Royal Academy Summer Exhibition
Delighted to be part of the Royal Academy’s 258th Summer Show at Burlington House, London. The exhibition is running until 23rd August 2026 and is coordinated by Ryan Gander.
Image Details: The Dreamer, oil on linen, 42cm x 52cm framed, 2026. Image by: Simon Mills.
Boyle Arts Festival
I am delighted to be exhibiting at the Boyle Arts Festival 2026 King House, Boyle, Co Roscommon. The exhibition is curated by Paul McKenna. Th exhibition runs from 16th July to 2nd August 2026.
Image Details: A Drawing from Life, oil on linen, 42cm x 52cm framed, 2026. Image by: Simon Mills.
https://boylearts.com/visual-arts/main-exhibition-2026/
Paper Palace
"Paper Palace" is a vibrant group exhibition running from June 25 to July 25, 2026, at QSS Gallery 2 (The Arches Centre, 11-13 Bloomfield Ave, Belfast). Curated by Kathryn Graham, the showcase highlights 13 contemporary artists exploring printmaking and paper as an expansive, interdisciplinary medium.
https://www.queenstreetstudios.net/events/paper-palace-group-show/
Image Details: Of a Body (Series) Screenprint on Munken Smooth Paper, 50.5cm 69cm x 4 images, 2024. Photography by Simon Mills
HERmetics: How Painters Think
HERmetics: How Painters Think is at Outset Gallery, Galway until Saturday 21st June 2026.
Artists: Sinead Aldridge, Majella Clancy, Patricia Doherty, Mary T Keown, Louise Wallace
Opening hours: Friday and Saturday: 10am – 5.30pm, Sunday: 11am – 4pm.
This group exhibition explores the concept of “aesthetic nomadism” in contemporary painting; where ideas move fluidly through drawing, collage, printmaking, sculpture, found objects, and mixed media before arriving on canvas. Through layered processes of repetition, disruption, memory and experimentation, the artists reveal painting as an active form of thinking.
Working primarily with oil painting and mixed media, the exhibition examines abstraction, materiality, texture, and mark-making, balancing structure with spontaneity. Each work evolves through layering, erasure, excavation, and reconstruction, challenging traditional approaches to contemporary painting practice.
The installation extends this thinking into the gallery space, drawing directly from the studio environment. Through varied hanging strategies, material references, and the inclusion of sculptural elements, the exhibition invites multiple viewpoints and reflects the shifting perspective of the painter at work.
@sineadaldridge1 @louisewallaceartist @marytkeown @patriciadoherty.visualartist @hermetics_in_the_studio
Images 1-3: installation images of the exhibition. Images 4-6:
The Pile, oil on linen, 42cm x 52cm framed, 2026 (Image by: Simon Mills)
A Flip Backwards, oil and collage on linen, 52.5cm x 63cm framed, 2026 (Image by: Simon Mills)
The Cave, oil and collage on linen, 52.5cm x 63cm framed, 2026 (Image by: Simon Mills)
John Moores Painting Prize 2025
I am delighted to be exhibiting at the John Moores Painting Prize, 2025 held at the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. The exhibition runs from 6th September 2025 – 1st March 2026
The 2025 iteration of the prize featured an exhibition of 71 contemporary painters, narrowed down from over 3,000 entries by a judging panel that included Zhang Enli, Dr. Zoé Whitley, Michael Simpson, Gemma Rolls-Bentley, and Louise Giovanelli. [1]
John Moores Painting Prize (@jmpaintingprize) - Instagram
https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/whatson/walker-art-gallery/exhibition/john-moores-painting-prize-2025#section--the-exhibition
Image Details: Melted Body I, oil on linen in an artist made walnut frame, 42cm x 52cm, 2025. Private Collection. Photography by Simon Mills.
Majella Clancy / Matter Out of Place
Curated by Dr. Louise Wallace
Exhibition Opening: Thursday 6th March, 6-8pm
Matter Out of Place takes its title from Lauren Elkin’s recent book Art Monsters: Unruly Bodies in Feminist Art in which Elkin describes the female body as ‘always matter out of place’[1] through its refusal to conform and be brought into line by perceived notions of femininity. This exhibition brings together ideas around the gendered body, its relationship to motherhood and material making. Clancy draws from life, building up a lexicon of experiential references which are then foregrounded through her painting and printmaking practice. The work is rooted in the language of abstract expressionism as a space of painting that holds potential for autonomy and agency while also interrupting, disrupting, and challenging ideas of fixity. Paper stencils integral to the making of her screenprints are reused as collage within the paintings. Here Clancy brings together painting and printmaking on one surface creating language which is ambiguous, tactile and slippery, where an expansion lives in the gendered, embodied mark. This fluid space of painting speaks to an out-of-place-ness and is at times unruly, untidy and unpredictable.
[1] Elkin, Lauren.’ Art Monsters: Unruly Bodies in Feminist Art’, Chatto & Windus, London, 2023, p.40
Image: Simon Mills
How The Image Echoes (Part 2),
Ulster University Gallery, February 2020
An exhibition with and about painting, curated by Dougal McKenzie and Louise Wallace. Artists: Majella Clancy, Susan Connolly, Cherie Driver, Joy Gerrard, Christopher Hanlon, Paddy McCann, Dougal McKenzie and Louise Wallace
Image: Simon Mills
How The Image Echoes (Part 1)
PS2, Belfast, 16 - 21 September 2019
Brian Bishop, Majella Clancy, Susan Connolly, Joy Gerrard, Christopher Hanlon, Paddy McCann, Dougal McKenzie and Louise Wallace
Featuring works by Brian Bishop, Majella Clancy, Susan Connolly, Joy Gerrard, Christopher Hanlon, Paddy McCann, Dougal McKenzie and Louise Wallace, this exhibition seeks to address the ways in which the artists’ works may be considered within our wider ‘image culture’ today.
The digital world of the camera, the screen, social media and the internet have, in less than two decades, created immeasurable numbers of images across new platforms. This exhibition seeks to raise the questions: What constitutes ‘an image’ when making art, and what, if anything, makes this different from the other multifarious ways of delivering images as outlined above?
Image: BPW
Belfast Print Workshop: Multi Matrix: Printmaking Symposium
Friday 13th March, 2020 The MAC, belfast
The common definition of matrix is ‘the cultural, social, or political environment in which something develops’. In printmaking ‘matrix’ refers to the source - plate, stone, screen.. from which the image originates - each process lends unique characteristics to the final product. Increasingly, the environment for art-making is cross disciplinary, combining mediums, techniques and influences. There is a need for artists, arts organisations and educational institutions alike to utilise a range of skills and services to remain sustainable and diversify income sources. The symposium will respond to this need by offering:
Fresh perspectives for approaching print from other areas of artist practice
Inspiration for applying print within education and well-being
Sharing of ‘best practice’ experience for finding a market for artwork and related skills