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Photographed are the artist Sarah Dwyer and sister Cliona Dwyer. Photograph Liam Burke/Press 22 Photographed are the artist Sarah Dwyer and sister Cliona Dwyer. Photograph Liam Burke/Press 22

Art

Penti Menti exhibition by Sarah Dwyer opens at Limerick City Gallery of Art up to June 14

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Photographed is the artist Sarah Dwyer and sister Cliona Dwyer. Photograph Liam Burke/Press 22

Limerick City Gallery of Art presents Penti Menti by Sarah Dwyer, her first institutional solo exhibition, running from April 18 to June 14

With Compliments. Limerick City Gallery of Art presented Penti Menti, Sarah Dwyer’s first institutional solo exhibition, marking a return for the artist to her native Ireland this past weekend. Attending the event were Abbey Pearl, Scarriff and Milo and Ainoa Brennan, Mountshannon. Photograph Liam Burke/Press 22
Attending the event were Abbey Pearl, Scarriff and Milo and Ainoa Brennan, Mountshannon. Photograph Liam Burke/Press 22

Limerick City Gallery of Art presents Penti Menti, Sarah Dwyer’s first institutional solo exhibition, marking a return for the artist to her native Ireland.

The exhibition at LCGA is the third and final iteration of the exhibition as part of its national tour. Born in Cork and now based in London, Dwyer has a significant international profile. Penti Menti brings together new paintings, drawings and ceramic sculpture created specifically for this exhibition, many of them being the largest in the artist’s career to date.

Born in Cork and now based in London, Dwyer has a significant international profile. Penti Menti brings together new paintings, drawings and ceramic sculpture created specifically for this exhibition, many of them being the largest in the artist’s career to date.


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The title refers to the art historical concept of pentimento—from the Italian, pentirsi, “to repent”— which refers to the visible traces of an artist’s revisions within a painting. For Dwyer, these transformations lie at the heart of her practice: painting becomes a process of layering and erasing, of burying and excavating, mirroring how memory and time shape both body and landscape. Her recent work reflects deeply personal experiences: the fragility of the body, personal loss and the persistence of memory. Each trace and echo of a previous stage in the painting becomes an integral part to the sum of its whole. These are felt through rhythm, gesture, and the shifting balance of colour and form.

Her bold palette – electric yellows, luminous pinks and deep marine blues affirm vitality while acknowledging vulnerability. Sharing the same playful defiance, her ceramics embrace risk and resist symmetry. The work has an underlying figurative foundation, which is then fragmented, reconfigured, or partially obscured. Dwyer’s work becomes a site of negotiation between intention and revision, mirroring the psychological or emotional layers of the human experience.

Attending the event were Brian Murphy and Zara Daly, Killaloe. Photograph Liam Burke/Press 22

Sarah Dwyer (b. 1974, Ireland) lives and works in London. She earned an MA in Painting from the Royal College of Art (2004) and an MFA from Staffordshire University (2001).

Recent exhibitions and venues include Brigitte Mulholland, Paris; Fabian Lang Gallery, Zurich; Larsen Warner, Stockholm; Fitzrovia Chapel, London, Palazzo Tiepolo Passi, Venice Biennale, Italy; Platform with David Zwirner, three solo exhibitions at Josh Lilley Gallery, London; three solo exhibitions at Jane Lombard Gallery, New York; FE McWilliam Gallery, Northern Ireland; Hastings Contemporary, UK; Rochester Art Center, MN- USA; Bloomberg Space, London; Kyubidou Gallery, Tokyo; the Royal College of Art, London; British Art Today, Saatchi Gallery, London; The John Moore’s Painting Prize, The Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool; The New Art Gallery Walsall, UK.

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