Mayo-based artist Ruth E. Lyons marks completion of new film work

A leading contemporary artist who relocated to Mulranny with her family of seven is marking the completion of her major new film work with a special preview screening at her Clew Bay studio.

Artist Ruth E. Lyons is best known for her monumental public sculpture. Works such as Wave Junction (a timber arch of neon light) and SUPERUNIFICATION (a 12 metre high steel curve that connects the sky to the ground in a gradient of blues) combine skill and curiosity to produce moments of sculptural magic.

Lyons has worked with timber, steel, concrete, light, water, sugar and salt. She is interested in matter, in the impact of industry on landscape, in questions of deep time and unknown futures, and in the cosmos.

The Sea Inside Us is a new film by Ruth E. Lyons and Colm Hogan, that chronicles the human relationship to the sea through salt.

Lyons first began working with salt over 10 years ago. Tracing the seam of an ancient ocean - the Zechstein Sea - the film follows Lyons into mines 300 metres underground, and across the snow- capped peaks of vast mountain ranges.

We see the artist thinking through aeons and minerals, formulating questions that fathom the unknowable while reaching for the eternal.

A special preview screening of the film will take place at the artist’s studio on May 10. Guests will be invited to watch the film and hear about the development of ideas behind this major new work, while experiencing a taste of the artist’s studio practice in her unique seaside environment.

Guests will also encounter a series of saltrock sculptures and listen to a live musical performance created specially for the film, as part of the event.

The event is produced by Kunstverein Aughrim and supported by the Arts Council of Ireland. Kunstverein Aughrim’s ongoing collaboration with Ruth E. Lyons is supported by The Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon and by Wicklow County Arts Office through the annual Strategic Project Award Scheme.