MARCEL VIDAL

Vidal’s sculptures, meanwhile, encompass contrasting and combative textures and materials: furs, feathers or deer hooves mixed with assembled wood, concrete or industrial metal hardware. Chains, spikes and pest-prevention devices are rigged up for attack or defence, echoing the hostility of urban space and inner-city infrastructure. The sculptures often house small, self-contained watercolour paintings that rub up against the authority of their environments: ribbons of sausages, fragments of sculptures, an irreverent asshole. In Vidal’s most recent work, sculptural assemblages have expanded outwards into more immersive environments, entering a dialogue with the history, architecture and symbolism of the spaces they inhabit. Gallery walls have been suffused with matte black spray paint, or floors softened with artificial grass, creating unexpected and surprising spatial shifts. Visually arresting, these sculptural environments create a playful tension between the organic and the constructed, the threatening and fetishistic, the vital and the macabre.

Recent solo exhibitions include: SILVERFISH, The Dock Arts, Carrick on Shannon (2018); Donut, Temple Bar Gallery + Studios, Dublin (2017/2018); #untitled, Basic Space, Dublin (2013); Selected group exhibitions include, Hennessy Craig Award, Royal Hibernian Academy, Ireland (2019); Zurich Portrait Prize, National Gallery of Ireland (2019); Too Much Sugar, Drawing & Installation Station, TBG+S, Ireland (2019); Syntonic State, Tulca, Galway (2018); Hannah Fitz / Áine McBride / Daniel Rios Rodriguez / Marcel Vidal, Kerlin Gallery, Dublin (2017) and MOON FARK, Jason Dunne / Marcel Vidal / David Eager Maher, RAKE, Norway (2014).

Vidal is a recipient of Arts council of Ireland Next Generation Award and the winner of The Hennessy Craig Award, RHA Gallery, (Both 2019).

Courtesy Kerlin Gallery