RHA Annual Exhibition, Ely Place, Dublin 2, until May 13th
Into the Darkness, Toward the Light, Carol Graham, Guinness Hopstore, until May 4th
To speak of interesting developments at the RHA may sound like Paul Vaughan's title for one of his volumes of autobiography, Exciting Times in the Accounts Department.
Nonetheless, this year's RHA Annual contains much that is surprisingly spirited and enjoyable, and it happens against a background of interesting, intriguing developments in the Academy. These developments arise from an accumulation of moves towards a revitalisation of the Academy in recent years, and the scheduled dissolution of the Board of Trustees set up to oversee the development of the Gallagher Gallery. In place of the Trust there are now three new academic bodies, which may sound like a recipe for clutter and inertia and, who knows, may still prove to be just that.
But in theory the separate bodies actually facilitate concentration on the Academy's three main areas of engagement: the development of the organisation itself, programming the Gallagher Gallery, which is a major exhibition space in the heart of Dublin, and the funding and financial side of things.
The inclusion of Dorothy Cross on the Programme Board (with Tony Kilduff in the chair, and Martin Gale and Liam Belton also there) signals an intent to expand the scope of gallery activities.
Indeed, the programme for the remainder of this year says as much, with shows by the influential Belgian painter Roaul De Keyser, Korean conceptualist Cho Duck Hyan, sculptors Grace Weir and Tacita Dean and a welcome 15-year survey of the work of painter Charles Tyrrell.
Landscape fares well in this year's Annual, from big bold statements like Jill Dennis' River, Drop to Barbara Warren's gentle, understated but always meticulously built views (she also shows a remarkable study of two figures in an airy interior). Then there are beautiful pieces by Nancy Wynne-Jones, T. P. Flanagan's studies of Carrick-Rea quarry, Mary Lohan's Mayo beach, full of a sense of the weather's capricious energy, and Raymond Mintz's anthropomorphic ravine - compare and contrast with Gwen O'Dowd's treatment of comparable material.
Martin Gale manages to work a complex account of familial relations, to each other and to the land, into his excellent The Daughter. Also worthy of note are landscapes glimpsed in transit by both Simon English and MaryAvril Gillan, Anita Shelbourne's moody study of Lissadell, Veronica Bolay's almost mystical evocations of transient moments, Peter Collis's dark Killiney views, and in a similar vein, John Coyle's subtle, Cezannesque works, Rosaleen Davey's beautifully atmospheric Dark Light and John Philip Murray's little pillars of light, two beautiful skies by Janet Pierce, James Savage's drawing of limestone pavement, Niall Wright's severely accurate view of Sally Gap, a strong John Shinnors, and agreeably relaxed offerings from Carey Clarke and Brett McEntagart.
Both Nick Miller and Melita Denaro show small works that are very powerful.
Tom Mathews enjoys the rare distinction of featuring as both artist and subject - he is a sitter for Paul Funge's spirited portrait and he shows one of his excellent art pun pictures, Kitaj Kats.
Among the surprises are a beautifully spare, understated painting by Sonia Sheil and, in quite a different vein, Suzette Tackney's four part abstraction with its delicate play on soft yellows and fleshy pinks. The presence of Stephen Brandes, Oliver Comerford, James Hanley, Deirdre McLoughlin, Simon McWilliams, Blaise Smith, Colin Martin, Gary Coyle, Olivia Musgrave, Michael Quane and Mark Pepper all add greatly to the overall tenor of the exhibition.
It's the first year for photography, so perhaps it will make a greater impact next time, but Norman Mooney's Wall I, among other pieces, suggests that it is a good move.
It would be easy to mock Carol Graham's Into the Darkness, Toward the Light, for what could be described as its New Age patchwork of feel-good, self-help spirituality. Easy but unfair, first because it contains some genuinely fine work, second because its premise, the charting of a personal spiritual journey, is quite valid, and third because Graham is an artist of proven ability and has more than earned our careful attention.
Into the Darkness is a brave venture that sets out to answer the question of how you visualise extremities of emotion and areas of deep, dark personal experience. The point about Graham's work is that, as she says, she had hitherto exclusively directed herself towards the depiction of what she calls an "accepted reality," that is, the world of outward appearances, the skin of things. Not uniquely, in the midst of a personal crisis, she found that her existing expressive langauge was unequal to her predicament.
At an early stage of the process of depression and healing that led to the work in this show, Graham walked a lot in the Mourne Mountains and painted landscapes. A few of them are included, and two of them, Lamagan in Mist and Bearnagh Catching Light, are outstanding. She speaks of them as external counterparts of her inward journey. Yet they are more than depictions of the "accepted reality" she speaks of. They have a magical lightness and clarity about them. One can sense her intense connection with the scene, can sense her in the scene.
In a way the nature of this latter work removes it from aesthetic considerations. In enacting an almost ritualistic form of healing, it is potentially therapeutic, and for Graham it clearly was therapeutic. And it is successful if others can look at it and identify with it, can in effect enter into its emotional world.
