Co-curator Dr Orla Fitzpatrick and artists Cíaran Dunbar, Garrett Carr and Ruth Gondalves Moore discuss themes and artists' focus

Picturing the Border: Seminar

Friday 2nd October 11.30am-12.45pm

Join us for a a panel discussion and short artist gallery talks with artists and curators including the exhibition's co-curator Dr Orla Fitzpatrick and artists Dr Cíaran Dunbar, Garrett Carr and Ruth Gonsalves Moore.

Focusing on representations of the Irish border in painting, print, photography, film, mixed-media and popular culture, as well as objects and ephemera; this exhibition explores how artists have reacted and responded to the border since 1922.

This exhibition shows communities on both sides of the border, and how the division of the country has impacted on the counties and region in a range of unique ways, moving away from stereotypical and clichéd depictions of the region.

This morning session focuses on the research project between Trinity College Dublin and Queens University Belfast exploring border culture, exploring the themes in the exhibition as well as insight and reflection on artwork in the exhibition by some of the exhibiting artists.

Tickets priced at €6 per person (minus booking fee), and refreshments available.

Picturing the Border 1921 – 2026

22 August – 31 October

Highlanes Municipal Art Gallery’s location as a cultural institution in Drogheda, within the border county of Louth, and the North East of the island, has ideally positioned it to draw on artistic partnerships and local contacts, networks and institutions for this major exhibition, to reveal a cultural response to the over one-hundred year old boundary. The gallery was developed in a cross-border capital project, and 2026 marks the twentieth anniversary of its founding.

Co-curated by Dr Orla Fitzpatrick and Aoife Ruane, the exhibition presents work by twenty nine artists including Array Collective, Kathleen Bridle, John Byrne, Garrett Carr, Krass Clement, Megan Doherty, Willie Doherty, Ciarán Dunbar, David Farrell, Kevin Fox, T.P Flanagan, Ruth Gonsalves-Moore, Anthony Haughey, Jeremy Henderson, Sean Hillen, Dorothy Hunter, Ben Malcolmson, Mairéad McClean, Maurice McGonagle, F.E. McWilliam, William Monk, Locky Morris, Brian Newman, Kate Nolan, Dickey O'Rorke, Tony O'Shea, Akihiko Okamura, Dermot Seymour, Constance Shortt and Donovan Wylie drawn from public and private collections from Ireland and Northern Ireland, and from artists’ studios.

Biographies:

Ciarán Dunbar undertook a BA in Photography at the Ulster University, Belfast. Ciaran’s parents originated from Northern Ireland but left in the 1980s to escape 'the Troubles'. Dunbar’s work explores issues of identity, displacement, and his relationship with his immediate locality. It is concerned with the tensions that lie beneath the surface, spatial planning, land usage and its impact on communities.

His work has been featured in numerous exhibitions across Ireland as part of the Reframing the Border programme.In 2021 he was selected for the Galleries Without Walls Photo Museum Ireland/Regional Cultural Centre / Nerve Centre Artists Collaborative Commission. He was Artist-in Residence in Photo Museum Ireland in 2022. He was awarded an Arts Council of Ireland Bursary in 2021and 2024. His artist’s monograph Diesel was published by Photo Museum Ireland in 2022. Ciarán lives and works in County Louth.

Dr Orla Fitzpatrick is a librarian and photographic historian from Dublin, Ireland. She earned a doctorate from Ulster University in 2016 and was librarian at the National Museum of Ireland from 2002 to 2026. She recently completed a post doctoral project on Ireland’s border cultures at Trinity College Dublin. Orla is currently librarian at Poetry Ireland where she is cataloguing the personal library of Seamus Heaney.

Ruth Gonsalves Moore was born in Enniskillen, where she returned to live in 2017. Ruth has worked as a community development and community arts management practitioner in Northern Ireland and the border counties, since first graduating with a Social work/Community Development degree and Masters (Equality Studies) in 1993 from University College Dublin. Returning to study in 2011, Ruth gained a first-class honours degree at University of Ulster in Photography (2014) and she regards her subject matter as that pertaining to cultural questions of identity, belonging, otherness and place.Interested in identity, cultural practice, segments and fragments of the everyday existence and being, the artist works with both documentary and conceptual dimensions of the photographic medium.

Dr Garrett Carr is a prominent author, academic and map-maker known for his contributions to literature and creative writing. He grew up near Ireland’s border and much of his work focuses on the region. He serves as a Senior Lecturer at Queen's University Belfast, where he teaches Creative Writing. He is the author of "The Rule of the Land: Walking Ireland's Border" and "The Boy from the Sea," with

Description supplied by the event organiser.