Language and colonialism at heart of new exhibition

A new group exhibition, Mountain Language/ An Act of Listening, will open in Galway City this Friday evening, February 4 and run until Saturday, April 16.

Featuring artists Ailbhe Ní Bhriain, Duncan Campbell, Sarah Pierce, Alice Rekab, Denise Ferreira da Silva and Arjuna Neuman, it’s the first event in Galway Arts Centre’s visual arts programme for 2022.

The show’s name, Mountain Language, comes from title of Harold Pinter’s play which was first performed in London in 1988. Inspired by the oppression that the Kurdish people suffered under Turkish rule, it follows a group of prisoners in an unnamed country, trying to find a voice when their own language has been banned.

This new exhibition explores the politics of language and people’s voices in colonialism, power and decolonisation and, according to Megs Morley of the Arts Centre, it’s especially relevant in Galway. The city is Ireland’s most multi-culturally diverse city and Connemara is one of the few places in Ireland where Irish is widely spoken.

In the aftermath of Brexit, it’s also important for artists explore  to topics of nationality, European-ness (or not), migration, and borders, she feels.

Sarah Pierce work consists of a large-scale installation, Gag, and series of short performances. These are based on the work of artists and activists Alice Milligan and Maud Gonne during the Celtic Revival, when they used tableau theatrical performances as a political tool. She responds the use of Celtic mythology in those silent plays and the way Irish was outlawed by the English as a way of seeking a ‘new’ language in theatre that would have a political resonance.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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