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Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection 2017 Works Revealed

Today, Wednesday July 12th 2017, Hennessy Ireland (part of Moët Hennessy, Patron of FICC) and IMMA (Irish Museum of Modern Art) revealed the works of four contemporary artists whose pieces have been purchased by The Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection 2017. Ciarán Murphy, Mairéad McClean, Mark Garry and Yuri Pattison were joined by Elaine Cullen of Hennessy Ireland and Christina Kennedy, IMMA Head of Collections, as the works went on display. They join the esteemed company of artists such as Alice Maher, Louis le Brocquy, Dorothy Cross and Patrick Scott whose works are already part of the IMMA National Collection of Modern and Contemporary Art.

Each of the works reflects the artist’s looking at and thinking about life today. Yuri Pattison’s multi-media installation, ‘transparency, hybrid viscosity (communal table v.00P)’(2016), reflects on the increasingly permeable boundaries between social and work life and the commodification of sleep that technology has created; The political as personal is evoked in Mairéad McClean’s film ‘No More’(2013) which recalls the childhood trauma of her father’s internment in Northern Ireland, through mixing TV news footage and an experimental theatre’s use of body exercises to conjure up that which resides in memory; Mark Garry’s installation, ‘North of the West’(2017), filmed at Mullaghmore Peninsula Sligo, acts as means of structuring an allegorical parallel between the sea and his paradoxical childhood relationship with the Christian faith – both powerful, immense, beautiful and potentially terrifying elements that surround the island of Ireland; while Ciarán Murphy’s enigmatic paintings, ‘L-2’(2013), take their starting point from a wide-ranging archive of images found, collected and carefully arranged into categories by the artist. Through a process of editing, erasing, overwriting or simply replacing what has been painted and unpainted, his work leaves a sense that is not quite of loss, or absence, but rather the presence of a non-thing.

In 2016 Hennessy Ireland formed a unique partnership with IMMA to help fund the purchase of important works by Irish and Irish based artists for the National Collection. Works are sought which show excellence and innovation within contemporary art developments, and which represent a signal moment of achievement with the artist’s practice and capture a moment in time of Irish culture. They must also have been made within the previous five years.


Artists are nominated by a selection panel, including IMMA Director, Sarah Glennie and Head of Collections, Christina Kennedy and independent guest curator, Roscommon based visual artist Linda Shevlin. Linda has curated, facilitated and managed both large and small-scale visual arts projects including the 53rd Venice Biennale where she was project manager for the representative artists Gareth Kennedy & Sarah Browne and Radical Actions at RMIT Galleries, Melbourne as part of Culture Ireland’s 2016 international programme I Am Ireland. Final recommendations are approved by the IMMA Collection & Acquisitions Committee, in line with IMMA’s Collection policy. The inaugural Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA Collection saw works by artists Kevin Atherton, David Beattie, Rhona Byrne and Dennis McNulty selected.

Pictured from left to right: Ciarán Murphy, Mairead McClean, Christina Kennedy, Mark Garry & Elaine Cullen.

Elaine Cullen, Market Development Manager for Moet Hennessy Ireland, said “Hennessy has strong roots to Irish culture and has a long tradition of supporting and nurturing Irish talent in the arts. It is a privilege to enable the acquisition of works by these four artists, works which are deserving of their addition to the hugely important National Collection at IMMA.”

Sarah Glennie, Director of IMMA, said "We are delighted to announce that through the invaluable support of the Hennessy Art Fund, these important works will now be joining the IMMA Collection, to be enjoyed by audiences now and for generations to come. It is vital that IMMA, as Ireland's national institution for contemporary art is in a position to collect the work that is happening now, defining our present and reflecting the extraordinary depth of contemporary visual art currently being produced in Ireland. We are indebted to Hennessy for their visionary support which allows this to happen. We are delighted to be taking this significant partnership into year two and we look forward to working with them into the future."

Christina Kennedy, IMMA Head of Collections, said “The Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA 2017 Collection artworks are an exciting addition to the National Collection. They have had international curatorial recognition through exhibitions and awards. These works are palpably different from work of a decade ago in the nature of what they reflect and how they are made, emphasizing how important it is for IMMA to be resourced with adequate funds to add to the National Collection so that our contemporary visual culture is traced for the future.”

IMMA welcomed over 580,000 visitors in 2016 making it the second most popular free visitor attraction in Ireland. In addition to the Hennessy Art Fund for IMMA, other highlights of the Hennessy cultural calendar include the Hennessy Literary Awards, the Hennessy Portrait Prize with the National Gallery and Hennessy Lost Fridays with RHA.

For further information visit www.imma.ie and www.hennessy.com, log onto the Hennessy Cognac Ireland’s Facebook page www.facebook.com/HennessyCognacIreland, or follow Hennessy on Twitter @HennessyIRL and Instagram @HennessyIRL.

 

For further media information contact Conway Communications 01 661 9728

Nigel Goggin: nigel(@)conwaycommunications.ie / 087 604 1161

Clara Tobin: clara(@)conwaycommunications.ie / 085 242 2452

 

 

Source: IMMA

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