• 1 Rem Koolhas, in Rem Koolhas, Hal Foster, Junkspace, with Running Room, London, Notting Hill Edition (...)

The fish that have disappeared from our lives return as public art in the concourse1.

• 2 Numerous paintings during the early decades of the 20^th century feature views of the sea, often inc (...)
• 3 This image by Paul Henry was selected as the frontispiece for Saorstát Eireann, Irish Free State Of (...)
• 4 For an extended discussion, see Éimear O’Connor, “Encouraging Civic Pride: Power, Pageants, Parades (...)

2A century or so ago, the representation of landscape, especially including imagery of water (salt or fresh or indeterminately boggy), was fundamental to the characterisation of a distinctive national identity in Ireland, as evidenced by a host of examples by Jack Yeats, Paul Henry, Seán Keating and others seeking to demonstrate a quintessential Irish character through visual expression2. While some images were presented as authentic representations of timeless, if understated, integrity, projecting consoling escapism in a destabilising period of conflict and emigration, as for example Paul Henry’s comforting image of a cluster of cottages beside a lake, near Mount Errigal, Co. Donegal3, others addressed the consequences of economic decline with unemployment (among local fishermen) and emigration (across the sea), as well as the more positive potential for modernisation through harnessing water at Ardnacrusha as part of the hydroelectric project, as shown for example in Seán Keating’s Night’s Candles are Burnt Out (1928-1929)4. Such images however gave little indication of the potential destruction to water resources in the future; rather these were generally presented in art as part of the background, essentially contextual, a means to an end, and largely taken for granted as ubiquitous, plentiful, virtually guaranteed. Any distinction between facility and threat in the representation of sea, lake or river was within a relatively narrow range and less about the water itself than the human narrative played out against that backdrop.

• 5 William Cronon, “The Trouble with Wilderness: Or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature”, Environmental (...)
• 6 This issue was a key element in the debates at a recent research seminar, entitled “Visual Cultures (...)

5Concepts of wild nature versus humanist culture, as separate, even opposing entities, are understood to have their intellectual origins with the Enlightenment, a distinction which is now understood to be responsible for a separation seen as problematic in a world where humanist interests cannot be pursued unchecked without taking account of ultimately self-destructive consequences. As William Cronon has argued, “[t]o the extent that we celebrate wilderness as the measure with which we judge civilization, we reproduce the dualism that sets humanity and nature at opposite poles”5. Further, the projection of a landscape as ecologically pure when it is in reality compromised or at least under threat, while advantageous to certain industries such as tourism and food, also carries the danger that there will be limited incentive to amend environmentally destructive behaviours. This dilemma has provoked recent debates across the globe about the projection of nature and the environment through a variety of media, and the extent to which it generates either discouragement or optimism – and in particular how such reactions impact on behaviour towards climate issues, such that activity is seen as either pointlessly too late, or vitally necessary before time runs out6.

• 7 Gwen O’Dowd in conversation with Yvonne Scott, 22 September 2017.
• 8 Clean Irish Sea, exhibition catalogue, Dublin, The City Centre, 1988, unpaginated. See also numerou (...)

6The seductive romanticism of Gwen O’Dowd’s painting is enhanced by the poetic use of Irish language, a regular practice in her work, evoking the exoticism and mystery of the less familiar, as well as onomatopoeic qualities and tonal inferences in words and phrases, such as glór na mara (“sound of the sea”), cladach (“coastline”), uaimh (“cave”), doimhneacht (“depths”), and tonn (“wave”). It might therefore be tempting to deny such imagery on moral, philosophical or theoretical grounds were it not that such a simplistic dismissal takes no account of the fact that O’Dowd was among the first artists in Ireland, along with Barrie Cooke, to confront the issues of environmental threat and destruction. In 1986, Gwen O’Dowd painted Sellafield (fig. 2) to contribute to a fundraiser for victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster earlier that year. While no particular theme was proposed for the endeavour, O’Dowd opted to produce an image of another nuclear plant closer to home, with the recognisable twin towers associated with that operation7. Significant environmental concerns published in the media related to the measurements of emissions from the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant in Cumbria, and fears that radioactive waste was being discharged into the Irish sea8. There was a popular perception in Ireland at the time that, while the country itself was relatively ecologically pure, it was impacted by the imported effects of industrial activity in Britain – and it is remembered that the concept of an independent Irish national identity relied on the perceived distinction between the sophisticated, secular, urbanism of industrialised Britain, and the innocent, pious ruralism of agricultural Ireland.

