Huge response to Open Call Exhibition
THE response to this year’s Open Call art exhibition at the Presentation Centre in Enniscorthy has been great, with a very high standard of work submitted to date.
With the current restrictions in place, the exhibition, which this year is being run for the fifth time, has gone online in terms of previews.
Commenting on the initiative, a spokesperson for the Presentation Centre said the response to the invitation for submissions has been fantastic so far.
While the Covid-19 pandemic obviously put a dampener on having the exhibition in its usual format the centre’s visual arts manager, Lisa Byrne, and marketing manager, Larry Dunne, were both determined to ensure that the artists were given a platform to promote their work and to that end have been exhibiting the submitted works on their social media platforms.
With regard to the exhibition, Ms Byrne said: ‘We strive to make art and art events accessible to all [and] the annual Open Call Exhibition is a testament to our goal, with submissions growing each year.
‘We welcome all art forms including film, sculpture, drawing and performance and are honoured to hang all work submitted.’
The exhibition was due to be opened by Lucy Medlycott, director of the Irish Street Arts, Circus & Spectacle Network.
Ms Medlycott said that people might be forgiven for asking if creativity matters in the current climate, when a new appreciation of the life-saving work those in the health services do has developed, in addition to a new understanding of the responsibility of decision makers, the patience of supermarket workers, the importance of bin services and the necessity of ‘farmers, bakers and toiler roll makers’.
‘When I was initially invited to open the Presentation Centre’s Annual Open Call for creativity 202, at the beginning of February, I was both deeply honoured and also extremely nervous,’ she said.
‘What approach could I take that would somehow shed some light [or] relevance on the need for creativity in today’s fractured world?’ she added.
‘Little did we know, that the fractured world was about to be presented with a whole different challenge in such a short space of time.’
She went on to say that with everything changed and people finding themselves cocooning and social distancing, there is a need for creativity because of the feelings of hope, inspiration and expression that it brings.
‘It is in times of adversity that perhaps creativity is at its most relevant,’ she said.
‘Proclaiming each creation as a personal triumph, a stroke of genius, or just pure pleasure in the knowledge that we did something worthwhile today, it is this creative output which holds the possibility to feel human, to feel connected, to feel valued and most importantly to stay sane,’ she added.
‘This is the stuff of creative thought, of creative process, of idea formation, of regeneration, of new possibilities and who can say that this does not matter?’
Ms Medlycott said creativity is a survival tool at the moment and highlighted how teachers have had to become more creative and engage their students remotely while organisations find new ways to focus on creative output rather than hours worked.
Even politics has changed to a degree and within the context of all that’s changed Ms Medlycott said the significance of creative expression has perhaps never been more important.
She praised everyone who submitted their work for the exhibition and acknowledged the work of Ms Byrne, Mr Dunne and also Elizabeth Whyte from Wexford Arts Centre for their imaginative way of presenting the work.