Autumn 2004- Dublin: NCDA Fine Art Degree Show
Review C109 Dublin: NCAD Fine Art Degree Show
A curious lack of discipline suffused much of the NCAD undergraduate exhibition with many exhibitors not making the necessary decisions and edits that enable good work to speak clearly. The show felt somewhat cluttered and murky as a result. Given the political upheavals of the last year, the show was also surprisingly apolitical. One encountered the usual dollops of identity politics, but on the whole the emphasis was on the decorative and the playful. This tallies with general trends in the international art world, as did a re-emergence of drawing. In fact works in drawing from students of the painting department were some of the most interesting in the exhibition. Once again the show underlined the collapsing divisions between the fine-art areas of print, painting and sculpture, this shift still being largely powered by an interest in digital media and video. The latter was very much present, though not to the extent of other years.
Working through the warren of spaces around the campus, there were a number of highpoints. Gráinne Nolan showed engaging short videos which documented those signs and symbols relating to movement (of lifts, elevators, etc.) embedded in urban environments and our everyday lives. In a generally weak sculpture section, Anne French fashioned a Virgin Mary who housed a hive of industrious bees in her chest. These were free to come and go through a tube to the window. A good work, it seemed to throw Joseph Beuys in bed with Katharina Fritsch though with a particularly Irish slant. Production values would need to be seriously upgraded if it is to be any sort of an artworld contender, however.  | | Sarah Lincoln: Untitled 1 , 2004lambdachrome print, 61 x 61 cm; courtesy the artist | Elsewhere Sarah Lincoln showed interesting photographs of street scenes constructed from other excised photographs. Put together in a crude and slapdash manner, these were uncanny enough to stop one in one's tracks. Holly Pereira relied on slapstick to interrogate cultural stereotypes, with the results being infinitely more problematic than the airline advertising she lampoons. Caroline Tobin showed hauntingly lovely constructed photographs of blurry urban landscapes. These looked as though long-submerged and bedecked by mysterious strings of light. Unfortunately the artist also showed her physical models which vented some of the magic. Thomas Demand, James Casbere and others producing constructed photography rarely if ever present their models with good reason. Jennifer Phelan showed some accomplished physical drawings in wire, though her wonderful piddling dog (enough to carry the presentation) was swamped by the artist also showing literally dozens of other works in her small space. The Media exhibition was curiously undifferentiated from the rest of the show, both in content and levels of interaction. The standout work was Barry Carthy's number-pad triggered video installation. With references to ilmic genres, our age of surveillance and associated urban anxiety, the work, with its complete absence of instruction and spare elegance, gave the section a welcome blast of artistic sophistication. Moving to the postgraduate section, the show was hugely lifted by the wonderful space in which it finds itself. An old cash and carry, now part of the Digital Hub, it is a perfect exhibition space effectively by accident. As one would expect, there was some accomplished painting to be found. Phillipa Sutherland, Mark Swords and Eoin Butler all showed strong work, though in general they felt curiously reminiscent of other work elsewhere. Painting does, however, suffer under the weight of its own histories, both recent and past. The Virtual Realities MA show was rather tame, surprising given the level of activity in Dublin in the area of art and technology. Once again, as in the undergraduate section, there was the curious lack of differentiation from work produced in other departments. Even stranger was the fact that many of the pieces lacked any element of virtuality, despite the department title, nor much in the way of interactivity. Perhaps more collaboration is required to create ambitious works. That said, Kieran McBride's trashy space extravaganza was arresting if a little conceptually impenetrable. It makes one think of the work being produced by NY-based artist and creative whirlwind Assume Vivid Astro Focus, which is no bad thing. With an MFA or equivalent effectively now a pre-requisite for opportunities in contemporary art, the curious naïvety and overcrowding of much of the undergraduate work is perhaps not a surprise. It is encouraging that for the most part these issues were addressed at postgraduate level. Given the disparity between the numbers exhibiting in the two shows, it would appear that postgraduate art education is an area with plenty of room for expansion in Ireland.
Overall the NCAD shows were spirited and ambitious. This was apparent in the breadth and variety of work on display and also from the positive blizzard of red dots that blanketed the spaces (sometimes obscuring the actual works). In addition to reflecting our perplexingly resilient and buoyant economy, it encouragingly also points to a general public both interested in art and, more importantly, confident of these emerging talents. It is support of this nature that will hopefully allow these artists to continue to develop and produce work into the future. John Gerrard is currently Siemens Artist in Residence to the Ars Electronica Futurelab, Austria; see www.johngerrard.net . National College of Art and Design Degree Shows, Dublin, June 2004
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