Stick with us for the dates here….
On Saturday June 27th our gallery - together with Hyde Bridge Gallery - welcomed in all the art works selected for Cairde Visual 2026. The art arrived just as the curtain came down on Root Fall, a stunning first solo exhibition by Marita O’Hanlon. Marita was of course the winner of last years Cairde Visual - Hamilton Gallery award, so her solo exhibition was the perfect way to precede Cairde Visual 2026.
The Cairde Visual selection committee was on hand to accept deliveries and it has always been one of the most exciting and memorable days each year as artists arrive from all over Ireland with their work, and Cairde Visual gets unwrapped.
Cairde Visual | Hamilton Gallery Award Winner 2026
Our heartfelt congratulations to Lorraine Lawlor winner of the Cairde Visual | Hamilton Gallery award 2026.
The award was Presented by Mayor of Sligo Borough Cllr Gino O’Boyle
Our sincere thanks the new manager of The Cat and The Moon, Katie Clinton, who represented Hamilton Gallery as Martina was at the launch of Carrying The Songs in the Hague
With the gallery closing at 5pm our team set about the initial placement and we then spent Sunday and Monday hanging the exhibition in full. A working weekend was necessary because on Tuesday morning we were in the Hague, setting out 288 paintings with the technical crew of Pulchri Studio for Carrying The Songs.
Sligo Artist Selected for Carrying the Songs Poster
We were delighted when the graphics team at Pulchri Studio picked an artwork by Sligo Artist Rachel Martin titled Dóibh Siúd Gan Spúnóg for their publicity profiling in The Hague, from among 288 original artworks.
Rachel had her first solo exhibition with us earlier this year following her graduation from TUS Limerick College of Art and Design last year which made it a double celebration.
Carrying the Songs is a partnership between Embassy of Ireland, The Netherlands, Hamilton Gallery and Pulchri Studio, The Hague.
In February we invited submissions for the exhibition of new paintings from artists, resident either on the island of Ireland or in The Netherlands. Submissions were to be themed on Carrying the Songs a poem by Irish poet Moya Cannon. The poem is a prescient meditation on how music and song can be one of very few things people bring with them when forced from their homes, or to abandon their native country.
As events would have it both Cairde Visual and Carrying the Songs opened opened simultaneously on July 4th.
Cairde Visual Opens, Sligo City Hall July 4th
So…you could say it’s been a busy busy time.
It was certainly a momentous day and we’d like to acknowledge how privileged we feel for the Gallery to have been involved with so many artists here in Ireland and in The Netherlands on these wonderful projects.
Our gratitude goes out to ALL artists who have appeared in both these exhibitions, for your patience, positivity and partnership. A truly special thanks to 64 Irish artists, their relatives and friends who travelled to The Hague for the opening of Carrying the Songs, to Ambassador Ann Derwin and her absolutely amazing team at Embassy of Ireland The Hague, to poet Moya Cannon for agreeing to allow her poem to be the inspiration for that event, to equally amazing committee working on Cairde Visual 2026, and to our friends and colleagues at Pulchri Studio.
Carrying the Songs Opens, Pulchri Studio The Hague
