Lapis Lazuli
Twenty two artists respond to the iconic poem by W B Yeats
Hamilton Gallery Sligo - 19 October - 23 November
Following exhibition at Choi Centre Cloud House Beijing China June 13th - July 4th 2024
DANIEL CHESTER, TOM CLIENT, GERRY DAVIS, JOE DUNNE, SUSAN DUBSKY, DIARMUID DELARGY, MEDBH GILLARD, GRAHAM GINGLES, MARTINA HAMILTON, BRÍD HIGGINS NÍ CHINNÉIDE, BRIAN MCDONAGH, NICK MILLER, GWEN O’DOWD, DONNCADH O’CALLAGHAN, SORCA O’FARRELL, CORMAC O’LEARY, GERALDINE O’REILLY, JANET PIERCE, SARAH QUICK, UNA SEALY, EMMA STROUDE, TRACY SWEENEY.
Hamilton Gallery has produced a celebratory brochure to mark the occasion of the exhibition Lapis Lazuli showing at Choi Centre Cloud House, Beijing, and Hamilton Gallery in 2024. It is available to download as a PDF file at this link:
For the print version of the brochure please contact info@hamiltongallery.ie
(Shipping and print costs apply)
Lapis Lazuli
A short film marking the exhibition of Lapis Lazuli at Choi Centre Beijing, June 2024
A short film to mark the presentation of Lapis Lazuli at Choi Centre -Cloud House, Beijing, June 13th 2024
Lapis Lazuli Exhibition
Lapis Lazuli
By William Butler Yeats
(for Harry Clifton)
I have heard that hysterical women say
They are sick of the palette and fiddle-bow,
Of poets that are always gay,
For everybody knows or else should know
That if nothing drastic is done
Aeroplane and Zeppelin will come out,
Pitch like King Billy bomb-balls in
Until the town lie beaten flat.
All perform their tragic play,
There struts Hamlet, there is Lear,
That's Ophelia, that Cordelia;
Yet they, should the last scene be there,
The great stage curtain about to drop,
If worthy their prominent part in the play,
Do not break up their lines to weep.
They know that Hamlet and Lear are gay;
Gaiety transfiguring all that dread.
All men have aimed at, found and lost;
Black out; Heaven blazing into the head:
Tragedy wrought to its uttermost.
Though Hamlet rambles and Lear rages,
And all the drop scenes drop at once
Upon a hundred thousand stages,
It cannot grow by an inch or an ounce.
On their own feet they came, or on shipboard,
Camel-back, horse-back, ass-back, mule-back,
Old civilisations put to the sword.
Then they and their wisdom went to rack:
No handiwork of Callimachus
Who handled marble as if it were bronze,
Made draperies that seemed to rise
When sea-wind swept the corner, stands;
His long lamp chimney shaped like the stem
Of a slender palm, stood but a day;
All things fall and are built again
And those that build them again are gay.
Two Chinamen, behind them a third,
Are carved in Lapis Lazuli,
Over them flies a long-legged bird
A symbol of longevity;
The third, doubtless a serving-man,
Carries a musical instrument.
Every discolouration of the stone,
Every accidental crack or dent
Seems a water-course or an avalanche,
Or lofty slope where it still snows
Though doubtless plum or cherry-branch
Sweetens the little half-way house
Those Chinamen climb towards, and I
Delight to imagine them seated there;
There, on the mountain and the sky,
On all the tragic scene they stare.
One asks for mournful melodies;
Accomplished fingers begin to play.
Their eyes mid many wrinkles, their eyes,
Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.
Lapis Lazuli | Beijing Opening | June 13th 2024
Oil on dibond
65cm x 45cm
2024