Our latest recommendations, and community noticeboard listings.
Our recommendations – no sponsored content, or adverts, just stuff we like.
Boxcars
Christmas is over, which means the Grafton Street area is no longer a burden masquerading as a location on our maps.
If you want to bask in its mild tranquillity, relatively speaking, then it might be worth venturing over to Balfe Street this evening where the Solomon Fine Art gallery is launching Boxcars, a new exhibition by artist Tim Morris.
Boxcars is an installation of over 200 miniature boxcars, which Morris has been creating since 2020. Made from discarded corrugated cardboard and cast in bronze, the project began as a way to occupy Morris over the course of the Covid lock-downs. Conjuring up images of transport, trade and travel, Morris wanted to express a sense of “waiting” during that period, before continuing to create more while travelling, most recently during a road trip across Europe and into North Africa.
Boxcars opens this evening, Thursday, 8 January, at 6pm, and will continue until 31 January.
For more information, visit Morris’ website here.
Urban Myth
Also launching this evening is Urban Myth, a new group exhibition in the Kevin Kavanagh gallery, which demonstrates the changing role of photography in our digital world.
Urban Myth examines how photographs are no longer just records of a moment in time, but instead have become “the basis of our modern folklore”, and the driving force behind most of our social media. “Where once we gathered round the fire to share stories, now we pass images from screen to screen,” says art writer Martin Shiels in an extract from a text that will accompany the show.
The exhibition will feature works by Michael Boran, Elaine Byrne, Gary Coyle, Sean Lynch, Scott Nokia, Adrian O’Carroll, Izabela Szczutkowska and Dragana Jurišić, whose own exhibition, The Last Balkan Cowboy will be opening in Temple Bar Gallery + Studios on 16 January.
For more information, visit the Kevin Kavanagh gallery here.
Charles Tyrrell
On Saturday morning, artist and Aosdána member Charles Tyrrell will be giving a talk on his creative journey and work down in the LexIcon Library and Cultural Centre in Dún Laoghaire.
Tyrrell, whose minimalist practice explores abstract and geometric forms, combines drawing, print and painting on canvas and aluminium. For anybody who wanders through the Docklands area, one of his most recognisable works is Liffey Grid, a monochrome enamel painting on the gateway into the Tropical Fruit Warehouse office development on Sir John Rogerson's Quay.
As part of the ArtNetdlr talk, Tyrrell will be discussing his career, which includes representing Ireland at the 1982 Paris Biennale, solo exhibitions at the RHA, Taylor Galleries and Project Arts Centre, as well as the Butler Gallery in Kilkenny.
The talk, scheduled for Saturday, 10 January, begins at 11am in the library. Tickets are on sale here.
Dublin Nights Mapped
If your local barista has ever remarked, an hour before they close up, that you are in at an unusually early hour, then Dublin City Council’s new interactive map, Dublin Nights Mapped, may cater to your needs.
Launched yesterday, Dublin Nights Mapped has assembled an eclectic list of places that you can go after 6pm, including some late-night cafes like Mind the Step, pool hall The Hideout, the Lidl Museum of Ancient and Contemporary Art on Aungier Street and public art spots such as Liberty Lane and South Dock Road.
The list features almost 100 locations, and can be viewed here.
So the next time you step into the local cafe at 4pm, asking for a double shot americano, you can pull up this map and declare that Dublin City Council recognises you as a normal person.
Oh Boland and Robbie Stickland
On Saturday night, Curveball, the new venue overlooking Curved Lane in Temple Bar, is hosting a lo-fi indie double bill.
Oh Boland, the “scum pop” trio from Tuam, are in town to debut some new songs from their forthcoming album A Power of Wides, the follow-up to 2024’s Western Leisure. According to the band, this will be an “agri-diesel rock opera”, and ticketholders for this weekend’s gig will be able to get a clearer understanding of whatever that is supposed to mean before Oh Boland hit the studio next week to record the record itself.
Joining them is songwriter, Search Results bassist, and poet laureate of early 30s existential dread Robbie Stickland, who recently featured on the experimental and alternative compilation A Litany of Failures vol. V.
Tickets are available here.
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Nature, Biodiversity and Sustainable Living free course
Finglas Library will be hosting a free course about nature, biodiversity and sustainable living between 16 January and 13 March.
Classes are scheduled for each Friday between 10am and 12pm across eight weeks, and will teach you simple steps to support plants, animals, and insects, ways to take action for climate change and biodiversity, and recommend books and resources on climate, nature, and sustainability.
To sign up, call or text 086 013 8147.
Cello Concerto World Premiere
On 30 January, 2024 Séan Ó Riada Competition winner Anselm McDonnell’s first Cello Concerto will be getting its world premiere in the National Concert Hall.
Performed by cellist Martin Johnson and commissioned by the National Symphony Orchestra Ireland, McDonnell’s Cello Concerto No. 1, Hostile Summits pits the solo instrument as an “observer to the towering majesty and divinity of mountains, the imposing meeting point between earth and the heavens”.
For more information, visit the National Concert Hall event page here.
Pallas Projects 2026 Artist-Initiated Projects
Pallas Projects has announced that Paddy Critchley’s Painter/Painter will be the first exhibition of its 2026 Artist-Initiated Projects Programme.
Painter/Painter opens on Thursday, 22 January.
For more information on Critchley’s exhibition and to see the other exhibitions confirmed for this year’s programme, visit the Pallas Projects website here.
Leftover Christmas Treats
Muslim Sisters of Éire is putting out a call out for leftover Christmas treats, such as chocolate selection boxes, which they would like to hand out on their weekly soup run.
If you want to make a donation, get in touch with them at 086 785 4866 or muslimsisterofeire@gmail.com, or drop your treats off at their office in 1 Frankfort Centre on the Dundrum Road, Dublin 14.
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Our latest recommendations, and community noticeboard listings.
Our latest recommendations, and community noticeboard listings.
Our latest recommendations, and community noticeboard listings.
Our latest recommendations, and community noticeboard listings.
