National Sculpture Factory

11/11/2025

Irish Times Q&A with Corban Walker
RESIST runs at Solomon Fine Art, Dublin, until this Saturday 15 November.

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03/11/2025

National Sculpture Factory in partnership with Cork International Film Festival and Sample-Studios are delighted to announce that 'Stolen Sealskin', a solo exhibition by Sarah Lou Kinneen, will open in Sample-Studios Gallery, The Lord Mayor's Pavilion, from 14-30 November. The Opening Reception will take place from 1-3pm on Friday 14 November - refreshments will be served and all are welcome to attend.

Sarah Lou Kinneen is the recipient of the Parallax Emerging Film Artist Award 2025, an annual partnership between Sample-Studios, Cork International Film Festival, and National Sculpture Factory to recognise, support, and platform an outstanding emerging film artist and recent graduate of a tertiary Irish fine art institution. The Parallax award provides: a bursary to support the artist financially; 12-month Associate Membership of Sample-Studios with access to professional development opportunities, facilities, and workspace; and a solo-exhibition opportunity in The Lord Mayor’s Pavilion as part of the Cork International Film Festival.
'Stolen Sealskin' reimagines the enduring Selkie legend through an immersive installation that drifts between myth, memory, and the coastal landscape. The legend follows a shapeshifting seal-woman who becomes bound to land and severed from sea when her sealskin is stolen. Through moving image, sculpture and sound, Stolen Sealskin navigates autonomy, coercion, and biopolitics, drawing from folklore and cultural memory.

Supported by The Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon and Cork City Council

29/10/2025

Blocks of oppression and pillows of hope: Corban Walker interviewed by Niall MacMonagle on the occasion of his exhibition RESIST, for the Irish Independent
You can read an online version here - https://www.solomonfineart.ie/news/266-what-lies-beneath-corban-walker-niall-macmonagle-interviews-the-artist-for-the-irish
RESIST runs at Solomon Fine Art from 23rd October to 15th November

29/10/2025

RESIST
Corban Walker at Solomon Fine Art
23 October - 15 November

In this, Walker’s second solo exhibition with Solomon Fine Art, he continues his explorations of scale and architectural constructs, shaped by his perception of a world mapped out to accommodate a different measure from his own. This new body of work reflects a deep engagement with the current volatile global landscape on multiple levels, while also addressing his experience of navigating his surroundings with reduced mobility.

In a process of distillation, a core value within the body of work, Walker integrates themes ranging from the climate crisis, disability, and the deplorable genocide in Gaza. Finding material from the constant and horrifying political landscape being played out throughout the world, he has created a response that reflects resilience under extreme frustration. This collection of sculptures accompanied by a number of works on paper span from a precise perception of scale to unravelled compositions of structure and to articulate a situation beyond comprehension.

Image credits:
1. Corban Walker studio, NSF Cork
2. Corban Walker, Untitled (RESIST), 2025, ash wood and tung oil, 76.8 x 66 x 53.5 cm
3. Corban Walker, Untitled (Annihilation Stream), 2025, fired porcelain, aluminium square tubing, 40 x 24 x 10 cm
4. Corban Walker, Untitled (Obliterated) 2000-2025, patinated bronze, muslin, ash wood, 15 x 116 x 25.5 cm
5. Corban Walker, Untitled (Reuse It, for M.W.), 2025, reused Siberian pine and reused steel, 144.4 x 40 x 15 cm
6. Corban Walker, Untitled (No Direction), 2025, aluminium, glass, 20 x 89 x 53 cm

28/10/2025

November is just around the corner and tickets for this are nearly gone 👀

Art Futures: Navigating Career Pathways in the Fine Art Sector
Saturday 1st November
Presented by Doherty Sculpture Park, hosted at TU Dublin.

NSF Director, Helen Carey, shall be speaking at this half-day symposium designed for emerging artists, recent graduates, and creative professionals beginning their journey. Chaired by Eamonn Maxwell, Curator, the other three speakers are Marine Tanguy, Josephine Kelliher, and Pádraic E. Moore.

Book your place here - https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/art-futures-navigating-career-pathways-in-the-fine-art-sector-tickets-1697835665179

TU Dublin / OT Baile Átha Cliath TU Dublin School of Art and Design TU Dublin Art & Design Society

24/10/2025

A little sneak peek of Liam Lavery and Eithne Ring's current commission before it heads to the foundry to be cast in bronze.
It is based on a quirky map from circa 1600 that has several perspective angles with exquisite detail, including spiked heads on two of its turrets. The artists are using a variety of materials, mixing up new and old technology as well as traditional crafting and printmaking. Techniques such as linocut, modelling, photopolymer etching and 3D printing.
Commissioned by Cork City Council, this bronze bas-relief will be sited in the reimagined Bishop Lucey Park, scheduled to be renamed and opened in November.

Lavery Ring Cork City Council Cork Arts

22/10/2025

Deadline approaching!
Our friends at Benchspace Cork are inviting applications for the 2025 Dearcán Bursary. Deadline: 5pm, Friday 24 Oct 2025.

