‘A Consequence of a Dappled World‘ is an exhibition of work by Maud Cotter. Maud is a Cork based artist who had studied at the Crawford Municipal College of Art and Design and has gone on to exhibit her work, lecture and curate exhibitions. She is also a co-founder of the National Sculpture Factory and a member of Aosdána.
The title of the exhibition takes its name from a poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins, ‘Pied Beauty’, which speaks to the beauty in natural and seemingly banal subject matter. Similarly, Maud highlights the beauty in everyday objects by presenting them as works of art. As Duchamp did with his Readymades, Maud challenges the way the viewer experiences and understands these objects by showcasing them in a new light. These assemblages explore the materiality of the objects as well as their relation to the space they occupy.
Glory be to God for dappled things –
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough;
And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.
All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.
'Pied Beauty', Gerard Manley Hopkins
The exhibition on display is the third rendition of a body of work by maud entitled ‘A Consequence of’, as earlier forms of the series were showcased in the Limerick City Gallery of Art in 2018 (‘A Consequence of – Without Stilling’) and The Dock in Carrick-on-Shannon in 2019 (‘ A Consequence of – A Breath of Air’). This new iteration of the series includes works produced as early as 2015 as well as new site-specific work for the Hugh Lange Gallery.
Sheeting, 320 × 550 × 180 cm, Maud Cotter, 2019.
‘A Consequence of a Dappled World‘ is running from 2 June – 8 August 2021 at the Hugh Lane Gallery. To see more of Maud Cotter’s work visit her website and Instagram.