• 9 The works by other Irish artists included Dermot Seymour, They’ll Be Breathing the Poisoned Wind As (...)
• 10 Clean Irish Sea, exhibition catalogue.
• 11 “Why Greenpeace is Campaigning in the Irish Sea”, Clean Irish Sea, exhibition catalogue. The intern (...)

7Just a couple of years after O’Dowd’s contribution to the Chernobyl fundraiser, the concerns over Sellafield led to a seminal exhibition in the context of a visual response among Irish artists to ecological issues: Clean Irish Sea (1988) was conceived as part of a campaign led by Greenpeace, and featured inter alia the work of Gwen O’Dowd, Barrie Cooke and other Irish artists9, as well as those from the other countries bordering the Irish Sea (fig. 3). That sea is described in the exhibition catalogue as a “relatively shallow, landlocked sea of only 6 per cent of the volume of the North Sea”10 the inference being that in such an environment, radioactive pollution could be quite concentrated, difficult to dilute or disperse, and likely to constitute a significant threat both to the environment, and to the inhabitants of the bordering coastlines. The catalogue included an introduction explaining the motivation for the campaign, listing a relatively high radioactivity, an industrial dump in the sea near Cork, levels of zinc, lead, mercury, cadmium, and radioactive caesium, along with other pollutants, argued as high compared with the Atlantic, the danger from consumption of fish in the region, and the absence of Blue Flag certification of beaches regarding sewage discharges and associated health risks11. Observation of any expanse of water and its representations demonstrates that such conditions may not be visible to the naked eye, particularly when viewed from outside that element.

• 12 His location at the time of the show in 1988 is identified as Thomastown, Kilkenny, which is on the (...)

8While O’Dowd, at just thirty years of age at the time, was developing familiarity with the issues, Barrie Cooke, then in his late fifties, had been aware and increasingly concerned for some time. His interests in nature of all kinds had been inculcated since childhood, and his education in the natural sciences at Harvard (before turning to art history, and subsequently to the practice of painting) together with a passion for fishing, and a consequent lifelong preference for habitation beside a river or lake12, ensured his intimacy with various aspects of the condition of local watercourses. His candid observations of devastating leakages of effluent in rivers, of algal infestation suffocating lakes, and of the spread of the invasive didymosphenia geminata in lakes and rivers, all emerged in his work from the 1980s onwards.

• 13 His extensive collection of books is the subject of research by the author.

9Cooke informed himself through exposure, observation, and through a passion for reading; his substantial collection of books13 reveals his obsession to understand and appreciate the natural world of flora and fauna, the geological and aquatic environments they inhabited, as well as the ecological challenges posed by anthropocentric activity. Water in its many guises features extensively in Cooke’s paintings; he responded to the concept that flowing water signified its purity and vitality, and it is well known that his dictum, painted on the gable of his house and studio overlooking Lough Arrow in Sligo, was provided in the words of Heraclitus: “everything flows”. Cooke’s intense interest in nature, particularly involving water, his knowledge of relevant sciences, and his ecological concerns, qualified him as an obvious candidate for inclusion in the 1988 show.

• 14 Brian Fallon, “‘Clean Irish Sea’ Show at City Centre”, The Irish Times, 2 December 1988, p. 12.
• 15 Paul J. Crutzen, Eugene F. Stoermer, “The ‘Anthropocene’”, Global Change Newsletter. IGPB, no. 41, (...)
• 16 Will Steffen, Paul J. Crutzen, John R. McNeill, “The Anthropocene: Are Humans Now Overwhelming the (...)
• 17 Will Steffen, Jacques Grinevald, Paul J. Crutzen, John R. McNeill, “The Anthropocene: Conceptual an (...)

