MONUMENTS II (Memory Traces) by Ciara Rodgers

Studio member Ciara Rodgers’ new solo show at Garter Lane Arts Centre, Waterford, until the end of October:

MONUMENTS II (Memory Traces) by Ciara Rodgers

Garter Lane Arts Centre are delighted to present Ciara Rodgers solo show MONUMENTS II (Memory Traces).

This exhibition is supported by Waterford Cultural Quarter and runs until October.

Ciara’s practice often involves historic and abandoned sites. Former future facing productions of man surrender progressively to nature in the form of the ruin and in the detritus of past technologies. Objects in the contemporary landscape do not simply disappear all in one go as if by magic but are relegated to obsolescence, haunting us like the living dead as they insist upon the integration of the past into the here and now.

The artist experiences brief moments of dislocation from the present whilst onsite, like dreams, false memories or scenes from books and cinema. There is a quiet displacement of half-hidden narratives that inhabit those spaces and she seeks to strike a balance between the nostalgia of ruins and a morbid enthusiasm for states of decay.

Time and place are blurred through Ciara’s charcoal drawings of structures and objects within non -descriptive vistas and through Polaroid narratives which often depict dreamlike excursions. Elevating these often-defunct structures to a higher level of appreciation, the artist refers to them as Monuments.