This initiative will support an emerging curator to develop their curatorial practice and gain experience in all aspects of exhibition production. The successful candidate will work with our team to produce a members group exhibition or project for our Studio 12 exhibition/project space, as part of our artistic programme for 2027. 

BIO

 

Ali O’Shea is a Cork based curator whose practice is rooted in creating alternative working methodologies under late capitalism. She completed her BA in Fine Art from Crawford College of Art and Design and later pursued a Masters in Curatorial Practice in Glasgow School of Art. Much of her research is informed by her work in the service industry as waitress/server, embedding everyday labour, hospitality, caretaking and waiting as artistic methodologies, questioning access to space and practice in precarious conditions. Ali is particularly interested in exploring artistic practices operating from below or outside, that utilise tactics within their labour to withdraw from incessant production without traditional support structures. Her curatorial work examines the impossibility of sustainable artistic practice in the contemporary world and hopes to utilise the site of exhibition as alternative reality for individual artistic agency and collective speculation. 

 

Ali has recently returned from Hobart, Tasmania where she was working with the Plimsoll Gallery and Rosny Barn & Arts Centre. Recent projects have included a response to Lily O’Shea’s work as part of Commune, Muine Bheag Arts, Carlow, when all the fires go out a collaborative text for Bloomers issue; Bless the Corners of this House and old hag you have killed me a radio show as part of Radio Solstice for Cork Midsummer Festival.

 

She received a Visual Arts Bursary Award in 2021 from the Arts Council of Ireland. She curated Table Games, a solo exhibition by Nina Nadig and Eva George Richardson McCrea, The Crypt at St. Luke’s, Cork, Ireland, 2022, Can you hear me Damo? a solo exhibition by Anne May Tabb, St Peter’s Vision Centre, Cork, Ireland, 2022, Slow Puncture a solo exhibition by Lily O’Shea, The Lord Mayor’s Pavilion, Cork and a passive house, event series with Fiona Kelly, Dori O’Connell, Mary O’Leary and Lily O’Shea at Rebel Reads, Cork, Ireland, 2021.

 

Further curatorial projects include; a passive house, Fiona Kelly, Dori O’Connell, Mary O’Leary and Lily O’Shea, relaxation*, Siuán Ní Dhochartaigh, Glasgow, UK; Over or Under, Molly O’Leary and Dominique Rivard, co-curated with Joe Henry and Cecelia Graham, Glasgow, UK; and Burning Down the House, Cork, Ireland, Avril Corroon, Michelle Doyle and Isabel English. She was curatorial resident with TACTIC Visual Arts Programme, Sample Studios, Cork, graduate resident at NO. 46 Grand Parade Gallery, Cork, desk research resident at The Guesthouse Project, Cork.