This article appeared in ‘ArtsVoice’ in the Kilkenny Voice, Tuesday December 5th, 2006.

Two experienced artists, one from the city and the other London born ,have combined to open an elaborate new Kilkenny art centre.

The Hillside Art Gallery & Studio at Donoughmore, Ballyragget, will be officially opened on Saturday December 16th. Behind the project are John Walsh from Greenshill, Kilkenny, who will be well known for his exhibitions in the Forecourt of City Hall during the Arts Festival for the past 22 years, and Colette O’Brien who has been living at Hillside Cottage, Donoughmore, since December 1999.

Colette began her career as a full-time artists in 1991, specialising in painting in oils. But in 1995, she decided to branch out into a new form of artistic expression - mosaics.

“The thought process needed for making mosaics are parallel to those required for painting”, she says. “People often compare mosaics to jigsaws but it is important to realise that they are very different. They do not have predetermined solutions but are expressions with the results varying on every piece of work.”

“Mosaics are the oldest, most durable and functional art form with colours that never fade and materials that withstand sun, rain, frost and even centuries of internment. As expressed by Carlo Bertelli, mosaic art flows through history like a great river through a porous desert, disappearing and reappearing again.”

Colette lived in London for 23 years before spending time in Dubai and Brussels. She moves to Ireland 11 years ago and lived in Naas before settling in Donoughmore.

She has exhibited in Brussels, Antwerp, Dubai, Dublin, Waterford, Kilkenny and many other Irish venues and has received commissions from Kilkenny Co. Council and Kilkenny Borough Council. Her biggest commission is an 8 foot by 4 foot ceramic for St Brigid’s School in Naas, which will be officially opened in February.

Work on the studio at Donoughmore took five years and now the gallery has been completed.

John Walsh studied at the College of Art in Limerick from 1972 to 1976 and graduated specialising in fine art, live drawing, painting, screen printing, pottery, sculpture, calligraphy and the History of Art - European and Irish. Most of his work is in pen and ink but he also paints in watercolours and oils.

He has received commissions from St. Francis Abbey Brewery including drawings of the old Maltings at James’ Street which now adorn the brewery conference centre.

He has worked for private houses in New York and was commissioned to do paintings for the Children’s Ward in St Luke’s Hospital. He was also commissioned by the Mount Juliet Estate to do all the drawings for a book that is being published on the people who worked on the estate over the years.

A teacher by profession, John worked at Johnstown Vocational School for several years before taking up a position in Kilkenny College in 1982, which he still holds.

Colette and John are very excited about their new gallery venture and hope to establish it as a notable landmark on the growing Kilkenny art scene.