Catriona Leahy

I examine time, duration and memory both in a personal and wider social context, giving these inherently ambiguous, intangible and subjective phenomena a material and spatial context. I am intrigued by the apparently enduring presence and stability of structures and form – social, physical, geographical and cultural – and the transitory and malleable nature of memory, a moment in time, where time as well as these constructs are perpetually moving and in flux. Redundant or vacant spaces often pose as protagonists in my work; their structure and form have a virtue of clarity, coherency and vividness but by their curious appearance and ambiguous setting, they remain notoriously evasive and ambivalent with the ever-present possibility of dissolution. As conduit spaces for my exploration into time and duration, they call to mind the brevity of our occupancy of space, and the dependency on our presence to ensure their abiding memory.

Rooted in printmaking, my practice is somewhat emblematic of how the discipline and its principles can transfer across various media. Utilising the disparate material of printed paper, the archive, cast concrete objects and projected imagery, I set up multi-dimensional installations signalling my interpretations of time and memory as tactile concepts, attempting to expand on an ultimate spatiotemporal experience. As the viewer navigates the work through space, they too become acutely aware of the passage of time and their involvement in activating its content.