Farrell explores the ways in which Susan Connolly, Judy Carroll-Deeley and Jennifer Trouton forge their own vision of oil on canvas at the Solstice in Navan
Using the word ‘struggle’ in the context of writing about painting conjures up outdated and sentimen tal notions of what it is to be an artist. But each time I stand in a painter’s studio and talk about their work, ‘struggle’ seems the most appropriate adjective to describe their journey from what they want to achieve and what they might actually be achieving at the time. It is an experience that is specific to painting, defined by the means of the artist’s expression being confined to the fairly limited con vention of liquid paint on flat grounds.
Eleanor Flegg visits ceramicist Mark Campden’s Kilkenny studio to witness the process behind his gleaming table-ware
Paula Murphy examines the background to Oisín Kelly’s immortalization of Big Jim Larkin commissioned by the workers of Ireland
Technical developments enable artistic development’: John Behan reflects on the circumstances which spurred his move to sculpture, in conversation here with Brian McAvera