Reclaiming a Space

Diana Copperwhite (RHA) is a member of Aosdána. Born in Limerick, Ireland, she studied at the Limerick School of Art and Design from 1987-92, received a BA in painting at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin and an MFA at the Winchester School of Art and Design, Barcelona in 2000.

Diana Copperwhite’s work stems from an idiosyncratic practice that embraces the temporal nature of painting practice. This encompasses working with large-scale wall installations, large canvases, drawing, and an ongoing interest in the human portrait. Her paintings explore the relationship between colors, gestures, figuration, abstraction and representation. She gives structure to the unseen world of atoms and molecules to examine the psychological and spatial interpretation of self. Layering fragmented sources that range from personal memory to science, media and internet, Copperwhite’s canvases become worlds in which the real is unreal and this unreality is in a constant state of reforming. Her work is in public collections, including The Irish Museum of Modern Art; The Dublin City Gallery, The Hugh Lane, The National Gallery of Ireland, Arts Council of Ireland; The Rothko Center, Latvia; The Limerick City Gallery of Art; The Highlanes, Municipal Gallery, Office of Public Works; Ireland, Contemporary Irish Art Society; Mariehamn Stadsbibliotek, Aland, Finland; the British Council, Hesburgh Library, Notre Dame University, and private collections. 

She has been reviewed widely both in Ireland and abroad, most recently in Hyperallergic, Brooklyn Rail, Art Forum, The Irish Times, The Sunday Times, and The Irish Arts Review amongst others. She was a resident artist at the Josef Albers Foundation Connecticut (2012). She was a finalist in the Guasch Coranty Fundació Painting Prize, Centre Cultural Metropolita Tecia Sala, Barcelona (2008). Copperwhite was awarded the AIB Art Prize in 2007, which resulted in a major monograph and touring exhibition of her work. Her publication Fake New World was published to coincide with a wall drawing and exhibition at the RHA Gallery Dublin and with her solo show Depend on the Morning Sun at 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel New York in 2017; it features a recent biography written by Gail Levin. Her most recent touring exhibition Onomatopoeia—curated by Aoife Ruane and instigated by the Highlanes Municipal Gallery, touring to Limerick City Gallery of Art and the Galway International Arts Festival—features a new publication called Onomatopoeia with texts by Sean Rainbird, Angela Griffith and a conversation with Liliane Tomasko. 

Current solo exhibitions: ONOMATOPOEIA at Flowers Gallery London until February 17th 2024. Recent solo exhibitions: The Highlanes Gallery, Drogheda. Limerick City Gallery and touring to the Galway International Arts Festival (2023). Sounding of Silhouettes Kevin Kavanagh Gallery (2023). Reflections in a Darker Mirror Thomas Jaeckel Gallery (2022). Recent group exhibitions with the Shelter Collective and It Took A Century, a survey exhibition of the women members of the RHA at The National Gallery of Ireland (2023). Who do we say we are at the Snite Museum, Indiana (2022).

Erin Lawlor (b. 1969 in Epping, England) received her bachelor of history of art in 1992 from Paris-Sorbonne University, France. 

She has had numerous solo exhibitions nationally and internationally. Recent solo exhibitions include “Invincible summer” at Wellington Arch (in partnership with English Heriatge), and “Earthly delights” at Vigo Gallery (2023), both in London, and accompanied by a catalogue with an essay by Dr. David Anfam; “Erin Lawlor” at Miles McEnery Gallery, NYC (2022); “entre chien et loup” at Luca Tommasi in Milan (2021); “Memory of a Free Festival”, at Fox/Jensen/McCrory Gallery, Auckland (2020); Erin Lawlor” at Miles McEnery Gallery, NYC (2019); “cat on the raz,” Espacio Valverde, Madrid; “hiraeth,” Fox/Jensen Gallery, Sydney (…). 

In 2017, a survey exhibition of Lawlor’s work, “onomatopoeia,” took place at the Rothko Museum, Latvia, and her work was showcased in “Maleri.Nu/Paint.Now,” at the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek Museum, Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2016. 

Recent group exhibitions include “The Cabin LA presents: a Curated Flashback” at The Green Family Foundation, Dallas; “Making a Mark: Abstraction in the Ahmanson Collection”, Irvine, CA; “British Painting 2019” at Space K, Seoul; “A brief History of Abstraction,” Rønnebæksholm, Denmark; “L’Echappée Belle, Erin Lawlor/Bram van Velde,” Galerie Pauline Pavec, Paris, France; “Drei Künstlerinnen der Gegenwart,” at the French Institute Mayence/Mainz, Germany; “Bête Noire/Candyman,” The Neutra Museum, Los Angeles; “A full open hand, drippings, and carefully masked lines,” Galleri Jacob Bjørn, Aarhus, Denmark (…). 

Her work is present in numerous private collections. Public collections include the Women’s Art Collection, Cambridge, UK; and the Rothko Museum,, Latvia, and corporate collections include Kolon Museum Art Collection, Seoul and the Nordstrom collection, U.S.A.

Lawlor currently lives and works in London, UK. She is represented by Miles McEnery Gallery in New York; Vigo Gallery, London; Fox/Jensen and Fox/Jensen/McCrory galleries, Sydney/Auckland; and Luca Tommasi, Milan.

Helen O'Leary is an Irish-born artist based in the United States and Ireland, who is best known for constructions that blur the boundaries between painting and sculpture. 

She holds MFA and BFA degrees from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, IL. Her work has been widely recognized through awards and residencies including the Rome Prize American Academy in Rome; the Hennessy Purchase Award, IMMA, Dublin; the Purchase Award American Academy of Arts and Letters; the John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship; the Pollock-Krasner awards (2); the Joan Mitchell Award for painting and sculpture; the Culturel Irlandaise, France; the Sam and Adele Golden Residency, NY; the Mac Dowell Colony, New Hampshire; the Skowhegan program, ME; and the Yaddo Residency, NY. Among multiple and prestigious exhibitions are the American Academy of Arts and Letters, NYC; The American Academy in Rome, Italy and NYC; The MAC Belfast, Ireland; National Gallery of Art, Ireland; Lesley Heller Gallery, NYC; Eric Firestone Gallery, NYC, Maine Museum of Art, Bangor, Maine; Muscarele Museum of Art, Williamsburg, Virginia; The Butler Gallery, Ireland, Galerie le Petit Port, Belgium; the Contemporary Arts Centre, Sidney, Australia; Patricia Sweetow Gallery, San Francisco; Zurcher Gallery, NYC; Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL, Glasgow Museum of Art, Scotland; and the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Ireland. 

A professor in the School of Visual Arts at Penn State University, O’Leary co-authored the Penn State program Representing the Irish Landscape, which includes climate scientists, poets, writers, social/ climate activists, economists, philosophers and farmers.

Born in Peekskill, NY in 1971, I currently live in Brooklyn, New York and maintain a studio at The Elizabeth Foundation in Manhattan. I received a BFA from the State University of New York at Purchase (1994), and an MFA in painting and drawing from The School of The Art Institute of Chicago (1997). My grandmother immigrated from County Kerry, Ireland to New York and I recently became an Irish citizen. 

For the past fifteen years, my work has explored abstraction and the legacy of modernism. While the core of my work is paintings and drawings, I also create large-scale wall drawings, sculptural objects, and animation. 

Since receiving my MFA in 1997 from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, my work has been presented in over 100 gallery exhibitions, both nationally and internationally. I have held three full time university positions including Cornell University, SUNY Purchase, and the City University of New York at Lehman College where I am now an associate professor of Art. I have been a visiting artist in over forty institutions as well as the recipient of several residencies and grants.