News

30/11/2020

Hi everyone. My solo exhibition at Blackwater Valley Makers in Fermoy opens tomorrow and runs for the month of December. It is called ‘We are one’ and concentrates on our relationship and interconnection with the natural world from which we spring and to which we inevitably return. I am posting my artists statement here and a few of the images and will upload the remaining images over the week. Please let me know your thoughts re the work. Thank you.

Artist’s statement

We are one

The first drawing of the exhibition is of my mother’s elderly hand outstretched to cradle a falling autumnal leaf – which signifies for me the deep relationship and interconnection between human beings and the natural world and the many non – human beings that inhabit it.

In the majority of the drawings I use the ‘blind’ approach which means that when I draw I consciously do not look at my actual drawing action; instead I concentrate my gaze on the subject matter. I like the element of surprise when I look down eventually at my paper/canvas as there is a risk involved in blind drawing  which could result in a drawing that either  does not meet  my expectations or far surpasses  them. In my drawings I aim to catch a feeling for the elements and creatures/plants I am portraying rather than to capture them realistically.  I find blind drawing an ideal drawing method for attempting to capture a sense of the essence, presence or energy of my subject. This approach to drawing helps me gain a deeper connection to what I am trying to portray and in so doing produce a drawing which feels to me to be in some way true to that which I am trying to depict.   I often use homemade charcoal and garden sticks for drawing and like the different blacks and marks they can give. I have used some homemade natural inks that I have made from beetroot, elderberries and blackberries in some of the drawings and the colours can be subtle and exciting at the same time. I use various types of paper including paper found or left for recycling in my work. I enjoyed printmaking in Art College and have added some print layers to some of my drawings.  I like to work outdoors as often as I can, weather permitting. 

I am using natural sounds including birdsong, the occasional cat, a car in the distance and the rustling of leaves and the sound of the river, which I gathered on my walks to engage another of the senses while you are looking at my interpretation of my world.

 I have also included a mummified starling which I found on one of my walks as I occasionally come across dead birds and small mammals and use them as subjects for my drawings.

I am highlighting the beauty and wonder of the world but I am also drawing the pain in my portrayal of the stream of sludgy water full of plastic items and bale wrapping. This particular drawing is paired with a drawing of a pristine section of the same river.  I have lived in rural north Cork for twenty years and enjoy walking and seeing its natural beauty. I have observed and learnt a lot from these walks and have come to know and love the area. Over the past few years I have noticed an increased degradation of streams, rivers and land in my area. I see with dismay hedgerows being butchered unnecessarily and edges of fields bordering woodlands sprayed turning grass yellow and I feel sorrow and anger at such actions.

I hope that my drawings, accompanied by the natural sounds of a walk in the countryside, help the viewer to look more carefully at the natural world that surrounds us and deepen our desire to nurture and protect it.

My drawings are at present unframed but if you wish to buy one I can arrange for the drawing to be framed.

If you would like further information about me and my work please see my website http://www.gilliancussenart.com

Hello. I am continuing to prepare for my solo exhibition which opens next week on Dec 2nd at Blackwater Valley Makers in Fermoy. I am currently trying to sort out the sound element and am looking forward to the kind expertise of Duncan, sound recording engineer, as I am very inexperienced in this area.

Besides this, I came across a great quote in the online journal Minding Nature in its Fall 2020 edition, “The fate of the land and humans rest in the hands of each other” by Renee Lee, Food science student at Cornell University USA. I find this quote relates particularly to one of my drawings in the exhibition that I referred to in a previous blog on 9/11/2020.

Below is a recent small drawing.

This is a blind drawing done in my garden while observing life around me. I used homemade charcoal, indian ink and monoprint in this drawing.

16th November 2020

Hello. This week I have been working on trying to put together some audio for my forthcoming exhibition. Not being the most computer literate person I am finding it very challenging to date. On the drawing side I’ve been finishing some pieces. You can see a detail of one of my drawings below.

I have joined Nuacollective, a group of approximately 50 artists who are based mainly in the Cork area– see nuacollective.ie.

It was great to hear a discussion on ecocide today on Newstalk radio around 5pm. Cathy Fitzgerald(see Haumea, Hollywood Forest) first raised the subject of ecoside legislation being introduced in Ireland at a Green Party ard dheis a year or so ago.

10/11/2020

This week I have been doing some more reading to try and increase my understanding and knowledge about the environmental crisis we are all in. Cathy Fitzgerald (see Ecoliteracy courses online,Haumea and the Hollywood Forest) recommended I check out the work of filmmaker Louie Schwartzberg. He has been making films for 40 years and has a series called MovingArt at movingart.com and can be seen on Netflix. I only watched a snippet but what I saw was beautiful. In the films Louie brings virtual nature into your own home. Those in nursing homes and unable to get out can benefit greatly from viewing them, as did I although my time was brief. He is also a very impressive and down to earth speaker.

