Celebrating legendary artist Brian Bourke

Arts Week with Judy Murphy

Obsessions, Preoccupations, Themes & Variations is a new solo exhibition at Galway Arts Centre in Dominick Street from artist Brian Bourke.

It will feature new and recent works from Brian, including a series he produced in response to a recent residency with Galway’s classical ConTempo Quartet. Dublin-born Brian, who has lived in Galway for many decades and turned 80 this year, is a legend on the local arts scene, and it’s only fitting that the exhibition is being opened by another legend, the Saw Doctors manager, Ollie Jennings formerly of Galway Arts Festival.

Brian and Galway Arts Centre will host two events during the exhibition, which runs until, Saturday July 2.

The first will be a free concert at the Gallery with the Galway quartet in residence, ConTempo Quartet, at 6pm next Thursday, June 9.

Then, on June 30, the Arts Centre will host a special evening in its Nuns Island Theatre venue, when filmmaker Bob Quinn will introduce Self Portrait with Red Car and Lillipup, two films he  made in the 1970s with Brian.

That will be at 6pm and will be followed by the screenings. Self Portrait with Red Car experiments with the subjectivity of image in relation to sound. Lillipup is a surreal and subversive take on how the pursuits of art and the artist are at odds with everyday life. Both films were shot in  Connemara, where both Brian and Bob live.

Brian will conclude the evening by giving a talk about his life and work.

Obsessions, Preoccupations, Themes & Variations addresses different themes in his art and attempts to create new stories by juxtaposing different works.

Brian is known for his drawing, painting, mixed media and sculptural works, often depicting nature, whether through landscape or intertwining it with his ever-evolving interest in mortality through animal skulls.

His ongoing relationship with the genre of portraiture will be particularly addressed in this exhibition. This continues a theme from previous shows where he challenged conventional portraiture by offering a unique take on masks and fictional characters, from Beckett’s Didi and Gogo to Don Quixote, via Mad Sweeney, the medieval Irish character of Sweeney in Buile Suibhne – Mad Sweeney.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.