Staring at the Sea: Land art and reflection symposium
The third part of a tripartite landart syposium between artists and organisations from Austria, Ireland and Croatia took place in West Kerry in the Cill Rialaig artist retreat village at the generosity of Dr. Noelle Campbell Sharp and the Cill Rialaig Project. This pre-famine village (c.1790) set high on a cliff at the very edge of Western Europe has been rescused and rehabilitated as the perfect retreat for artists, poets, writers, film makers and composers of national and international repute.
6th-18th July 2023, Cill Rialaig Artists Village & Iveragh Peninsula, County Kerry
As part of Pallas Projects’ ongoing international exchanges with artists and curators in Croatia and Austria we are happy to present Staring at the Sea. This residency at the Cill Rialaig Artist Village is one section of a multi-part project which began as ‘Stone Walls’ led by Josip Zanki, exploring dry wall stone techniques as a tool for artistic expression and site-specific practice at Kožino, Privlaka, National Park Paklenica, Velebit Mountain, Fortica at the Island of Pag, Paška Vrata, Croatia in 2021; and continued as ‘Wood and Stone’, led by Luise Kloos, which extended the materiality of the project to include an exploration of natural materials, interventions, sited objects and performances in the natural environment of Grafenbergalm, Styrian Alps, Austria in 2022.
This symposium foregrounded studio activity, reflection and group work alongside exploration in the open landscape. The combination of stone, sea and artistic retreat resonates with the ancient practices associated with the drystone beehive huts that were built in the region for meditation and reflection on the expanse of the Atlantic Ocean. Presentations from Aoibheann Lambe a local archaeologist with a speciality in the Iveragh Peninsula, and curators from each region supplemented by visits to Skellig Michel, ancient clocháin – beehive huts in Glenfahan on Slea Head, Loher Stone Fort and Beach, and Valencia Island.
We welcomed Austria curator and artist Luise Kloos with artists Gerlinde Thuma, Silvia Maria Grossmann, arts manager Tanja Gurke and art historian Marie Maierhofer; from Croatia curator and artist Josip Zanki with artists Laura Stojkoski, Ivan Fijolic, Dorian Pacak and anthropologist Nikolina Durutt; alongside Irish artists Bernie Colhoun and Ellen-Rose Wallace.
The project was curated by Mark Cullen & and administrated by Eve Woods.
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A cooperation project with Luise Kloos, Next, Josip Zanki, HDLU, Zagreb and Mark Cullen supported by Culture Ireland took place in the Styrian Alps, Austria. 
Wood and Stone, Grafenbergalm, Styrian Alps, Austria, 2022
Dachsteinalm (Grafenbergalm)
Art hike with work presentations and performances.
On the occasion of Bodo Hell’s 44-year mountain summer
Participating artists: Ursula Beiler (AUT), Götz Bury (AUT), Mark Cullen (IRL), Ivan Fijolić (HRV), Silvia Maria Grossmann (AUT/CHE), Bodo Hell (AUT), Luise Kloos (AUT), Erwin Lackner (AUT) , Maria Schneider (AUT), Gerlinde Thuma (AUT), Kurt Ryslavy (AUT/BEL), Josip Zanki (HRV)
Guest artists: Willi Steiner vlg. Egger (Ramsau), Jakob Brandstätter vlg. Marharter (Ramsau), Linde Waber (AUT)
Introduction:
dr Tanja Gurke, art historian
Organisation
next – association for contemporary art
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I am exhibiting my first Italian solo show at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Villa Croce, Genoa.
Museo d’Arte Contemporanea di Villa Croce
28-01 – 13-03-22
Curated by Valeria Ceregini
Towards Super-Connection is a mobile and modular installation and exists in a significant relationship with the place of its manifestation. It derives from a concept of quantum theory in which the quantum state of a particle is related to that of every other particle in that particular system. Towards Super-Connection explores through the site-specific installation, and both the featured drawings on paper and the lightbox, a dystopian present where nature sublimates itself to the needs of a system of structures and constructive forms: a changing system where the model exists as a code inherent in its parts. In the end, it is clear how Mark Cullen’s research is recurrent the spatial survey, and the representation of primigenial figures that are also evident in his site-specific installations – they seem like a 3D representation of these generative natural elements which are at the base of the Universe itself.
