ONCE YOU have nerved yourself for the upstairs downstairs trekking involved in viewing any annual exhibition at the NCAD, the result is well worth it. Glassware, ceramics and allied crafts maintain a good level this year, and I was much impressed by Julie Ann. Foley's nude figures embedded in glass - miniature sculptures, though in a special sense.
Vivien Alexander's stoneware is well made and immediately attractive, in spite of some overdone stylistic flourishes. Isabelle Peyrat works imaginatively in pate de verre, an unusual medium, and Eva Wawrzyniak, Nicola Prior (interesting standing screens in wood with glass insets), Ruth O'Leary, Jan Glover (lively and creative work in tiles), Grace Gallagher Paula Boyle are all accomplished without being pretentiously artycrafty.
Fashion and industrial design section is outside my brief. The textiles, however, once again is colourful and eventful; Jennifer Daly, Alison O'Flynn, Leonie Prendergast, Sinead Ryan, Charlotte Flood, Lisa Carson, Sheena McKeown are among the names I noted.
The sculpture, alas, is disappointing, as it has tended to be recently. There is the almost inevitable paraphernalia of blinking videos, wheezing or grunting sound tracks, miniature rooms in which insignificant objects are intended to appear meaningful and don't, etc. This has begun to look very tired and pointless and it should be given an overdue break.
Eugene O'Malley's big piece, mostly in wood, has a certain weighty presence and also the merit of suggesting the physical labour which must have gone into it. Anne Kelly's Castles in the Air, basically a large blue room with the inevitable video, suggests or promises rather more than it actually delivers.