10According to Brian Fallon, then art critic of the Irish Times, in his review of the Clean Irish Sea exhibition when shown at the City Centre Gallery, Dublin, in 1988, “[t]his Dublin exhibition is well timed not only ecologically, but in the sense that it coincided with the ‘Celtic Vision’ show now at the Bank of Ireland”14. That the coincidence of cultural representation is given equal prominence with the ecological relevance of the Clean Irish Sea show indicates the modest significance assigned to environmental concerns at that time. It seems extraordinary now that a show whose title seems anachronistic for the 1980s is given some kind of parity with one that is about imminent, vital concerns. However, it is to Fallon’s credit that he reviewed the show at all, as Clean Irish Sea received a relatively limited response in the media. Such modest interest was perhaps to be expected for such a topic given the legacy of the post-war era identified as the “Great Acceleration” of anthropocentric activity. Paul J. Crutzen and Eugene F. Stoermer published research in 2000 proposing the term “Anthropocene” to characterise the current geological epoch, to succeed the Holocene15, and to recognise the unprecedented impact of human activity on the environment to the extent that it represented a discernible layer in geological structures – a key factor in the naming of the successive eons, eras and epochs. While the Anthropocene was reckoned to begin during the 18^th century with the invention of the steam engine, this first stage “ended abruptly around 1945, when the most rapid and pervasive shift in the human-environment relationship began”16. This second phase, or the “Great Acceleration” referred to “the post-World War II worldwide industrialization, techno-scientific development, nuclear arms race, population explosion and rapid economic growth”17. This phase is therefore characterised by potentially catastrophic levels and types of activity, but not so much by the kind of recognition that might generate the necessary action to curb it.

• 19 Ibid.

12Fallon singles out for praise the work of Barrie Cooke and Gwen O’Dowd, each increasingly recognised in Ireland as major landscape painters of the late 20^th and early 21^st centuries. Their examples in that show were each on a large scale (Cooke’s is 165 x 201 cm and O’Dowd’s diptych is 192 x 280 cm in all) and between them addressed two key dimensions of ecological concern and how it was signified; the symbolism of colour in Cooke’s painting, and the layering between surface and depth in O’Dowd’s. Cooke’s painting L’azur, l’azur, l’azur, l’azur, l’azur… (fig. 4) attracted further comment in Fallon’s review: “Barrie Cooke has an impressive work which suggests more the azure of the Mediterranean than the cold and greenish waters of our coasts”19. This observation however misconstrues the significance of the colour, associating it with literal, local climatic conditions in the era of the package holiday and the typical promotion of sun destinations in Europe at the time, projected in holiday brochures as characterised by relentlessly blue skies, seas and swimming pools, to destinations mainly in southern Europe. In fact, there is little evidence that Cooke intended his image to depict the Irish Sea as such, while the language of the title might have prompted the assumption of a clumsy reference to the côte d’azur. In any case, repeating the word “blue”, rather than azur, might have suggested the somewhat negative psychological connotations of the term, rather than the positive connotations of the colour for him.

• 20 Caring for the Earth, A Strategy for Sustainable Living, David A. Munro, Martin W. Holdgate (eds.), (...)
• 21 Part I provides “Principles for Sustainable Living”, and Part II outlines “Additional Actions for S (...)

13More relevant however is that Cooke had in any case always been attuned to environmental science not just through his own direct engagement, but also in his interest in the structures and literature addressed to it. He owned, for example, a copy of the text Caring for the Earth, A Strategy for Sustainable Living, published in 1991 by three significant organisations, in partnership: IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature), UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme), and WWF (World Wildlife Fund for Nature)20. Described as a “User’s guide to Caring for the Earth”, it includes chapters on various kinds of aquatic environment21. As the text points out,

• 24 Frank Fraser Darling, Wilderness and Plenty, London, British Broadcasting Corporation, 1970. This p (...)
• 25 Christopher F. Mason, Biology of Freshwater Pollution, London – New York, Longman, 1981.

