Mechanism/ The Dock Arts, Carrick-on-Shannon, Ireland 2017

Here in the Dock, Carrick-on-Shannon, Kearney develops and extends the work developed at the CCI, Paris creating a number of additional, site-specific installations which respond to the history and cultural context of the town. His theatrical framing of the exhibition is accentuated further here with (beyond the entrance curtain) the even more dramatic flourish of a parachute suspended in the grand stairwell – a surreal gesture obliterating any rational expectations the viewer might have relating to such a space being impenetrable to an ‘outside’. One can’t help thinking of David Niven’s character in A Matter of Life and Death, his failed parachute provoking a dying reverie on the joyous materiality of life, language and sound, as he relishes what he anticipates is his last shared words with the radio-operator on the ground played by Kim Hunter. His subsequent ascent into a courtroom-like celestial realm of judgment seems equally resonant here in this building.

Part of an essay by Katherine Waugh.

Curated by Sarah Searson

Photographs: Andrew Kearney and Anna Leask