Marathon trip taken to pick up great collection

GREEN ACRES gallery and restaurant owmer James O’Connor and the company’s head of wine sales Donal Morris travelled over 1,100km around Ireland in one day recently to pick up sculptures and paintings for this year’s Wexford Festival exhibition, which was officially opened last weekend by the festival artistic director David Agler.

The rewarding marathon journey in the Green Acres van began at 4am and included a trip to Galway to collect a John Behan sculpture of Cuchulainn in his dying moments, which the intrepid pair put sitting between them in the front of the vehicle, and a stop-off in west Kerry to meet Pauline Bewick, taking in visits to Dublin Belfast, Clare, Limerick, Kerry, Cork, Waterford and Kilkenny.

The stunning group show, which has taken a year to curate, is a comprehensive snapshot of Irish contemporary art featuring sculptures and paintings from 70 artists of national and local renown, including Colm Brennan, Stephanie Hess, Eamonn Ceannt, Ana Duncan, Sonja Landweer, Ian Pollock, Stephen Lawlor, Sharon Greene, Emma Berkery, Charles Harper, Charles Harper, Rosemary Stapleton, Cara Gordon, Aidan Butler, Mary O’Connor, Conrad Frankel, Aidan Butler, James English, Nerisha Allen, Mateusz Lubecki, Marian Campbell, Janet Morris, Bernadette Madden, Felim Egan, Hilary Elmes, Keith Wilson, Joe Dunne, Sharon McDaid, Gary Devon, Gerry Davis, Liam O’Rourke, Aidan Hickey, TJ Maher, Peter Pearson, Mary O’Donnell, Ken Browne, Maeve Doherty, John Dinan, Gwen O’Dowd, Sinéad Ní Mhaonaigh, Elizabeth O’Brien, Martin Gale, Conor Walton, Cara Dunne, Phelim Connolly, Paul Maloney, Robert Ryan and Anthony Scott.

It’s a must on the Wexford festival exhibition trail – and well worth return visits to make sure you appreciate it all. The exhibition is accompanied by a beautiful art catalogue and will continue daily until November 11.