15Among his many books on nature and ecology, Cooke owned a copy of Wilderness and Plenty (published in 1970) by then vice-president of The Conservation Foundation, Frank Fraser Darling. Described as “an important contribution to the growing debate on man’s responsibility for his environment”, the essays collectively focus on the contemporaneous impact of that relationship, including the exploitation and conservation of water24. Cooke also owned a copy of Biology of Freshwater Pollution (1981) by Christopher F. Mason25, an influential lecturer at the Department of Biology in Essex University, who proposed that while freshwater pollution was mainly caused by chemical agents the effects were primarily biological. This text argues for biological indicators of such pollution rather than chemical tests of water purity. Cooke’s concerns for the ecological environment and biological impact are reflected in his paintings of the watercourses in Ireland that increasingly reflected his dismay at the emerging issues of devastating pollution as a consequence of industrialising agriculture, growing urbanisation, and the drainage requirements of burgeoning housing estates.

• 27 Research by the author on Barrie Cooke’s artwork in New Zealand is the subject of a funded research (...)
• 28 Confirmed by the present author’s several visits to New Zealand since 2014 to research the environm (...)

17As recent research reveals27, during his many visits to New Zealand, Cooke spent most of his time on the south island, fishing and painting the environment that he encountered there, in particular the freshwater rivers and lakes in the wider landscape terrain. As these demonstrate, the colour blue had a particular significance for the artist who was drawn to the great expanses of the lakes of the Mackenzie country, including Lakes Tekapo, Pukaki, and Ohau, applying the intense colour he so much admired as in Lake Tekapo Painting I (fig. 5). Unlike the rivers, these subjects tend to be presented as flatter, at times almost abstract, forms, but in a characteristic shade in emulation of the distinctive opaque, blue, glacial water that feeds the lakes28. It also reflects the intensity of the summer sky during the fishing season from around November to February, when he normally organised his travels there.

• 29 Karen Sweeney, “Slow Dance on the Forest Floor”, in Barrie Cooke, Dublin, Irish Museum of Modern Ar (...)

20As indicated, the blue of the painting L’azur, as well as the repetition of that colour in the title, suggests Cooke’s longing for what it promises rather than any literal representation of topography and climatic conditions in either the North Sea or the Mediterranean. It has been proposed that the title of the painting refers to “a quest for a pure, elusive blue, for a landscape of desire”29. This accords to an extent with the reading proposed here, though without recognising how the artist interpreted blue in scientific as well as aesthetic terms. The horizontally-flowing tonal variations in L’azur indicate a river rather than the flat, still, geometries associated with the New Zealand lakes, that were shortly to appear in his work. The watery green trickles in the upper register of that painting suggest a drenched riparian zone, while the more defined red and brown brushstrokes could refer, as in other of his works, to either stone or the dense wood of the undergrowth.

• 30 Brian Fallon, “‘Clean Irish Sea’ Show at City Centre”, p. 12.

22In his review of the Greenpeace show, Fallon commented positively on Gwen O’Dowd’s painting: “The best picture, I thought, was Gwen O’Dowd’s large, two-piece canvas ‘Underneath the Waves’, which has considerable surface beauty even if the form is a little loose”30. Again we see how aesthetic, connoisseurial concerns supersede recognition of the ecocritical thematics of the work. O’Dowd’s seminal painting, Underneath the Waves (fig. 6), a diptych on a huge scale, is intended to draw attention not just to the surface of the water, but its depths, and what may be contained there.

• 31 Seascapes became a regular feature of 17^th-century artworks often now included under the broad head (...)
• 32 Gwen O’Dowd in conversation with Yvonne Scott, 22 September 2017.

