Amelia Stein’s Sky & Bog: Erris, Ireland
By Janis Blackschleger, March 17, 2015
Fine arts photographer Amelia Stein pursues how the hauntingly beautiful, bleak landscapes in the wild Atlantic location of the Barony of Erris, Dún Chaoicháin, in County Mayo, Ireland have challenged and shaped the lives of its inhabitants over the Millenia.
By Janis Blackschleger, March 17, 2015
Fine arts photographer Amelia Stein pursues how the hauntingly beautiful, bleak landscapes in the wild Atlantic location of the Barony of Erris, Dún Chaoicháin, in County Mayo, Ireland have challenged and shaped the lives of its inhabitants over the Millenia.
Amelia Stein’s exhibition “Erris,” shown at the RHA Gallagher Gallery in Dublin, investigated the human presence in the landscape by the construct of studies of sky and bog, comprised of two bodies of work. Sky, that immense and charged element, dominates and scores these images.
Habitations, sometimes domestic, sometimes agricultural, and sometimes an evolution from one to the other vie with the topography for equality under the indifferent and vast sky. Photographed with a sense of theatricality under the great skies and weather patterns that are ever present in North Mayo.
There is an implied presence in the vocabulary used to describe these structures, the family name of previous inhabitants or owners. The promontory in the distance is Rinn Bhán, Ceathrú na gCloch which translates to The White Headland.
The markings in the earth made by the hand cutting of the turf banks to gather fuel are evidence of labour and of subsistence through generations, audible in the ridges and plains of these hand worked pits.
An art form in itself, the cutting marks bear the hallmark of each individual turf cutter’s style and strength.
These stacks of turf, dried and awaiting consumption as fuel to heat homes, are defacto sculptural forms placed in the landscape.
. . .. . . . Absence is a recurring theme in the photography of Amelia Stein.
The walls of seemingly abandoned dwellings — showing the weathering and passage of time in the wild, open, North Mayo landscape — stand in contrast to the life line of an electrical power supply cable.
Amelia, who resides in Dublin and County Mayo, explains.
“It was only as I stood in the darkroom in Paris with the artisan hand printer with whom I work — as he translated the images from negatives to full prints — that what I had decided to place on film was fully revealed to me.
All this positioned under the ever changing drama of ‘the Big Sky’ that are the weather patterns that exist and pass over this particular landscape, permitting me to picture these buildings as still lives in the open landscape.”
“It was only as I stood in the darkroom in Paris with the artisan hand printer with whom I work — as he translated the images from negatives to full prints — that what I had decided to place on film was fully revealed to me.
All this positioned under the ever changing drama of ‘the Big Sky’ that are the weather patterns that exist and pass over this particular landscape, permitting me to picture these buildings as still lives in the open landscape.”
The bogs of Erris are not wild heathlands
but the scarred, worked surfaces of generations of turf cutting.
The rich, dark ground is spongy and often impassable, making bogs unsuitable for most types of agriculture.
Recently enacted European Union regulations, as well as Irish law, ban the collection of turf from 53 peat-bog conservation areas. The hand cutting of turf and its use as a heat source has been a traditional way of life, and a sustainable one, through generations.
Which stands in sharp contrast to the ravages from heavy machinery, digging deep into turf banks, to harvest peat on a grand scale.
Which stands in sharp contrast to the ravages from heavy machinery, digging deep into turf banks, to harvest peat on a grand scale.
Photographer Amelia Stein’s work is represented in the collections of The National Gallery of Ireland, IMMA , the Arts Council of Ireland and have been on view in solo and group shows in both Public and Private venues to the present day. Elected a member of the RHA in 2004, Aosdána in 2006, the Photographer Amelia Stein’s black and white photographs pursue character and the constituent elements that create them. Absence and the passage of time is a recurring theme .Described as a portrait photographer, her work is not confined to the figure or facial studies but the wider meaning of portraiture, from the conventional face to the breadth of wider open landscapes, from small intimate details to the landscape on the grand scale.
Though meticulously composed in the camera her practice gives equal emphasis to the subtleties of the darkroom and meticulous attention to detail in printing.
Formerly as a performing arts photographer, Stein worked in Theatre and Opera in Ireland 1979-2000. Currently she divides her time between Dublin and North Mayo. She is represented by Oliver Sears Gallery in Dublin.
Though meticulously composed in the camera her practice gives equal emphasis to the subtleties of the darkroom and meticulous attention to detail in printing.
Formerly as a performing arts photographer, Stein worked in Theatre and Opera in Ireland 1979-2000. Currently she divides her time between Dublin and North Mayo. She is represented by Oliver Sears Gallery in Dublin.
RHA: The Royal Hibernian Academy in Dublin is an artist based and artist orientated institution dedicated to developing, affirming and challenging the public’s appreciation and understanding of traditional and innovative approaches to the visual arts. Its core remit is to support contemporary art and artists in Ireland through exhibition, education and advocacy.
The Royal Hibernian Academy originated when artists from the Society of Artists in Ireland petitioned the then Viceroy, Earl Talbot, in the late 1700s for the opportunity to exhibit their works annually. A Royal Charter was finally granted in 1821, and the deeds received in 1823, giving the Academy independence from all other institutions.
Celebrated landscape painter William Ashford served as the first President. Artist Abigail O’Brien is the current and first woman President of the RHA, which is made up of 30 Members, 15 Senior Members and 10 Associate Members, all of whom are professional artists. The disciplines of Architecture, Painting, Sculpture and Print (including Photography) are all represented by the Academy’s broad national membership.
Amelia Stein
190th RHA ANNUAL EXHIBITION
Online October 20 — December 13, 2020
Plastic Bag 1, Béal Derig . Edition of 5 . Archival Pigment Print, Bamboo Paper 56 x 45 cm
Plastic Bag 2, Béal Derig . Edition of 5. Archival Pigment Print, Bamboo Paper 56 x 45cm
Pool 2, Cill a’Ghallagáin. Edition of 5 . Archival Pigment Print, Bamboo Paper + Pencil 49×38 cm
Pool 3, Cill a’Ghallagáin. Edition of 5 . Archival Pigment Print, Bamboo Paper + Pencil 49×38 cm