Ailbhe Ní Bhriain

In films and installations, multidisciplinary artist Ailbhe Ní Bhriain examines the influence of cultural memory on contemporary perceptions of the world. Ní Bhriain’s film installations are collages of different spaces: museum displays, views of the Irish countryside, airports, and immigrant detainment centers. The cumulative effect of these images, which also incorporate computer-generated images and animations to blur the differences between real and imaginary landscapes, reveal the ways civilizations mediate what are considered natural environments as much as any other developed spaces. Ní Bhriain’s works show how systems of displacement, classification, and valuation permeate all aspects of the world, and how western governments, and even art institutions, have perpetuated these systems as instruments of imperial subjugation and dispossession. (Recipient of the Golden Fleece Award, Dublin in 2020)

Supported by The Arts Council of Ireland & Culture Ireland