LEONARDO 500 IS IN TOP 10 OF THINGS TO DO IN GALWAY

Our exhib opening on Tuesday the 15th is featured in this week's Galway Advertiser, thanks a mill to Kernan Andrews. And it also made the Top 10 Things to do in Galway this week!

LEONARDO 500 - EXHIB OPENING

Artwork by Fiona Ormsby

To celebrate its 10th anniversary, Group 8 will hold the opening of its annual exhibition, LEONARDO 500, on Tuesday the 15^th October at 6pm in the Church Gallery in Ballinasloe library. The exhibition will run for two weeks from that day and features writing, paintings, photography, textiles, ceramics, mixed media and sculpture inspired by Leonardo da Vinci, whose quincentenary is this year. Writer and art curator Margaret Hickey will open the exhibition.

LEONARDO 500 is the result of collaborative work the members of Group 8 undertook, taking inspiration from the life, art and ideas of Italian painter, inventor and literal Renaissance man, Leonardo da Vinci. Da Vinci was an extraordinary thinker, responsible for the Mona Lisa, The Last Supper, and designs for the first flying machine, parachute, and machine gun. Sigmund Freud said of him, ‘He was like a man who awoke too early in the darkness, while the others were all still asleep.’

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.

ART & WORDS - Author Nessa O’Mahony to Read

Dublin-based writer Nessa O’Mahony is the next guest in artist collective Group 8’s Art & Words series of talks in Ballinasloe. She will appear at Gullane’s Hotel, Ballinasloe, on International Women’s Day, Friday March 8^th at 7pm. Nessa will give a reading from her début crime novel The Branchman and she will be interviewed by Group 8 member, Nuala O’Connor. Admission is free. Refreshments will be served.

Nessa’s novel The Branchman was published in late 2018 by Arlen House. Set in Ballinasloe in 1925, it features Detective Michael Mackey, ex-British Army and Civil War veteran and one of the first members of the Free State’s new elite Special Branch. Mackey is assigned to the Garda Barracks in Ballinasloe and uncovers a plot by subversives to disrupt the peace. 

The novel is inspired by the real-life adventures of Nessa’s grandfather, Michael McCann, who was a member of the original Special Branch and was stationed as a Garda in Ballinasloe from 1929 to 1945.  Donal Ryan has described the novel as ‘a taut and absorbing thriller’ while writing in the Irish Times, Declan Burke said that ‘most fascinating, perhaps, is O’Mahony’s evocation of the wider political backdrop, that fragile, imperfect peace that took hold in the wake of the War of Independence and the Civil War.’

PRESS FOR MAPS AND BECOMING BELLE LAUNCH

Great press ahead of our exhibition opening and book launch on Tuesday 11th Sep. in Ballinasloe Library. Thanks to both the Connacht Tribune (below) and the Galway Advertiser.
ALL WELCOME!

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.

NOELLE LYNSKEY POETRY READING - ART & WORDS

Portumna-based writer Noelle Lynskey is the next guest in artist collective Group 8’s Art & Words series of talks in Ballinasloe. She will appear at Tosnú Art & Craft Gallery’s studio in Brackernagh, Ballinasloe, on November 17^th at 7.30pm. Admission is free. Refreshments will be served.

Noelle, now living in Portumna, is originally from Strokestown. She is Director of Shorelines Arts Festival, Portumna for the last eleven years and founder and member of the Maple Poetry Group and Portumna Pen Pushers writing group as well as a member of The Peers, a professional writing group of ten years standing. She is also a member of the Strokestown International Poetry Festival committee.

In the past, Noelle has read at Cúirt Literary Festival, Baffle, Inis Cealtra Arts Festival, Terryglass Arts Festival, Shorelines Arts Festival, RTE Sunday Miscellany, Clifden Arts Festival and Cos Cos, with poems published in many anthologies and literary magazines including Crannóg, Skylight, Scríobh, Roscommon Anthology, Maple Leaves and West 47. Her literary awards include Baffle, Scríobh and the Hannah Greally Award.

With three adult daughters, Noelle works as a community pharmacist in Portumna. Poetry is one of Noelle’s passions and when possible, she takes time out to write. She is currently readying a poetry collection for publication.

We are delighted to welcome Noelle Lynskey, a stalwart of the Galway arts scene, to read at Tosnú. We promise a magical night of words, candlelight, tea, cake and lively discussion. Everyone is welcome.

CULTURE NIGHT OPENING - MAJESTY IN THE MINUTE

Here are some pics from our hugely successful opening night on Culture Night. We were delighted with the enormous turnout and the warm welcome from the library and our fellow Ballinaslovians. Thanks to all of you for making it a great evening.

Juno McLoughlin arriving for the opening

Detail of Fiona Ormsby's work

Fiona O and friends

Ally and Jack Soden and Juno McLoughlin

Lily Kelly's lobster and light piece

Some of the crowd

Group 8: John, Nuala, Grellan, Zara, Úna, Joyce, Lily, Tommy