Taking time to look at the Irish landscape, it is easy to see why so many artists are compelled to try and paint it. We have all seen so many images of mountains, lakes, fields and trees; lots of cows and plenty of horses. Pausing to look a little deeper reveals richer finds, and it is these that Bernadette Kiely has been observing and painting, from the landscape around Thomastown, Co Kilkenny.
Here, in a studio that was once owned by Barrie Cooke, she has been looking at lichens and the regular rising and falling (and often flooding) of the River Nore. Simple Harmonic Motionis the title of Kiely's exhibition at Dublin's Taylor Galleries, where these gently insistent paintings are on display. While big, noisy forces (such as war, economics and the scandals of corruption) compete to grab our attention and the headlines, Aosdána member Kiely's beautiful paintings remind us that the slow and relentless growth of lichens and the inevitable movements of the tide will outlast them all. Until July 18th. www.taylorgalleries.ie.
