Natura | Backwater Artists Members Exhibition featuring Debbie Godsell, Dee Hurley, Hina Khan, Julia Mitchell, Chloe Nagle, Kate O’Kelly, Deirdre O’Mahony, Conor O’Brien. Curated by Brian Mac Domhnaill

Main Gallery

23 April – 16 May 2026

Opening reception Thursday 23 April 5.30-7.30pm

This exhibition, curated by Brian Mac Domhnaill, explores the unusual and often strained relationship human beings have with the natural world and how, through the lens of art and other manmade creations, nature is celebrated, analysed, objectified, abstracted or assimilated to communicate a personal or shared response to the world around us. The exhibiting artists are Debbie Godsell, Dee Hurley, Hina Khan, Julia Mitchell, Chloe Nagle, Kate O’Kelly, Deirdre O’Mahony and Conor O’Brien, all of whom have recently become members of Backwater Artists Group, through its studios, artists network and darkroom. Natura is the Latin origin or the word nature, and its original form the word was used to describe the essential qualities of a person or thing and only later, through the lens of philosophy, was it used to describe a whole system of existence or, in a narrower form, all physical life not controlled by humankind.

Debbie Godsell’s work examines our contested historical relationship with the landscape and features elements of history, tradition and customs associated with the harvest, a celebrated example of humanity’s conquering of nature. Dee Hurley collects, arranges and presents botanical samples or artefacts in order to celebrate biodiversity and the beauty and structure of natural forms. Hina Khan uses the landscapes of Pakistani miniature painting as the natural backdrop or stage upon which socio-political issues and humanitarian crises can be portrayed or symbolised. The paintings of Julia Mitchell represent an organic synthesis of the external natural word and artist’s own internal world. Through her photographic practice Chloe Nagle confronts the nature of objects, their familiarity and strangeness and through her images creates monuments to observed things and associated moments of intensity. Similarly Kate O’Kelly explores how identity is shaped by physical objects and environments, encompassing themes of memory, play, our imagination, and the subconscious. Deirdre O’Mahony is interested in the politics of landscape, rural/urban relationships, rural sustainability and food security. Conor O’Brien explores the relationship between marginalised queer bodies and the alien other of science fiction. Their biomorphic creations referred to as Visitors pull on life native to earth such as fungi or marine life, informing the viewer that they are more like us than we might initially think.