Inge Van Doorslaer, fellow artist and friend, and I have begun making videos for the Lonradh at Home series at the Crawford Art Gallery and our first joint effort is out tomorrow, 11/11/20, on the Crawford Art Gallery website crawfordartgallery.ie under Creative Cocooning. This video follows on from a series I did over the summer months which can also be seen on the website. Lonradh is a monthly programme for people with memory loss and their families which has been running at the Crawford Art Gallery for many years.

I am continuing to work towards my solo exhibition at the Blackwater Valley Makers in December. Here is a detail from one of the drawings I will be having in the show.

It’s November already and I have only three weeks to get my work ready for my solo exhibition at Blackwater Valley Makers in Fermoy…..

I have been working on combining my drawings with monoprint over the past week. Following the ecoliteracy course I did this summer with Cathy Fitzgerald of The Hollywood Forest, http://www.haumea.ie, I have been thinking and reading more about our place in the world and am going to try with my drawings, to generate a sense of wonder in the viewer while also bringing attention to the local problems in my rural neighbourhood mainly stream and river pollution from farm runoff.

But other news! I joined Backwater Artists Network(BAN) in Cork city almost a year ago and we are having our inaugural exhibition online at the moment until Nov 30th. Please see the following link for the exhibition webpage http://backwaterartists.ie/programme/current/backwater-artists-network-group-exhibition/

This is the drawing I submitted to the exhibition

Curlews and oystercatcher on Beale Strand, charcoal and oil bar on paper. Apologies but it must be because it is the bewitching month – my PC wont allow me to download the image, so please have a look on the link above. Thank you!

Hello again,

This week I have been trying out a few different ways to draw the world around me and have been combining some monoprint with my drawing. The results are interesting but I am not sure if it works……. Below is one such attempt – an image of birds and a cat in the garden.

Hello again! It has been a while since I have posted in this blog so I am committing to writing weekly from now on to keep you up to date with my work as it progresses towards my solo show at Blackwater Valley Makers in Fermoy in December. Hopefully the show will go ahead, but if not I will upload all the images on this website. I have included here a section of one of my drawings of a mummified bird, I think a blackbird,which I found in an abandoned cottage recently. It was quite a find! Beautiful.

Hi everyone. Welcome to my blog. I am currently reading about Thomas Berry, the eco -theologian whose work I was introduced to by Dr.Cathy Fitzgerald on the recent online Ecoliteracy course. I find his words inspiring and simple yet profound and want to try and incorporate some of his ideas into my work for my exhibition in Fermoy in December 2020 at Blackwater Valley Makers. I am currently embarking on trying to make my artwork ecological in many ways – in my use of materials, in my treatment of my subject matter -the land and its multitudinous inhabitants and in my making of the artworks. Apat from this I continue to work on my bi -monthly videos for Lonradh at Home with the Crawford Art Gallery , Cork. If you have not seen any of these yet do have a look as they can be quite funny. They are amateurish but I think they are improving. You can find them on http://www.crawfordartgallery.ie/adultsandcommunities and then click on the Creative Cocooning Overview. Constructive criticism is very welcome!

I have begun to develop new  work for my December 2020 exhibition at Blackwater Valley Makers, Fermoy, Co.Cork  and  am attracted to exploring the great eco -theologian thinker and writer Thomas Berry’s ideas of the beauty, and the mystery of life and particularly his ideas of why he thought the dominant culture needs a ‘new story’ of how to live well with the wider community of life. To incorporate some of his thinking into my creative work so as to inspire others, I have picked a very small area of land (one-meter squared–1m2) which I am going to examine over a period of months. I hope to look at it with wonder and discover things I had not known and/or realised about the interconnectedness of life. I am only barely aware that another ‘world’ exists at ground level teeming with life – a microcosm of life, and have had glimpses of it at various times while being quiet and still in our garden. I
would like to observe and record my impressions of this world and my reaction to it, and see
what arises in the drawings. 

In a recent online ecoliteracy course with ecological artist-educator Dr Cathy Fitzgerald and her collaborator, philosopher Dr Nikos Patedakis, I’ve begun to understand the challenges and potential of ecological art practice. I’ve also begun to realise the centrality of developing compassion practice for myself to explore what are often overwhelming statistics and facts about how our culture currently degrades the conditions of life, to the point where the survival of human and others species are threatened. Developing a compassion practice, the benefits of which is confirmed by recent neuroscience, is I think so important so we can face the hard-to-look at consequences of a culture mindless of its own ecocidal activities.

Following a successful show at the County Library, County Hall, Cork, my current exhibition Memory is grey is going to be shown in the Jennings Gallery, UCC from Thursday 9th  to Wednesday 29th  April 2020.

For the Bealtaine festival which celebrates and promotes creativity as we age, in the month of may Memory is grey is on display at the Cork University Art Gallery, Dining Hall corridor  from 1st to 31st May.