This is the fifth and final instalment of 17(joy) at Lombardi Kargl, Vienna, titled: ‘A (sort of) retrospective exhibition by Deirdre O’Mahony consisting of an interview, found objects, traces of artworks, ephemera and sounds’.
“This is an amalgamation of the two art legacies that fascinate me the most: land-oriented practices and hardcore conceptualism, with a nod to such luminaries as Lucy Lippard and Seth Siegelaub. As the lengthy title announces: we present (a kind of) retrospective by the Irish artist Deirdre O’Mahony, though instead of finished artworks, we glean fragments, found objects, remnants, raw materials, vegetables, maps, correspondence, and sounds. The new piece filling the space is a sound collage compiling acoustic traces of research, field recordings, journeys, and conversations and encounters in the Irish countryside.” Sebastian Cichocki, curator, writer, and educator who is the Head of the Possible Art studio at the University of Arts in Poznań (UAP), Poland.
The exhibition serves as a visual footnote to the extended text, ‘Land Art as Useful Art: Sebastian Cichocki in Conversation with Deirdre O’Mahony’, which is being published in two chapters by L’Internationale Online.
17 (joy) is a project curated by jen kratochavl
the first Joy brought in voices -or rather memorabilia and almost forensic evidence -of thoughts, work, and forms of togetherness from various collectives, leaving the art world mostly behind and formulating new bonds towards the land
deirdre and sebastian’s show offers an experienced view of such movements and strategies
if the first one could have been read as an attempt to escape the pressures of inequality within a market-driven and politically repressed art world, here we enter a space of solid, long-term situatedness
Joy appeared five times, and once -during an exhibition break -brought in friends
Joy spoke of land, alternative art scenes, long-term friendships and comradeship rooted in more conventional institutional infrastructures, and played with various cross-generational bonds
Joy will return … another time
and hopefully stay with us continuously