NORTH WEST DRAWING COLLECTIVE
Mary-Ruth Walsh
Biography
Born in Dublin, Walsh graduated from Goldsmiths College London (MA) and the National College of Art and Design (BA), Dublin. Walsh has participated in national and international exhibitions and Artist’s Residency Programme in the Irish Museum of Modern Art (IMMA) Dublin; RHA’s experimental drawing studio (Dublin); Aabenraa Artweek (Denmark) and Basekamp (Philadelphia). Walsh had 10 solo exhibitions in the last 13 years and group exhibitions include IMMA (Dublin); Dublin City Gallery The Hugh Lane (Dublin); RHA (Dublin); CUBEOpen (Manchester); Oonagh Young Gallery (Dublin); Highlanes Gallery (Drogheda); Parlour (New York): Arts Centre (Wexford and Galway); Cross Gallery (Dublin); Goethe Centre (Dublin) and SCOPE (Miami).
Artist Statement
Taking inspiration from the language of architecture, Mary-Ruth constructs imagined proposals and spaces exploring ideas relating to the built environment and contemporary culture. She creates new dialogues drawing from utopian ideals of 20th and 21st century planning and design, and juxtaposes these with vernacular architecture. Often using found objects to make my work, she translates these into a type of architectural shorthand - like a new vocabulary.
Mary-Ruth uses drawings and lens-based images and set up the work in such a way as to create a double take for the viewer to explore the gap between an object and its two-dimensional representation. This gap is full of promises and denials, of realities and unrealities. In a way the work is about activating the viewer by using the ‘language of seductive surfaces’.
