BOOK LAUNCH & EXHIB OPENING

Group 8 will hold its largest cultural event to date in Ballinasloe Library in September 2018. The event will see the launch of Becoming Belle, the major new novel by Group 8 member Nuala O’Connor, as well as the opening of the group’s exhibition, MAPS, which will feature art and writing that focuses on the theme of - unsurprisingly - maps! Broadcaster and former TD Mary O’Rourke will launch Nuala’s novel.

The book launch and opening will take place on Tuesday the 11^th September at 6pm in the Church Gallery in the library and the exhibition will run for two weeks from that day, encompassing Culture Night on the 21^st September, when members of the group will give artist talks from 6pm to 8pm.

Nuala O’Connor’s novel, Becoming Belle, follows the fortunes of music hall actress Isabel Bilton, who was the last Countess Clancarty to occupy Garbally Court in Ballinasloe. It’s a witty and inherently feminist novel about passion and marriage, set in Victorian London and Ireland, and will delight anyone familiar with Ballinasloe.

The exhibition MAPS is the result of collaborative work the members of Group 8 undertook around the theme of maps in all their guises, as geographical topography as well as maps of the mind and heart. The exhibition will feature paintings, photography, felted textiles, ceramics, mixed media and sculpture.

Group 8, was founded in 2009 and is comprised of eight visual artists and two writers: Joyce Little – visual and multimedia artist; Tommy Campbell – sculptor and woodturner; Lily Kelly – visual artist; Grellan Ganly – visual artist; Úna Spain – visual artist; Nuala O’Connor – writer; Zara Little-Campbell – writer; John Soden – painter; Walter Coughlan – ceramicist; and Fiona Ormsby – textile designer.

Group 8 is a non-profit, professional arts group whose aim is to foster awareness, imagination and co-operative learning between the artist and the community. The group hosts exhibitions, literary events, artist talks, readings, workshops and book launches. See thegroup8.blogspot.com for more.

All are welcome. Free admission. Refreshments will be served.