23While described as a landscape painter, a term that has long been expanded to include seascapes31, O’Dowd’s œuvre often focuses on a single element, such as the sea, a strategy that embodies two key characteristics. First, the work undermines an anthropocentric reading as there is no horizon line, coastline, or any defining structures, so the viewer is deliberately denied the usual spatial co-ordinates that enable their positioning, and is offered limited clues to either scale or depth of field. The infusion of encaustic with oil paint, adopted here, has often been applied in this artist’s work to convey an aqueous environment that has both surface and depth, whose restless agitation and organic (and other) suspensions deny any glass-clear optical access; instead it remains visually ambiguous, at once both intimate and infinite. It is a compelling if somewhat ominous representation; as O’Dowd recently observed, “it is quite a haunting image in some ways”32.

• 33 Ibid.

24Involvement in the show provided the impetus for O’Dowd to continue to develop the theme, and led to a painting entitled Doimhneacht (1987) that evolved eventually into a series as well as to other interpretations of the maritime environment33. Movement is evidently a key dimension in her work, in both the emotional and the physical sense. She is drawn to spend time swimming in the sea, generating both a somatic and visceral appreciation of its qualities and conditions. Her recognition of the sublime power and potential to overwhelm characterises her interpretations, and she seeks to represent the experience of its proximity and physicality. As her work reveals also, O’Dowd is less interested in evoking specific places than in conveying the direct experience of encounters with natural conditions. She has been described as a painter of “abstract landscapes”, a term that may seem contradictory given the tangibility of the physical landscape. Pure abstraction dispenses with the representation of material objects in preference to emotional or spiritual encounters. However, the term becomes more relevant in the light of her evocative rather than descriptive imagery.

• 34 See Yvonne Scott, “Georgia O’Keeffe’s Landscapes: Modern and American”, in Georgia O’Keeffe, Nature (...)
• 35 Gwen O’Dowd’s On Inis Mor II (1992) in the collection of the Irish Museum of Modern Art was shown i (...)
• 36 Gwen O’Dowd in conversation with Yvonne Scott, 22 September 2017.

25In an era of increasing ecological concerns regarding the future of the planet, Gwen O’Dowd’s seascapes are of particular relevance. The twin hazards of climate change and of pollution have been highlighted with ever increasing urgency, though are not recent phenomena. In the year following the Clean Irish Sea show, O’Dowd was awarded a residency in Banff and observed at first hand the impact of global warming on the shrinking glaciers, and found expression in her painting of Ice Fields (1990). This ancient and glacial river of ice drew her in turn to the Grand Canyon in Arizona, whose deep gorge had been carved out over eons by the relentless erosion of the Colorado River, in a manner that brought to mind selected work by Georgia O’Keeffe34. In the west of Ireland, O’Dowd found parallels in the process whereby the ocean relentlessly wore away at the sheer cliffs of North Mayo. Her images evoke plumes of surf soaring above the cliff edge on impact35 as well as the intimate niches of the Uaimh series, a local equivalent to the processes that carved out the Grand Canyon. As a keen observer of the natural environment, particularly the sea, she recognises the intensifying ecological concerns. As she explains, she has never been interested in presenting a “pretty landscape” and, however sublimely romantic her imagery may appear to be, she has remained acutely aware of current issues, both political and ecological; such awareness is “always omnipresent”36.

• 37 See, for example, Mary Robinson, Climate Justice: Hope, Resilience, and the Fight for a Sustainable (...)

26Recent widespread recognition of the devastating infestation of plastics in the oceans combines with established anxieties about toxic leakages into the environment, a context subtly represented in the artist’s work which effectively reveals how, while the destruction remains, it is largely indiscernible on the surface. The view of the sea and sky continues to appear unsullied, around Ireland at any rate, whatever about the reality of its components. However significant and potentially irreversible the anthropocentric impact on these environments, they nonetheless embody a physical capacity that may be occasionally harnessed, but remains fundamentally beyond human control, as the spate of cataclysms in recent times has demonstrated. The widespread, disastrous costs at a grassroots level have been effectively communicated37. Contemporary artists are often concerned to confront and reveal the catastrophic destruction of environments and the consequences, often interpreted in a hopelessly dystopian and grotesque aesthetic.