Now Exhibiting
Norah grew up in County Mayo. She originally studied and worked as a catering manager but left the profession to study at the Galway Campus the Centre for Creative Arts and Media in GMIT. She graduated in 2011 with a First Class Honours Bachelors’ of Arts Degree in Fine Art, specialising in Printmaking. On graduating she won the Galway Print Studio Annual Bursary and remained a member there until its closure in 2018. She now works from her own studio workshop, Cló sa Chróin Claremorris and is a member of Limerick Printmakers.
Making art allows her to emotionally engage with the defining moments of her life as well as face the changes and challenges that the passing of time brings. At the same time, it facilitates creative expression and engagement with the world around her. Abstraction leads Norah to work instinctively. Often, she just allows this instinct to kick in and take her where it will, on a journey of creativity, discovery and learning.
Norah has had solo exhibitions in Ireland and Northern Ireland as well as numerous group shows throughout Ireland and the UK, France, Australia, Bangladesh, New York and Japan. She has also been selected for many juried exhibitions including theRDS Student Awards, Impressions(Galway Arts Festival), Cairde Visual(The Model, Sligo) and Legacy (Hyde Bridge Gallery, Sligo). She completed residencies inWales in 2015 and 2017 and in rural Kenya in early 2020. Norah teaches art workshops, mainly in printmaking, bookbinding and painting. Her work is in the collections of the National University of Ireland, Galway, Mayo and Roscommon County Councils and private collectors.
In this exhibition, the artist is drawn back to the innocent days of childhood. Days of limitless possibilities free from the stress and worries that later life can bring. Days of seemingly endless summer without restrictions or inhibitions, without responsibilities and before the onset of that self-doubt that infects most artists once they decide to put themselves out there to be seen and judged by others.
About this work Norah said:
Making this work could be said to be a form of mindfulness. In order to create as a child would, I had to empty my mind of all fears and doubts. Like in a lot of my work colour is paramount, something that resonates with children. My preference for abstraction allowed me to be freer in my compositions and working instinctively released my inner child whose creativity was bounded only by my adult artistic experience.
For further information email info@norahbrennan.ie
My Halcyon Days will be on display in Tuar Ard until the end of October and can be viewed Monday to Friday from 9am – 12pm. To arrange a viewing outside these times please phone 087 1265451.