Supported by Cork County Council Arts Service and South Cork Local Enterprise Office, the award includes twelve months of workspace, full access to Benchspace’s professional manufacturing equipment, and a stipend of €10,000 towards expenses. All artists, craftspeople and product designers working in jewellery making and fine metalwork living in the Cork County Administrative area can apply.

https://benchspacecork.ie/2025-dearcan-bursary-applications-are-open-copy/

Local Enterprise Office South Cork Cork County Council

21/10/2025

Archiving Hope by Fiona Hayes is on show in the foyer at Cork County Hall until this Friday 24th October.

Created on the Factory floor during her MA Art and Environment, Archiving Hope explores a post-industrial West Cork gravel pit. It is a deep mapping and sensing investigation into the vibrations of life in this temporarily abandoned space and an archive of this new ecological environment. It is in essence a holding place.
This disused 40-acre West Cork gravel pit is a momentary island refuge amidst the industrial-agricultural landscape. It is part man-made lake and part biological desert, a space that has been stripped of thousands of years of its geological history, in essence, it is a new space exposed by extraction now ready once again for occupation and rebirth.
Concrete blocks hold fragmented images from this magical island, images of insects and birds, and of delicate flowers, herbs, grasses, shrubs, and tiny little trees, that have erupted from between the stones and rock. The summer beacons are now gone but are immortalised on these blocks, blocks that are made from fragments of the local geological past, this installation re-unites event and actor, as past and present become known.

Images: Fiona Hayes, Archiving Hope, Concrete Sculpture, sound, 8 video projections, Natural fauna

Cork County Council Cork County Council Library & Arts Service

15/10/2025

Deadline approaching!

Cornerstones of The Career of an Artist include the Studio, the Residency, the Network, the Gallery; all which require planning and coherence. These building blocks of the approach to the Career of An Artist are the subjects of this series of talks/discussions.
NSF director and independent curator Helen Carey will suggest a number of steps to consider or to reject, in a series of four sessions, two of which will be in person in NSF, and two which will be virtual via Zoom. Each session will last 45 minutes, with 30 minutes of presentation and 15 minutes of discussion. Six participants will be selected, and each session will begin at 5pm.

Session schedule
Tuesday 04 November – 5PM | The Studio - in person
Tuesday 11 November – 5PM | The Residency - online
Monday 24 November – 5PM | The Network - online
Tuesday 02 December – 5PM | The Gallery - in person

Participants should be interested in attending all sessions, as it is a series and inter-related. If you are interested, please send a CV and 4 paragraphs outlining your key questions for each of the above fields – The Studio, The Residency, the Network, The Gallery – such as how studio visits unfold, how to maintain a network etc. Up to six participants will be selected.

Deadline: 20 October 2025
Capacity: 6 participants
Admission: Free to attend subject to selection
To apply: email [email protected]

14/10/2025

Ciara Sheehan is the first of our Graduate Residency recipients to join us on the Factory floor, coming from the Limerick School of Art & Design TUS Sculpture and Combined Media graduating class of 2025.
Ciara works with diverse media, including sculpture, ceramics, metal, textiles, sound and digital drawing. Her work draws influence from Celtic mythology and contemporary feminist discourse and her own lived experiences. Ciara’s immersive dream-like installations is a form of carnivalesque storytelling, re-imagining and deconstructing familiar folktales. Through these fantasy sculptures, Ciara presents a joyful celebration of feminist identity and the process of making - while acknowledging the contradictory qualities that often accompany these experiences.

09/10/2025

Cornerstones of The Career of an Artist include the Studio, the Residency, the Network, the Gallery; all which require planning and coherence. These building blocks of the approach to the Career of An Artist are the subjects of this series of talks/discussions.
NSF director and independent curator Helen Carey will suggest a number of steps to consider or to reject, in a series of four sessions, two of which will be in person in NSF, and two which will be virtual via Zoom. Each session will last 45 minutes, with 30 minutes of presentation and 15 minutes of discussion. Six participants will be selected, and each session will begin at 5pm.

Session schedule
Tuesday 04 November – 5PM | The Studio - in person
Tuesday 11 November – 5PM | The Residency - online
Monday 24 November – 5PM | The Network - online
Tuesday 02 December – 5PM | The Gallery - in person

Participants should be interested in attending all sessions, as it is a series and inter-related. If you are interested, please send a CV and 4 paragraphs outlining your key questions for each of the above fields – The Studio, The Residency, the Network, The Gallery – such as how studio visits unfold, how to maintain a network etc. Up to six participants will be selected.

Deadline: 20 October 2025
Capacity: 6 participants
Admission: Free to attend subject to selection
To apply: email [email protected]

07/10/2025

Calling the Cork arts community; 2025 Graduate awardees are coming to National Sculpture Factory for their awarded time on our factory floor - are you an accommodation provider? Our artists are looking for mid - week accommodation (digs) for short duration.
If you have accommodation and would like to be put in touch, please email [email protected] and we will pass on your email details.
NSF observes GDPR regulations and will only be shared according to your instructions, with our artists who need short term accommodation.