United Arts Club : Life Drawing Exhibition

I've spoken before about the Thursday Life Drawing group at the United Arts Club, which I attend as regularly as possible. This Thursday, March 11th, sees the launch of our annual exhibition of drawings at that venue. It's always a fun evening - an enjoyable and interesting opportunity to view (and purchase) a selection of drawings by a wide variety of artists. Consider yourself invited!

The show launches at 8pm and runs until March 29th - viewing Monday to Saturday from 5.30pm (as the UAC bar / gallery only currently opens only during the evening).

The piece above is one of two drawings that I'm exhibiting, and there'll also be work by Comhghall Casey, PJ Lynch, Aisling Dolan, Michael McWilliams, Eoin Coveney and many, many more talented people, including Brian Gallagher, who runs this drawing group.

Brian also has an interesting solo show launching next week at the Signal Arts Centre in Bray.

** UPDATE ** My IGI colleague Mario Sughi has posted some photos of the life drawing exhibition launch here.

Help Haiti : United Arts Club Drawings

The United Arts Club, 3 Upper Fitzwilliam Street, Dublin 2 hosts regular life drawing sessions each Wednesday and Thursday evening. This Thursday, members of both drawing groups are coming together to raise funds for the victims of the Earthquake in Haiti.

A portfolio of unframed life drawings, donated by members of both groups, will be available to view in the UAC bar for ONE WEEK ONLY - from 9pm Thursday 4th February until 8.30 pm Thursday 11th February (the UAC Bar opens at 5pm each evening). Members, guests and visitors may select and purchase drawings to take away on the spot. As all drawings will be presented unframed, prices will be very affordable (maximum price 50 euro!). If people wish to donate more than the purchase price, that's fine too.

I'm a (sometimes) regular at the Thursday evening session, run by IGI colleague Brian Gallagher. The slideshow above shows my drawings, all A3 in size, which will be available for 20 euro each.

This is a great chance to pick up some really nice original drawings, from a wide selection of artists (including some well-known names) at very reasonable prices. So, do drop in for a look if you're around Dublin 2 any evening during those dates - but don't dither - 'hot cakes' and all that!

Clubbing Time : Life beyond Books





If you're in town for the Dublin Book Festival, you might like to make a little detour towards Fitzwilliam Street over the weekend. An exhibition of work from the Thursday night life drawing group is being launched by Irish author Fiona O'Brien at the United Arts Club tonight. This exhibition will run until 29th March, with viewing daily from 5.30pm - this quirkily shabby building only wakes up around then; septuagenarian baggotonians rubbing shoulders with the great, the good, upstart artists, poets, models, rakes, knaves, all sorts really. If you've attended any of Irish Pen's regular events there, you'll know the venue. Founded in 1907, by Countess Constance Markievicz among others, the club celebrated its centenary in 2007 (obviously enough).

Among the artists exhibiting in the show are Brian Gallagher, PJ Lynch, Oisin Roche and Comhghall Casey, winner of the Hennessy Craig Award 2008. The image above is one of two drawings I'm showing in the exhibition.

On a related note, I've an interview with PJ Lynch (in my illustration alter-ego, Scalder) about his most recent book over on the Illustrators Guild of Ireland blog, Scamp.

I'm looking forward to tonight's launch - but will be taking it easy on the hooch, as I've been lucky enough to score one of the places in Mebdh McGuckian's poetry workshop at the Book Festival. So, I need to be bright-eyed and bushytailed for Friday morning! I'm looking forward to this, coming after disappointment at missing the cut for this year's Poetry Ireland Introductions series. Again. Doesn't look like my submission to South was successful either. Ah well, onwards, upwards, wordwards.

Writing for Children Event

I was at the United Arts Club last night for Irish Pen's Writing for Children event - a panel discussion featuring Mags Doyle from Childrens Books Ireland, Helen Carr, Editor at O'Brien Press and Oisin McGann, author and illustrator. Irish Pen's own Sarah Webb was the moderator, and the event concluded with Q&A from the audience.

It was a very interesting and informative evening. While there was the familiar territory of classic dos and don'ts re manuscript submission, all panellists contributed further points of interest. McGann's overview of lessons learnt as he moved from novice to successful author were a highlight. A very pleasant guy, I had a nice chat with him in the bar afterwards. Among the audience of aspiring and published writers were Poetry Ireland's Dave Maybury and a few members of the Illustrators Guild of Ireland. Good company led to pints - so this post is being written with slightly fuzzy recall.

Luckily, Sarah has a bit more detail about the event over on her blog, here - phew!