Studio Project 09: November 2007

Thomas Ireland: Looks So Wrong, Feels So Right
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Thomas Ireland produces a range of work from drawings to layered installation pieces that bring together disparate elements from various specific sources and specialist cultures. By weaving together a combination of found objects, second-hand shop findings, handmade or processed objects, he explores the phenomenology of waste, cultural wealth and overspill through the use of non-linear narrative constructs. His work deals with a range of issues including disaster, memory, experience, love and loss, and examines the proximity of humans to the world around them and the need to never look back.

For the duration of the studio residency Ireland has examined the idea of endeavour as temporary. He explores the shelf-life of objects, ideas and purpose in a society predicated on the idea of a final outcome and the next big thing. His installations comprise a series of sculptural objects and interrelated images aimed at suggesting and disrupting narrative whilst also evoking humour and addressing ideas of underachievement within a complex hierarchical system. In one of market galleryís two spaces, Ireland has created an installation of new assemblages and sculptures crafted from aluminium foil, lights, cardboard, wood, found objects, photographic elements and paintings to establish an allegorical relationship between relative acts of endeavour.