Exhibition in Kilkenny uses fiction to look at the natural world

A new body of work by Caoimhín Gaffney, All at Once Collapsing Together, will open at the Butler Gallery in June.

Spanning across film, photography and writing the exhibition uses fiction to imagine new ways of relating to the natural world. Images throughout the exhibition act as mirrors to the healing and relief the environment can offer, with narratives fraught with climate anxiety interrupting and reframing these as temporary and fragile.

The film and texts are without traditional narratives or character arcs, aiming to create an unsettled terrain that reflects the uncomfortable emotions and sensations they discuss. The work asks us to consider how important natural sensory information is to our sense of self: what does it mean for a sound to go missing from our ecosystem? When we no longer hear our native birds, which parts of ourselves will be forgotten?

All at Once Collapsing Together showcases the work of Caoimhín Gaffney, an artist, filmmaker and writer whose work has been shown in exhibitions and film festivals internationally. Notable solo exhibitions include the Crawford Art Gallery in Cork , Block 336 in London and the Contemporary Art Institute CAI02 in Sapporo. Gaffney’s films have screened at prestigious festivals including European Media Arts Festival, Cork Film Festival, and London Short Film Festival where they received the Little White Lies award.

Their international recognition includes being an UNESCO-Aschberg laureate artist-in-residence at the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art’s Changdong residency in South Korea and receiving a Sky Arts scholarship. Gaffney holds an MA Photography and Moving Image from the Royal College of Art and obtained their PhD from Ulster University’s School of Arts Humanities & Social Sciences in 2022.

The exhibition opens on June 8 and runs until July 28.

A special event will take place during the exhibition when an audience is invited to join artist Caoimhín Gaffney in conversation with Pádraic E. Moore, on Thursday, June 27 from 6pm to 7pm at Butler Gallery. The conversation will discuss Gaffney’s practice and work in the exhibition All at Once Collapsing Together.

This is a free, ticketed event with limited places.

butlergallery.ie