gregory seán sheehan
visual artist

Image: © Donal Sheehan 2024

Slumbering
[ a storehouse of memory ]

The turf I work with has been gathered from blanket-bogland on the Wicklow and Dublin mountains in Ireland. These relatively undisturbed mountain boglands have been self-regulating entities for thousands of years. They are not only large areas of self-regulating biotopes providing habitats for numerous animals, birds, insects and plants but also landscape in its most resilient and durable instance. This archaic and unique landscape has always been an inspiration, both in a personal and artistic sense.

The general structural composition of this work tends to be reduced, alternating between horizontal and vertical sections of ascending and descending movements. The interaction between these movements are often kinetically interwoven and set in motion with various highly diluted solutions.

Referencing the layered accumulation of the source material, most of this work is structured horizontally. The working procedure is essentially rhythmical. Turf, which has previously been applied to the surface, generally serves as a substructure upon which an animated interaction between colour, form, and content evolves.

In accordance with the laws of gravity, complex and tightly woven rivulets of pigment cascade and intermingle over this substructure; elucidating the underlying form. The rhythmical vitality of the flow can be seen to evoke aspects of growth, depth, origin, time, and transformation.

These works might frequently bring the viewer to unfamiliar places, where concepts like “abstraction” tend to become, more or less ambivalent.

This short video Terra incognita was put together as a visual accompaniment to the exhibition of the same name – on show at the Kuenstlerhaus Goettingen, Germany in 2016.

Music and audio:
© David Begley, Co. Wexford, Ireland.

Born 1956 in Dublin, Ireland, I originally trained as a graphic-artist. Since relocating to Germany in 1981 I have been based in Lower Saxony, spending thirty years in the communications and design industry.

I decided to concentrate on the artistic side of my creative activity in 2001. Since then, my work has been exhibited in Germany and Ireland and is represented in both private and corporate collections.

After seventy orbits around the sun, perhaps I’m not feeling my strongest right now. But despite all the wear and tear and a few missing teeth, I’m reeling still with an ever-increasing sense of curiosity and wonder.