Hamilton Gallery countdown to our St Brigid’s Day exhibition at 12 Star Gallery, Europe House London, is underway.

The exhibition will open to the public from January 23rd and run until February 1st, St Brigid’s Day, and it is part of the Irish Embassy in London’s St Brigid’s Day Celebration of Women and creativity

In the run up to our opening night in London we bring you a daily blog with a selection of the 90 works by Irish women artists that will be shown at the exhibition.

We will include interviews and insights from the artists involved as well as other news and developments relating to events at the 12 Star Gallery in London which will occur in compliment to the exhibition.

Tonight our artists are Lisa Gingles, Janet Graham, Catherine Greene and Angela Hackett.

We also include the poem “Nothing Else” by Leland Bardwell,

Lisa Gingles is a Northern Irish artist who live and works in Valencia, Spain.

She moved to Valencia after graduating from the University of Ulster in Belfast in 1998.

My current preference is to work in small format, using mainly mixed media that can include drawing, pen and ink, painting and collage. 

For my St Bridget’s Day piece, I used the St Bridget´s cross, the flower “Lilium Candidum” and the color white, all of which are associated with St Bridget herself. While the robin flying with the reed in its beak is making (or undoing) the cross, are depicting elements from the poem of Leland Bardwell, St. Brigid’s Day 1989.

Janet Graham was born in Northern Ireland, now based in Donegal.

I trained with Stephen McKenna PPRHA whose teachings and interest in the paintings of past civilizations continue to inform my work.

A child of mixed religion parents, I grew up during the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Here I use tools of one of these religions to symbolize the religious divide... (St Brigid cross and a decade of the rosary.) 

Catherine Greene is an established figurative sculptor working in bronze and latterly mixed media. Her versatile output ranges from large scale civic, to private commission and large exhibition pieces to smaller sculptures which explore the figure in the context of the sensual and often surreal world which they inhabit.

Major commissions include the equestrian memorial of the patriot Thomas Francis Meagher in Waterford, the Memorial to the much loved comedian Dermot Morgan, Merrion Square Dublin; and the central Alterpiece sculpture of the crucified Christ in the new basilica Fatima Portugal.

Angela Hackett: Born in London of Irish parents.Based at QSS artist studios, Belfast BA. hons. National College of Art and Design, DublinMA University College Falmouth. The recipient of numerous awards she has been exhibiting in Group and Solo Shows in Ireland since 1994.

”The ‘women gathering’ to honour St. Brigid day inspired me to paint a vibrant image of the Saint which would convey the serenity, holiness and fortitude of Ireland’s secondary patron.”