Abstract

The work of Dublin-based painter Lorcan Walshe is particularly concerned with the relationship between inscription in its broadest sense and the visual image. His two related series, The Artefacts Project (2007) and Museum Pieces (2008), engage with Ireland’s precolonial past in search of personal artistic, as well as broader cultural, roots during a period when national narratives were being challenged and reconfigured as a result of an increasingly diverse Irish society. The Artefacts Project and Museum Pieces reflect on whether the art of the precolonial past can still be read in a meaningful way in a postcolonial present in which Ireland finds itself part of a globalized world. Reaching across the chasm of history, Walshe’s works emphasize that our reading of the past must always involve an act of translation in order to retain significance in the present: the meaning of the artefact is created anew as it is translated not only from one historical moment into another, but also from one artistic medium into another. This article argues that Walshe’s The Artefacts Project and Museum Pieces question the hierarchical division between writing and the visual image by reading the artefacts of Ireland’s past as visual texts. In this context, drawing and painting themselves emerge as forms of inscription that are part of the process of reading and acts of translation. As a result, the artefact becomes a palimpsest of translations and inscriptions.

摘要

都柏林画家 Lorcan Walshe 的作品特别关注最广泛意义上的铭文与视觉图像之间的关系。他的两个相关系列，The Artefacts Project (2007) 和Museum Pieces (2008)，在国家叙事受到挑战和重新配置的时期，与爱尔兰的前殖民历史相结合，寻找个人艺术以及更广泛的文化根源一个日益多元化的爱尔兰社会。手工艺品项目和博物馆藏品反思在爱尔兰发现自己是全球化世界的一部分的后殖民时代，是否仍然可以以有意义的方式解读前殖民时代的艺术。跨越历史的鸿沟，Walshe 的作品强调我们对过去的解读必须始终涉及一种翻译行为，以便在当下保留意义：人工制品的意义被重新创造，因为它不仅从一个历史时刻被翻译进入另一种，也从一种艺术媒介进入另一种。这篇文章认为，Walshe 的手工艺品项目和博物馆藏品通过阅读爱尔兰过去的人工制品作为视觉文本，质疑书写和视觉图像之间的等级划分。在这种情况下，绘画本身作为铭文形式出现，是阅读和翻译过程的一部分。结果，这件人工制品变成了翻译和铭文的重写本。