Kenny show celebrates Laura’s life in art
Historian Gearóid Ó Tuathaigh will officially open an exhibition of paintings by Laura Vecchi Ford at Galway city’s Kenny Gallery, at Liosbán Retail Park this Friday at 6pm.
It’s entitled Untitled, Unless Otherwise Stated – a Retrospective, and a collection of her poetry with the same title, will also be launched at the event.
Vecchi Ford, who was born in Italy in 1939, studied art at the Brera Academy in Milan and had her first solo exhibition in 1967. In the late 1960s, she attracted the attention of the Venice-based patron of the arts, Peggy Guggenheim.
Vecchi Ford later moved to Galway to teach Italian at University College Galway. But even as she taught Italian language and literature to university students, visual art remained central to her life. She continued to make etchings, engravings, drawings and particularly paintings, with exhibitions in Ireland, Britain, and Italy through the decades.
Her work contains symbolic motifs, such as birds taking flight, fish leaping, cars or the moon and these all feature in the Kenny show, along with her ‘signature’ use of text in landscape, still-life and flights of fancy. There are also some fine portraits. These include ones of Umberto Eco whom she knew in Italy; her friend, the campaigner Margaretta D’Arcy; fellow artist Sean McSweeney, and the late musician Micky Finn.
All are welcome to the opening of the exhibition this Friday at 6pm. The show will continue Monday to Saturday, 9am-5pm daily until Thursday, April 2, at The Kenny Gallery, Liosbán Retail Park, Tuam Road, and online at www.thekennygallery.ie.
■ Admission is free and the paintings are for sale.