Still taken from video performance of the construction of a simulated dry stone wall in Rotterdam.
Audio is a collection of archival conversations from 1950s Connemara.
The Making and Unmaking of Stone
This work seeks to explore the laborious process of dry stone wall maintenance as an analogue for the process of preserving the Irish language. Through the examination of the materiality of these walls in the Connemara landscape, this research unpacks the forces that have shaped the Irish language. The language and landscape have come to represent imagery of nationhood — a complex, manufactured image imbued with inferred notions of ‘purity’ and ‘authenticity’.
Synthetic rocks made using foam, concrete, plastic, metal wire and screen printed type. Conducting this work about Ireland from a distance, finding rocks in the Netherlands was near-impossible. As a consequence I decided to design my own geologies for constructing a wall. An uncanny simulacrum of the stone wall.
Exhibited in the gallery space as separate piles rather than one assembled wall as seen in the video. They act as the ingredients for the wall without drawing any boundaries inside the space
The Making of Stone. (2025)
Video performance, archival audio,
sculputral installation
Shown at the Niewe Insituut, Rotterdam.
A video displayed on a steel table showing the process of breaking down stone with extreme heating and cooling. These stones were collected during research in Connemara. Borrowing from the traditional method of building bonfires to break rocks, in order to clear fields for agriculture.
The pigments created from these stones were displayed in vials on a metal stand. These pigments were then used to screenprint
solid blocks of colour. The prints bear no image but posess the texture of sandpaper. The image of the stones has been transformed and distilled to tactility.
The Unmaking of Stone. (2025)
Video, hand made pigments, screen prints.
Shown at the Niewe Insituut, Rotterdam.