video work

‘ONLY WHEN I LAUGH’

A Solo exhibition from Niamh Davis in Cross Gallery Dublin, 2014

Excerpts below:


Low Resolution Video Reel of 2014 work

Clip of Exhibition in Cross Gallery, Dublin

PRESS RELEASE

“Only When I Laugh” 

Cross Gallery, Dublin
“When does it hurt ?… Only when I laugh”.

Only when I laugh takes it’s name from the 1979 TV sitcom set in a hospital ward. The programme followed the exploits of long term hypochondriac patients enabled in their malaise by a system which both tolerates and oppresses them.

These new works by the artist Niamh Davis, a Cross Gallery artist, explore multiple approaches to this question. During her digital residency at the Fire Station Dublin earlier this year Niamh set up a series of short minimal vignettes based purely on an encounter between the artist herself and the camera. In this situation artistic production is reduced to it’s barest form, a series of personas act out jovial expressions pushed to an extreme, externalising inner states and giving form to contradiction.

In one work the artist dressed in a party hat comically uses absurd gestures to communicate with footage and sounds of Noc the beluga whale, Noc rose to fame with his ability to approximate the sound of a human voice. However his pleas for help from his captors remain unanswered.

Singing the theme tune to the TV sitcom Niamh leaves us with the refrain
I am H.A.P.P.Y I know I am, I’m sure I am, I’m H.A.P.P.Y

 

‘UNTITLED (AFTER STEVE REICH), 2012

By Niamh Davis, Slapping by Edward Costello

HD Video

‘you/me’, 2012

By Niamh Davis

HD Video

Excerpt from ‘Tension’, 2012

By Niamh Davis

HD Video

niamhdavis.ie nothing to say

Still from you/me, 2012, C Print

By Niamh Davis

 

HD Digital Video

By Niamh Davis
Dimensions Variable
Length : 36seconds

“Beginnings and Endings”

By Niamh Davis, featuring Angelo Heart

Digital Video, 2008

Excerpt from “Nothing is Funnier than Unhappiness {sic.}”

By Niamh Davis

Digital Video, 2007

Excerpt from “I Love You”

By Niamh Davis

Digital Video, 2007

résumé

Niamh Davis

Represented by The Cross Gallery

EDUCATION / AWARDS

2014 Fire Station Artist’s Studios

Digital Media Residency Award

2014 Innovation Academy, University College Dublin

Post Graduate Diploma, Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Design Thinking

2009 Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Dun Laoghaire

Digital Cre8or Certificate (Digital Media) obtained

2007 Ciaran Langford Bursary Award,

6 months residency in the Backwater Artists Studios, Cork, Ireland

2007 Crawford College of Art and Design, Cork

First Class Honours obtained in Higher BA Degree in Fine Art

2006 Crawford College of Art and Design, Cork

Lower Degree obtained in Life Drawing and Art History and Appreciation

2003 Sallynoggin College of Further Education, Dublin

NCVA/FETAC Certificate for Fine Art, Craft and Photography

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2014 Cross Gallery, Dublin, “Only When I Laugh”

2012 nag, Francis St. Dublin, “The Sense of an Ending”

2010 The Andrew Stone Gallery, Westport, “Could this be Love?”

2008 Arte Moris, Dili, Timor Leste, “Hau Hosi”

SELECETED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2014 nag, Pimlico, London, “Nag Offsite”

2014 Templebar Studios and Gallery, “Lovestock”

2013 Hollybrook House, Co. Wicklow, “Nag Offsite”

2012 Cross Gallery, Dublin, “Cluster”

2012 Commonplace Artists Gallery, Dublin, “Mean Time Between Failures”

2011 nag, Francis St. Dublin, “Goodbye”

2010 Crawford Gallery, Cork, “Backwater Twenty – 10″

2010 Ulster University, Belfast, “The Wars on Women: Peace Works”

2009 The Market Studios, Dublin, “Nativity”

2009 The Courthouse, Westport, “Westport Arts Festival”

2009 PS2, Donegall St. Belfast, “Fix09 @ PS2″

2009 The Cross Gallery, Dublin, “Sex, Guise and maybe some Video Tape”

2008 Dili, Timor Leste, “New Work”

2008 Dili, Timor Leste, “Freedom at a price”

2007 Tigh Fili Gallery, Cork, “24 Hours Non-Stop Art”

2007 Ashford Gallery, R H A, Ely Place, Dublin, “Nothing Without a Woman”

2007 Crawford College, Cork, “Crawford College of Art and Design Degree Show”

2006 The Granary Theatre, Cork, “Look Closer”

2006 Cork Institute of Technology, Bishopstown, Cork, “Pay For Soup”