More than aspiring 30 artists aged from 11 to almost 80-years-old are currently displaying their work at the Hugh Lane Gallery as part of a Dublin Port project.
As part of the initiative, drawing clubs were held with community groups in recent months in Dublin’s inner city.
Dick Nugent (75) a member of the Sean O’Casey Community Centre Drawing Club said he gets “terrific enjoyment from the class. My only experience would have been in mechanical and technical drawing.”
Mr Nugent grew up in Blackhorse Avenue, Dublin 7 and recalls being paid “a few bob” to help drive cattle down to the Dublin Port as a child. His drawing is of a herd of cattle boarding a boat at the port.
“I loved working for Dublin Port and it’s great to be part of this project. It’s very humbling to think one of my pieces would be hung in the Hugh Lane,” he said.
Head of education and community outreach at the Dublin gallery, Jessica O’Donnell, said the art was “really striking” and of a high standard.
Chief executive of the Dublin Port Company Eamonn O’Reilly said, “For decades, Dublin Port touched almost every family living in the vicinity of the north and south quays. Now they have brought those memories back to life through drawing and painting.”
Mr O’Reilly said Dublin has always been well known as a port city “but up to now we’ve had no pictorial representation of that. This is the start of that process.”
Lord Mayor Mícheál Mac Donncha, who launched the exhibition, said the project “will further enhance the partnerships between the port and the city, and the community and the arts.”
The Port Perspective exhibition runs from July 5th to July 16th, 2017.
