Architecture/Sculpture: Work by Graduates of Cork Centre for Architectural Education

Preview: January 31, 18:00, Boole Library, UCC.
To be opened by Dr Sabine Kriebel, History of Art, UCC and Jason O’Shaughnessy, Cork Centre for Architectural Education.

PLUCK PROJECTS are pleased to announce their forthcoming show Architecture/Sculpture at the Boole Library, UCC. Working with Jason O’Shaughnessy and Dr Eve Olney along with their Master of Architecture (MArch) Graduates from Cork Centre for Architectural Education (UCC/CIT), Pluck will showcase a selection of models and constructions, originally made as part of larger designs for proposed buildings.  By removing them from their context, this show instead asks the viewer to consider the affinities between model and sculptural object.  Abstract forms manifest graduates’ inventive designs, implying the atmosphere and impression of a concept, rather than the more conventional tendency of directly illustrating plans.

The work from which these models are taken was conceived in response to the brief Athens_Endless [C]ity in 2015/2016, undertaken as part of the M.Arch program. This innovative course asks students to interrogate ideas about the built environment, creating responses that consider buildings as social spaces that are lived, impacting communities and introducing new concepts into society. From this theoretical framing, exciting prospects are envisaged that address social and political questions, challenging the ways in which we are directed to live by conventional spaces, and proposing alternatives that positively impact those who inhabit them. The graduates of this programme are given the tools needed to contribute to some of Ireland’s most celebrated architectural firms, with alumni working for some of the most renowned architectural practices in Ireland and abroad. Graduates from the Programme are multiple award winners, and have recently won the inaugural “RIAI Scott Tallon Walker Student Excellence Award” in Architecture, the “RIAI Thesis Writing Prize”, the IDI “Sustainable Design Award” for Architecture”, and the “European Association for Architectural Education Prize (EAAE) Prize for Innovation in Architecture”.

In Architecture/Sculpture, Pluck celebrate the conceptual drive of the M.Arch programme, foregrounding the creativity of graduates, their ability to mediate between critical discourse and their attention to form and structure. With these intriguing objects; some that explicitly reference building and some that explore more abstract concepts of texture or shape;  an often neglected aspect of how our built environment is conceived comes to the fore. Architecture/Sculpture presents viewers with objects that act as architectural sketches, putting the ideas behind buildings on show.

With work by Gillian O’Keeffe, Chloe Kerins, Habban Ali, Claire Quinn, Stephen Hannon  and Danielle O’Sullivan, and Catriona Courtney.

With thanks to Crónán Ó Doibhlin, Head of Research Collections and Communications, Boole Library, University College Cork.

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Gaolbreak: Angela Fulcher

January 28 – February 25, Mon-Fri 09:00 – 17:00.

Preview: January 27, 18.00. Catalogue launch and drinks reception.

In November 1923, prisoners held at Cork City Women’s Gaol launched an escape attempt. Tying together bed sheets to construct a rope ladder, the prisoners descended from the walls of the prison and made their bid for freedom. In Gaolbreak, Cork-based artist Angela Fulcher draws on this history to create a large scale fabric installation in the atrium of Cork City Hall. Knotted lengths of bedding fall from the building’s balconies, obliquely referencing this story of revolt in recognition of Ireland’s Decade of Commemorations. Fulcher brings to bear her fascination with the world of consumer-driven textile design, using contemporary items from low-cost suppliers like Michael Guineys and Penneys. Using sometimes kitsch, heavily patterned material, Fulcher looks beyond the garish to consider prospective connections between everyday devalued materials and their extraordinary potentials.

This project builds on Fulcher’s substantial body of work which has led to growing recognition of her practice. Paying close attention to the details and qualities of materials and surfaces, Fulcher explores the contexts and philosophies associated found materials. Her intelligent and subtle subversions touch on the histories and politics of manufacturing, fashion and obsolescence, the vagaries of taste and the realm of traditional feminine making. Fulcher takes a unique approach to sculpture. Her recent practice has involved creating large-scale, temporary textile sculptures that engage their environment: Sun Stopping at VISUAL, Carlow (2016) reflected on its site, creating striking interventions outside the gallery; Vermiculated Render Quoins to Ground Floor (2016) at the Engage Festival Bandon echoed the patterns on the Allin centre’s walls, translating them into textile sculptures of heavily patterned upholstery fabric and red pleather. Creating surprising, intelligent and witty works of art, Fulcher scrutinizes our everyday environment, picking out derided artefacts in order to consider their implications.

Curated by Pluck Projects

Catalogue with essay by Prof. Jessica Hemmings, Professor of Crafts & Vice-Prefekt of Research at the Academy of Design & Crafts (HDK), University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Funded by Cork City Council. Angela  Fulcher is a recipient of the Next Generation Bursary Award 2016, a special initiative of the Arts Council and the Ireland 2016 Centenary Programme, in recognition of the role of artists in the events of 1916.