New Perspectives: Vivienne Roche RHA in discussion with Mary McCarthy

As part of the RHA’s New Perspectives series of talks, we have invited artist Vivienne Roche and Director of Crawford Art Gallery Mary McCarthy to discuss the artist’s practice to date and her current exhibition Abridged at the RHA Gallery.

“What does it mean to ‘abridge’? ‘To shorten by omission of words without sacrifice of sense’. This same act of selection and compression applies equally to the non-verbal, to visual meaning, to the works in this show.

For each and every one of us, the range of detail in what we could potentially experience over our lives requires constant abridging. What then happens is that what we leave out ceases to matter, and what we leave in comes to matter most. The result, inevitably and of necessity, is distinctly personal, but nonetheless open to recognition in the shared experience of each of our lives and the times we lived in (Time Dials).

And so it is, in this show which draws from my life and from some of what I have seen and loved. My daughters’ baby teeth become monumental (Baby Teeth in Perspective), the seaweed on my beach is plaited like hair (Plaited Sea), my sense of the vastness of natural and human time (The Wax Age) is fed by the work of the sea, yet the results of its actions lie still and pliant on my studio table inviting me to abridge and transform them (Tidal Time in Studio Time).

Objects and buildings talk to us. My dear, late brother Paul had, like my father, a devotion to the beauty of precision (Found to be Precise i.m. Paul Roche) and I learned of his sudden death as I was admiring the precise beauty of Riddarholmen Spire in Stockholm.

And so it is with the other works in this show. My time studying in Boston in the early 1970s was deeply coloured by the efforts to end the Vietnam War (Light Above, Steel Below: Tabling Vietnam Peace). I later went to Paris to see the negotiating rooms.

Drawing is central to my work, as is appropriate scale. And, given my fascination, both personal and artistic with ‘time’, I think of drawing as I might think of the layout of a clock face (Flow-print/drawing, Arriving at the iris.) in the temporal life of a work.

The pattern in this diversity in this show just happens to be an abridged version of myself.”

Vivienne Roche RHA, August 2024.

Biographies of speakers

Over her long career as an artist, Vivienne Roche RHA has contributed in many ways to the arts in, and from, Ireland. Her works of public art range from her early-career memorial sculpture to President Cearbhall O’Dalaigh in Sneem (1983), through creations such as Liberty Bell (1988) and Sentinel (1994) outside St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin to major pieces such as Flow (2002) in the Council Chamber of Fingal County Hall, NC Iris (2006) outside the National College of Ireland Dublin, and Whitelight Garden (2006) in Park West, Dublin.

Sculpturally, Roche has worked with such media as steel, bronze, glass, wax, plaster, landscape, light and time, as well as with found materials such as those gifted by the tides near her home in Garrettstown, Co Cork. She has taken her inspiration from sea and shore, wind and light, architecture and engineering, and has addressed issues ranging from climate change to the echoes of medieval archaeology. All are emotionally filtered through her own autobiography.

Roches’ most recent public sculpture is The Book of Climate Bells & Sunbell Garden (2017) for Esker Educate Together National School in Lucan, Dublin. Her Climate Bells (2016-2018) sculptural series has been presented by President Higgins to various Heads of State.

Watercolour, ink and photography are regular resources but foundational to all her work is a profound commitment to drawing. A line on paper is where all her work begins.

Roche was a founder member, and first chair, of the National Sculpture Factory in Cork and a member of The Arts Council (1993-98). Her work is in public and private collections in Ireland, UK, Sweden, Finland, USA, France, and Germany. Honours include membership of Aosdána (1996), an honorary Doctor of Laws from University College Cork (2006), and the Munster Technological University Alumni Award (2010).

Mary McCarthy is the Director of Crawford Art Gallery one of Ireland’s National Cultural Institutions. She was appointed Director of the Crawford Art Gallery in 2018 and since then has worked with the Gallery team and the Board to advance a major capital redevelopment programme. As well as significantly developing the Gallery’s collection through acquisitions and donations.

A graduate of English and Philosophy in UCC followed by a post-graduate degree in Arts Management in UCD Mary has worked in commercial galleries in New York and Dublin as well as at the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA). Mary served as Director of the National Sculpture Factory , Director of Programmes for Cork’s European Capital of Culture, the first Arts and Culture Manager at Dublin Docklands Development Authority as Chair of Culture Ireland, Ireland's State agency for the promotion of Irish arts worldwide. She has also been a Board Member of IMMA and the Cork Film Festival. She has served on several European Commission working groups on culture, cities and cultural development, and has been an assessor for European Capital of Culture cities. Most recently, she sat on the Irish Government’s Taskforce on Arts and Culture Recovery during Covid times.

Mary is currently spearheading the ambitious redevelopment of Crawford Art Gallery . The project, which is being funded by the Minister’s Department, has been designed by an interdisciplinary design team, led by award-winning Grafton Architects, and is being delivered by the Office of Public Works and Crawford Art Gallery.

Host or Publisher RHA Gallery