THERE is a life-sized, very pink baby elephant covered entirely in pink silk roses on the second floor of the Red on Green Gallery in Fitzwilliam Square in Dublin. It's the work of installation artist Finola Jones and there was a very summery opening party on Thursday night to "Rosey's" arrival, with several fellow artists there, including Drummond who took time off preparing work for two shows which open next week in the Rubicon gallery in Dublin and the Crawford Cork, and Roberta Sandberg, wife US embassy man Denis Sandberg who is having a show of and painting with Bernadette Ni Ghallchoir in the Department of Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht beginning next week.
Finola's father, market research guru Jack Jones, arrived with his wife Patty and grandchildren Killian, Robin, Holly and Terry, who seemed delighted with the brilliantly witty piece. Australians Mark McCaffrey and Anne Mulroney were busy spreading the word about Australia Week which they are organising. They are ever-optimistic, even iftheir timing is a little unfortunate - it begins on July 1st when all our attention will be focused on other continents. That's the week the European Presidency begins, and the week the US ship docks. However their antipodean film and art events do sound well worth looking out for.