Uillinn: West Cork Art Centre
16 March – 11 May 2024
Curated by Catherine Bowe and Karla Sánchez Zepeda, Els Dietvorst’s ‘Adrift’ at Uillinn: West Cork Art Centre is an exhibition that reveals itself slowly. At once minimalist yet monumental, there is a sense of interconnectedness through the sea to people and places, both near and far. Natural and manmade totemic objects form a resonance that aligns with a universal, impersonal power that has become weakened and obscured in our Western society.
Dietvorst is a Belgian interdisciplinary artist who has been living in Ireland for the last 15 years. It transpires that we hail from the same city in Flanders, where the legendary giant, Druon Antigoon, cut off the right hands of mariners who refused him tribute. Steeped in history and a rich visual culture, Antwerp is a port city, and Dietvorst grew up on the banks of its tidal river. Now living on the Wexford coast, like me, she found her place here as a sheep farmer, where tough lessons are learned, and the rhythms of the natural world dictate one’s every move. For many of us, the pull of the ocean is impossible to ignore, and it permeates every aspect of this exhibition. Like a current, it carries the viewer along gently, and there is a sense of the wild, and a feeling of belonging within this sphere.
Els Dietvorst, I Saw The White Dogs Of The Dawn (Triptych Part II), 2018, Digital Film 53mins; images courtesy of the artist.
The main gallery space at Uillinn displays a collection of works emanating from the littoral zone. Stigmata (2021), three life-size wooden arms perched against the wall, are enigmatic objects. Carved and exquisitely shaped, they are marked in a way reminiscent of Polynesian tattoos. One resembles a flute, while nearby, the spine-like sculpture, Shanti, Shanti, Shanti (2021), has a talismanic presence. Off centre on the gallery floor, Windswept, is a robust tree-form made from driftwood. Formerly connected and nourished by the earth, its parts stand united as a testament to terrestrial lives claimed by the sea.
A work entitled Pocket Stones (2021-4), lines the left wall of the space. A series of handmade paper ‘pockets’ each contain a painted stone, charged with the energies of their finder. A dreamlike, non-narrative poem has been typed on each envelope in succession by the artist. These minimalist yet evocative compositions speak volumes, prompting existential questions as they cast their salty spells.
The centrepiece of the exhibition, Memorandum of Humanity (2022), hangs as a testament to communal resilience amid adversity. Previously shown at CENTRALE for Contemporary Art, Brussels, in 2022, it is a residual drawing made as a result of an interaction that took place with the BARRA Movement.1 Over 1000 stones were placed on a linen sheet, symbolising both labour and collective memory. Each stone was given a unique identification number, most were traced around, and some were physically incorporated into the drawing. This work evolved from an intervention that took place during the pandemic, when Dietvorst began placing white stones on a black rock on the foreshore, as a way to connect and give hope. The formation has become what the curators aptly describe as a ‘coastal shrine’ and the process continues to this day, with spontaneous public participation, on Blackhall Beach in Wexford.
Ascending the staircase, epic blood-ink murals have been painted by Dietvorst. The main painting, Chyrsalis (2024), depicts a scene of human suffering and resilience, featuring a recurring symbol in the artist’s repertoire, a neanderthal skull.2 Another painting, Manifest for Skibbereen (2024), shows the abandoned bridge over the River Ilen. Painted for the townspeople, it captures the artist’s empathetic engagement with the local community in West Cork.
Els Dietvorst ‘Adrift’, installation view, Uillinn: West Cork Art Centre; photograph by Tomasz Madajczak, courtesy of the artist and Uillinn: West Cork Art Centre.
Culminating with the screening of I Watched the White Dogs of the Dawn (2018), through painterly compositions and candid interviews, real people involved in fishing share stories of their relationship with the sea. We sense that there is more to life than what is visible on the surface. Why else would they continue such an unforgiving and tough occupation? Dietvorst’s work serves as a poignant reminder that amidst the complexities of a globalised society, alternative narratives and possibilities exist. If we are indeed ‘adrift’, the sweeping beacon emitted from this film is our navigational aid, offering an alternative route. The resonance and life-force that permeates this exhibition represents the moral and epistemological power of society.
A national touring exhibition, ‘Adrift’ was previously exhibited at Highlanes Gallery (1 July – 19 Aug 2023) and will be presented in Wexford Arts Centre and Wexford County Council in October 2024.
Mieke Vanmechelen is an artist from Kerry currently resident at Fire Station Artists’ Studios, Dublin.
1 BARRA is an encounter and an invitation instigated by Els Dietvorst currently taking place in Belgium and Ireland. barramovement.com
2 Eva Wittocx, ‘The symbolic surrealism of Els Dietvorst’, ED 2010 – 2014 (Antwerp: M HKA, 2014) p. 9.
