Niamh NicGhabhann Coleman finds that the work of this year’s graduates reflects a turn towards ideas of work, as well as the complexity of human relationships
What is work? Which work is worth keeping, when all work seems up for renegotiation? What work can our bodies and our brains uniquely do? These have become everyday questions, as artificial intelligence applications pop up in almost every corner of our lives. In a (perhaps unrealistic) best-case scenario, the appearance of these new technologies will result in an uptick in media literacy, in critical thinking and in assessment of the quality and provenance of information that is put before us. We will be more demanding in terms of the culture that we consume, wanting to be sure that what we have chosen to spend our time with is, in fact, worth hearing and seeing. Our inner lives, our creative and empathetic selves, deserve more than hallucinated distraction.
To read this article in full, subscribe or buy this edition of the Irish Arts Review
Daniel Breen selects a sculpture by Seamus Murphy in the collection of Cork Public Museum
Daniel Maclise’s portraits of women, with their Romantic mood and understated symbolism, are among the best of his work, writes Julian Campbell
Philip McEvansoneya considers how the Trench Collection of Tibetan art in the National Museum of Ireland was acquired by the collector, and the museum, and asks if it’s time this ethnographic display was made more accessible to the public