ART: Norman Villa, a fine period building and previously one of Galway's most popular guesthouses, has been transformed intoa new art gallery, writes Lorna Siggins
When an artist takes a regular afternoon nap, a workspace with a bedroom is a distinct advantage. No day passes without Brian Bourke having his happy hour, but he isn't fussy. His partner and fellow artist, Jay Murphy, recalls occasions when studio print tables have sufficed.
This month, however, Bourke fell on his feet - if not on his back. Not only did Galway guesthouse owners, Mark and Dee Keogh, decide to convert their period house, Norman Villa, into a gallery, they also invited Bourke and Murphy to stage the gallery's first exhibition as part of the Galway Arts Festival - giving the pair the run of their walls, their garden and one of their top-floor bedrooms.
And so, Bourke snoozed while Murphy hung, literally, during several afternoons last week as the Keoghs prepared for their grand opening on the eve of the two-week festival. It is almost a year since the couple made the break with guesthouse life after 13 years - a move which caused some heartbreak among their regular visitors who have found them in Fodor's and all the best guidebooks.
The 200-year-old three-storey residence is one of Galway's finest period buildings, with its dramatic carriage entrance, coach house and stables out the back.
The Keoghs, from Dublin and Roscommon, restored the building to its original state, complete with fireplaces and pine flooring, when they purchased it. Their former dining room looks out onto an extensive courtyard and lush garden. However, the table has now been removed, there are plinths outside ready to display artwork, and the two downstairs rooms are currently displaying Brian Bourke's work - a series of drawings and mixed-media portraits made during an intensive five-week residency at the Galway Arts Centre in Dominick Street.
The Keoghs have been collecting art for 25 years, and the gallery project seemed like a natural progression. "We had a wonderful time running the guesthouse, but when we finished up on September 30th last year we said we wouldn't make a decision until after Christmas," Dee Keogh explains.
"We were looking for a change of lifestyle, we had our own art here, and we thought, why not?" For a city of its size and reputation, Galway is not over-run with galleries. "And when we made up our minds, we were delighted. Just delighted." The venture was funded with their own capital, entirely.
Brian Bourke already dominated their own private living room, which includes works by Tony O'Malley, sculptor John Coll and Kathleen Furey. Both Bourke and Murphy advised them on interior design and colour, they kept some furniture, and the family bedroom at the front of the house was converted into the second gallery space - currently exhibiting Jay Murphy's latest work, entitled Welcome to Galway, Mr Grosz.
Grosz, the German expressionist painter associated with the Dada movement in Berlin, provided much of the inspiration for Murphy's interpretations. A "pastiche" of Grosz's cityscapes is how she describes her images of last year's Macnas Hallowe'en parade. As the spirits in the Mexican Day of the Dead, complete with mythical sow, wind past Lynch's Castle, Taaffes's bar and other Galway city landmarks on canvas, Murphy has captured familiar faces in costume, including Paul Fahy of the Galway Arts Festival and city arts officer, James Harrold.
The Keoghs suggested the hallway downstairs for a sequence of images of the May blossom by Murphy.
"I just had this feeling that the May blossom was going to be good this year, and it was, and I got out there and worked on it," she says.
Several salamanders - look out for one on a ceiling - are witnesses to the new project. Dee Keogh laughs as she remembers how one or two purchases of the tailed amphibian, which, myth has it, can live in or extinguish fire, led to a whole collection.
The couple's only resident now is the family dog, but they intend to keep one guest room upstairs for visiting artists. "It won't be any trouble to us, because it is what we have always done," she says.