Author John Banville was in Limerick to support the launch of In A Liminal State, a retrospective exhibition displaying the work of painter and master printer Stephen Lawlor at the Hunt
Museum. Running until July 3rd, the exhibition explores many of the artworks featured in the newly published Gandon Publication “Profile 29: Stephen Lawlor”.
Born in Dublin in 1958, Stephen has exhibited and worked regularly in Sweden, Belgium and China. His figurative images can border on abstraction but there is always a strong connection with the history of European painting. His use of light and his focus on the past makes his work instantly recognisable. Images of women started to appear in his work after an uncanny encounter in 2004. His recent paintings have been described as ‘like Dutch Master on acid’ and can seem far removed from the spectral Geisha or Royal figures in his etchings, encased in the liquid black of their inky spaces.
In his introduction to Profile #29, author John Banville, says “Considering the paintings and prints of Stephen Lawlor, I am struck by how apposite is that notion of an art that makes visible the invisible space of air … That world exists, in these works, in a liminal state, oddly resistant to the eye’s grasp and yet wholly palpable, wholly there. Gazing into one of his canvases you find yourself being drawn deep and deeper into a landscape – or a ‘landscape’ – sumptuous yet uncertain, that is at once familiar and ineffably mysterious. It is a magical, slightly eerie sensation; you seem astray in a forest, a garden, a numinously shadowed cityscape, under a turbulent gold-and-umber sky that seems more solid, more grounded, than the ground you tread on.”
Speaking about the exhibition, Jill Cousins, Director at the Hunt Museum, said “In a Liminal State is a fascinating study of the influences on Stephen’s work. The exhibition contains gems from his early period as well as more current work, many of which give you feelings of tension and unease. You are in an uncertain place or space.”
Artists Statement
“From the mid 1980’s, I focused on multi-plate etching and I started painting in 1990. I have worked from the landscape and from the human figure, but I always return to exploring the lexicon of European painting and I am interested in incorporating the compositional structure, colour and light from classical antiquity.
Iconography by artists such as Titian, Veronese, Rubens and Van Eyck has been at the heart of my practice since I began in 1983. After an encounter in 2004, I went through a radical change of perspective which shifted my focus to include the portraits of powerful women from those same centuries. I surround myself with these women from Tudor and Medici periods, the Royal Courts of Europe and the Floating World to try to reach back into the haze and absorb their emotional presence.
The scenes and characters I explore inhabit our collective consciousness and, in recent years, I have started looking into images from cinema in the same way.”
Stephen Lawlor, 2022
Several prints and paintings by Stephen Lawlor are available for purchase ranging from €160 to €9,000 as well as copies of the Profile #29.
ENDS
For media information, please contact Edwina Gore, Gore Communications, 087 6295323
For further information, please contact Emma Twomey, Hunt Museum, 087 9046784
Listing Information
Exhibition title: In A Liminal State: A Retrospective of Stephen Lawlor
Location: Hunt Museum, Rutland Street, Limerick
Dates: 12May – 3 July 2022
Tickets: Entry is free of charge
Website:www.huntmuseum.com
About The Hunt Museum www.huntmuseum.com
The Hunt Museum exhibits one of Ireland’s greatest private collections of Art and Antiquities, dating from the Neolithic Period to the 20th century. Generously donated by John and Gertrude Hunt to the people of Ireland, this diverse collection is now housed in Limerick’s 18th Century Palladian style building, formerly The Custom House.
About Stephen Lawlorwww.stephenlawlor.com
Lawlor was born in Dublin in 1958 and studied at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin. He lectured for many years in printmaking and life drawing at DLCAD Dublin. He won the printmaking prize at the RHA twice and print prizes in the USA and in Spain. He participated in the 1st International Print Biennial, Lingshi China 2012 and 7th International Biennial Douro Portugal 2014. He was elected a member of Aosdána in 2014 and an associate member of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers (RE) in London in 2016.
He was a founding member of the International Academic Printmaking Alliance (IAPA) at the Central Academy of Fine Art in Beijing, 2016.
His paintings and prints are included in many public, private and corporate collections including the Ashmolean Museum Oxford, AIB, The Royal Collection London, Butler Gallery, Kilkenny, Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, Citibank Plc, Douro Museum, Portugal, DCU, Geneseo State University, New York, The British Museum, National Gallery of Ireland, University of Limerick, OPW, Smurfit Plc, UCD, Biblioteca de Catalunya and the Central Academy of Fine Arts Beijing. He has been a member of Graphic Studio Dublin since 1984 and was Chairman from 2000-2005.