Ciss Kanakassy (b. 1957) is a Berlin-based Senegalese artist whose practice addresses the legacy of colonialism in contemporary Africa, in particular as it is expressed in the financial systems of the former Francophone colonies of West Africa, where the currency, the CFA franc, historically tied to the French franc, is now pegged to the euro. The acronym CFA originally stood for Colonies Françaises d’Afrique – French Colonies of Africa – and now Communauté Financière Africaine – African Financial Community. In 2001, Ciss Kanakassy created the Laboratoire Déberlinisation (Déberlinisation Laboratory), a multifaceted project that traces contemporary African issues to the …

The Us’S Economic Promises Are Over: An Interview With Miguel Luciano, Marisa Lerer, Conor Mcgarrigle

Articles

Hurricane Maria struck Puerto Rico in September 2017. The island was left without electricity and clean water for months. However, the natural disaster was not the only cause of this lasting devastation. The financial fall-out from predatory loans, which led to Puerto Rico’s inability to invest funds in its own infrastructure, caused an enduring humanitarian disaster. Artist Miguel Luciano (b. 1972) in this interview discusses his work in relation to the 2017 Puerto Rican debt crisis and the legacy of the over 100-year span of Puerto Rico’s colonial status as a US territory, which gives the US disproportionate control over …

Augmented Interventions: Re-Defining Urban Interventions With Ar And Open Data, Conor Mcgarrigle

Books/Book Chapters

This chapter proposes that augmented reality art and open data offer the potential for a redefinition of urban interventionist art practices.

Data has emerged as a significant force in contemporary networked culture from the commercial commodification of online presence as practised by internet giants Facebook and Google to the 2013 revelations of the unprecedented scale of the US Government’s data collection regime carried out by the NSA (Gellman and Piotras, U.S., British intelligence mining data from nine U.S. Internet companies in broad secret program, http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-intelligence-mining-data-from-nine-us- internet-companies-in-broad-secret-program/2013/06/06/3a0c0da8-cebf-11e2-8845- d970ccb04497_story.html, 2013). Big data and its effective deployment is seen as essential to the …

Pathways To The Cosmos:The Alignment Of Megalithic Tombs In Ireland And Atlantic Europe, Frank Prendergast, Gabriel Cooney

Articles

Gabriel Cooney and Frank Prendergast present the context of and outline the approach to this one-day conference organised by Archaeology Ireland on behalf of the National Monuments Service at the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht and the Office of Public Works to mark the European Year of Cultural Heritage 2018. The event will take place at Dublin Castle on 15 September 2018.

Editorial—Culture And Cosmos : The Marriage Of Astronomy And Culture, Volume 21, Frank Prendergast, Nicholas Campion, Liz Henty, Bernadette Brady, Darrelyn Gunzburg, Fabio Silva

Book/Book Chapter

This volume of Culture and Cosmos draws together a selection of papers delivered at the 24th annual conference of the European Society for Astronomy in Culture (SEAC). The conference, titled 'The Marriage of Astronomy and Culture: Theory and Method in the Study of Cultural Astronomy', occurred between the 12th and the 16th September 2016 and was held at The Bath Literary and Scientific Institution (BRLSI), which has been hosting research endeavours since it foundation in 1824. SEAC 2016 combined history with the latest in twenty-first century developments and, for the very first time, was webcast to SEAC members who could …

Ultimate Witnesses - The Visual Culture Of Death, Burial And Mourning In Famine Ireland, Extract, Niamh Ann Kelly

Books/Book Chapters

No abstract provided.

Representing Reality: The Social Organisational Insight And Potential Of Stephen Willats Diagrams., Gráinne Coughlan

Conference papers

This paper focuses on the work of British artist Stephen Willats, who’s practice beginning in 1963 increasingly concerned the expanded territory of art beyond the gallery. In particular, it will discuss how Willats’ interest in modelling social systems required the use of visual representation including diagrams, largely considered beyond the conventions of art making, but utilised by Willats as a new mode to articulate social realities.

