Bands of Light

Urban Retreat Gallery, South Block HQ Building, Hanover Quay, Docklands, Dublin Until Nov 2 01-6337865

The title of Molly Brown’s show refers to light, and the quality of the light is certainly an active element in her paintings from Cill Rialaig on Kerry’s western edge. Brown, long based in Dublin, is from the “land-locked, flat plains” of Minnesota. When she went to stay in Kerry, it happened to snow, and she was taken by the nature of the winter light – at what might be described as its subdued brilliance, which comes through vividly in her work.

Also striking in Brown’s paintings is their beautifully weathered, geological character. They emerged from a gradual, incremental process that reflects the character of the Kerry landscape and seascape, an epic, unfolding drama involving sea, rock, bogland and weather. Boundaries emerge as pivotal elements in the paintings, both literally and figuratively, in terms of faultlines and abrupt chasms in the rock, the shoreline itself, ancient field patterns, and between light and darkness, seasonal shifts, the seen and unseen.

The show’s location, on Hanover Quay, is particularly appropriate.

CAN’T SEE THAT? CATCH THIS

Bridget Flannery, Cross Gallery, Dublin Until Oct 31