Day and night exhibition at the Leitrim Design House 

The Leitrim Design House is delighted to showcase a new exhibition of paintings on ARTWALL titled ‘Day and Night’ by Irish artist Margaret Roberts from Saturday, on August 26. 

This collection of paintings was created over the last 3 years and are colourful semi-abstract compositions in cubic or pointillist style. Margaret’s process involves building up many layers of oil paint. She works and reworks these layers on the canvas with a pallet knife adding texture and creating a three dimensional effect of light shining through a patchwork of colours. 

Night time scenes create a surreal mood while daytime scenes are warmer, more familiar, such as a dappled sunlit forest in a cubic format or a flowerbed bursting with colour in a pixelated pointillist style. 

Margaret shares more about her inspiration and process: “Frozen north is an attempt to create a semi abstract image based on the dramatic landscapes in the northern Scandinavian countries in the dark, cold winters. Flower festival is created using a pointillist style with flat brushstrokes of colour to create an abstract work after enjoying the herbaceous borders of the Botanic gardens in Dublin. 

“Textures of Wicklow is a semi abstract work of a view of Wicklow towards the sugarloaf.  I used a lot of texture and patterned shapes to get the feel of a slight patchwork of fields, trees and mountains. Sunlight in the forest is a work that has lots of shapes and colours creating the feel of dappled sunlight in the trees. Seaweed on steps is based on a view of the bathing place in Seapoint, Monkstown where the rusty handrail descends the seaweed covered steps. 

“The vibrant blue green sea contrasts with the green brown seaweed. Seaside town in moonlight is a cubist style work capturing the shapes of a seaside town, perhaps Dun Laoghaire, in a slightly surreal palette of blues. House in moonlight is a completely imagined scene of a tiny house perched beneath the huge hills lit up dramatically on a moonlit night. Lake and fields springtime is a painting of a few country cottages in a light hearted piece, in a hilly pink and yellow landscape”, Margaret added. 

The artist is self-taught, painting for many years in her studio in the seaside town of Dun Laoghaire. She has had several successful exhibitions over the years including the Nolan Gallery Dublin 2015 and ART SOURCE in the RDS. The exhibition will be on view until October 17. 

Visit The Leitrim Design House in the beautiful Dock Art Centre, St. Georges terrace, Carrick-on-Shannon. Opening hours are 10am – 6pm Mon – Friday and 10am – 5pm on Saturdays or browse online at www.leitrimdesignhouse.ie.