The exhibition features a modular installation of rods and geometric intersections derived from Buckminster Fuller’s geodetic design concepts. The structure composed of bamboo strips is susceptible to a conservation process where each element is carefully hand-laminated in PVC tape, followed by aluminium tape to give an aspect both futuristic and vernacular. This process perfectly follows the protection and conservation process of satellite components coated with a gold or aluminium film to protect them from cosmic radiation. This procedure represents for the artist both a meticulous meditative process and a gesture towards the safeguarding of a natural material such as bamboo by completely subsuming its essence: exploiting its form for a new esoteric purpose – that of making art.
Text by Valeria Ceregini
https://valeriaceregini.com
Featured image: Mark Cullen, Towards Super-Connections, 2020. Modular sculptural system: bamboo, aluminium, hydro pipe, steel fixings, dimensions variable, installed at Portrane, Fingal, Co. Dublin.
The exhibition is generously supported by Culture Ireland, the Irish Embassy and The Arts Council of Ireland, and kindly hosted by the Museums of Genoa – Villa Croce and the Municipality of Genoa.
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and have been selected for the upcoming Tactical Magic at TULCA in Galway by curator Kerry Guinan.
1 -17 November 2019
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Marshallhúsið, Grandagarður 20
101 Reykjavík
Iceland
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DE XI – ALTERN-ATOR
HDLU,
Mestrovic Pavilion
Trg žrtava fašizma 16, 10000, Zagreb, Croatia
OPENING 2OTH APRIL
The accompanying catalogue features the Difference Engine ANNEX in print format.
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Artist-Run Europe
Artist-Run Europe: Practice/Projects/Spaces receives a Silver Bell at the 2017 ICAD Awards.
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Artist-Run Europe: Practice/Projects/Spaces
The publication that I have been working with Gavin Murphy and the Pallas team over the last few years is now on sale at bookshops across the world.
Artist-Run Europe: Practice/Projects/Spaces
Edited by Gavin Murphy & Mark Cullen
Published by Onomatopee, Eindhoven
Designed by WorkGroup, Dublin
208 pages, Swiss bound, Full colour
Contributors: Jason E. Bowman, AA Bronson, Noelle Collins, Valerie Connor, Mark Cullen, Céline Kopp & Alun Williams, Joanna Laws, Freek Lomme, Megs Morley, Gavin Murphy, Gavin Wade and Katherine Waugh.
With case studies of spaces and projects: Triangle France, Transmission Gallery, Pallas Projects/Studios, Eastside Projects, Catalyst Arts, Pink Cube, Secession, Dienstgebaeude, Supermarket, FOOTFALL, and The Artist-led Archive.
Pallas Projects/Studios first opened its doors on Dublin’s Foley Street in May 1996 and to coincide with our 20th anniversary is a new publication Artist-Run Europe – a major survey and analysis of artist-run practice in cooperation with spaces from all over Ireland and Europe. The groundbreaking study is based on over 4 years of research, it features illustrated case studies looking at different organisational models of spaces, newly commissioned essays, and a detailed index of over 500 European artist-run spaces. The book is thoughtfully designed by Dublin studio WorkGroup and printed and bound to a very high standard in The Netherlands.
The book features an index of artist-run spaces throughout Europe with almost 600 spaces listed from 36 European countries.
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Daily Practice: Selected Works 2007 – 2008
The Molesworth Gallery, Dublin
20/10/2016 – 2/11/2016
Spanning a period of ten years, the works in Daily Practice juxtapose scientific instruments of perception, such as observatories, neutrino detectors and the CERN hadron collider with the conventions of mandalas as subjective tools for understanding the universe. (A mandala is a spiritual and ritual symbol in eastern religions, representing the universe. In common use, “mandala” has become a generic term for any diagram, chart or geometric pattern that represents the cosmos metaphysically or symbolically).
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I am happy to report that Gibbons & Nicholas are bringing my work along with a number of
Irish based artists to Context, Art Fair, New York.
Mark Cullen 