As a consequence of his understanding of cybernetics gained from time as a student on Roy Ascott’s Groundcourse at Ealing School of Art, Willats’ investigated ideas of self organisation, feedback and self determination outside …

1916 And The Challenges Of Commemorative Exhibitions In Ireland, Siobhan Doyle

Conference papers

Like many countries, Ireland has a chaotic and tumultuous past which results in challenges for national cultural institutions in presenting history to satisfy the education and expectation of both national and transnational audiences. The Easter Rising of 1916- a failed rebellion against British rule- is the pivotal event in the creation of the modern Irish state and is synonymous as a moment in the past which represents Irish history, characterizes Irish culture and amplifies national identity.

With 2016 marking 100years since the Easter Rising, my paper will explore how the recent centenary commemorations of this historic event have been a …

Future Oriented Sustainable Design. Design Purpose: What Is Design And Who Is It For? [Please Note: This Is A Large File And May Be Slow To Download.], Barry Sheehan

Academic Articles

In November 2016 I was asked to make a presentation at the Future Oriented Sustainable Design International Conference in Wuhan in the People's Republic of China. My topic was Design Purpose: What is Design? And who is it for?

The presentation examines the wider aspects of design and its categories and asks who were are actually designing for.

I made a powerpoint presentation that I narrated in English whilst it was simultaneously translated into Chinese for the attendees at the conference. On my return to Ireland I created a soundtrack to accompany the presentation slides for people to watch the …

A Site Of Change: The Masterplan, Brian Fay

Exhibition Catalogues

Essay on the community based art project The Master Plan curated by Jennie Guy with artists Ella de Burca and John Beattie.

James Joyce Run: Good Puzzle Would Be Cross Dublin Without Passing A Pub, Barry Sheehan

Academic Articles

I write a blog www.jj21k.com which looks at the works of James Joyce, the environment which he wrote about and changes that have taken place since he wrote about them. The blogposts are predominantly about Dublin. As part of discovering Dublin by reading and Running I have written several longer pieces.

In Ulysses Leopold Bloom thinks Good puzzle would be cross Dublin without passing a pub. This piece creates a running narrative that does just that, linking Cabra where the Joyce family lived on the north side of Dublin, with Shelbourne Road on the south side and where James Joyce …

Grange Stone Circle (B):New Thoughts On An Old Monument, Frank Prendergast

Book/Book Chapter

No abstract provided.

1916 And The Challenges Of Commemorative Exhibitions In Ireland, Siobhan Doyle

Conference papers

This paper examines how National Cultural Institutions in Ireland have demonstrated significant responses in facilitating collective, reflection, celebration and engagement with the 100th year anniversary of the 1916 Rising by discussing some of the broad tensions and issues facing three exhibition case studies at the National Museum of Ireland and National Gallery of Ireland in Dublin and at the Crawford Art Gallery in Cork City.

Discover Joyce's Dublin By Reading And Running, Barry Sheehan

Academic Articles

James Joyce told his friend Frank Budgen. “‘I want’ said Joyce, as we were walking down the Universitätstrasse, ‘to give a picture of Dublin so complete that if the city one day suddenly disappeared from the earth it could be reconstructed out of my book.’” (Budgen, 1960, p.67, 68).

This research looks at the relevance of Dublin to Joyce’s writings and to the relevance of Joyce’s writings to Dublin. It is concerned with the virtual Dublin of Joyce’s writings, the physical manifestation of Dublin over time, and the relationships between them.

Numerous scholars read and analyse the writings of Joyce …

When Attitudes Become Toys: Play Orbit And The Cybernetics Of Participation, Tim Stott

Conference Papers

This paper discusses the exhibition Play Orbit, curated by Jasia Reichardt, then Assistant Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, in collaboration with Peter Jones of the Welsh Arts Council and first shown at the Royal National Eisteddfod of Wales in Flint from 4to 9 August 1969 and then at the ICA itself from 28 November 1969 to 15 February 1970.

The exhibition consisted of ‘toys, games, and playables [produced] by people who are not professionally involved with the design of playthings, but who work in the field of the visual arts’, wrote Reichardt. In its choice …

Knowledge Management: Collaboration Versus Concentration In Open Plan Workspaces, John Walsh

Articles

This paper looks at the design of open-plan offices, particularly in relation to the impact ofspatial design on different work-modes. It briefly examines the history of the open plan office, lookingat how today’s typical open-plan workplace has evolved. It considers how workplaces can besuccessfully designed to facilitate the seemingly conflicting requirements of supporting both collaboration and concentration