Rooftop archive 10 - mid 1990s

I showed some of the drawings from 1992 that began my obsession with windows and the stonework ruins in the rooftop archive post, here. In that post I also give links to previous rooftop archive posts. When I moved to Ireland in 1993 I brought with me a series of large paintings that I had completed in Toronto the previous year and had full intention of creating more in this series. This series became the exhibition My Tower of Strength and toured arts centres throughout the island of Ireland 1994-1998.   

Early in 1994 I relocated to rural Kerry where I was reunited with my favourite castle ruin, ie, Ballycarbery Castle near Cahersiveen.

I was offered an exhibition at St John's Art Centre in Listowel first and thought it was the perfect place to display My Tower of Strength (a former church, open stonework walls) but I wanted more paintings in the exhibition and got to work on these window drawings, which were studies for the Ballycarbery paintings. 

There were five Ballycarbery paintings altogether, but I'm not sure which of these six drawings did not make it into my final decision plans for what I would paint! It may have been this one, but I'm not sure...

The Ballycarbery paintings, which were the brightest (predominantly yellows, greens and pinks) works in the series and all completed in early 1994 before the touring exhibition began. Although St John's  was the first to offer me a show, the touring began in Siamsa Tire, Tralee, who also wanted the exhibition at a slightly earlier date.

Ballycarbery Castle had a great many intact windows to choose from and I enjoyed drawing them. 

All of these sketches are acrylic on paper and 76 cm x 56 cm.

When I moved to rural Kerry, I thought the phenomenon of drying peat hanging out of ruined outbuilding windows was most interesting. Surprisingly, I never took this concept further than sketches and photographs, especially as I moved to a house near Portmagee in 1995 and my husband stacked peat in ruined windows of our own abandoned outbuildings! As with previous window ruin drawings, this is acrylic on paper, 76 cm x 56 cm.

Castles!

After Easter I went for a few days down to Waterford area. As discussed in a previous post, I stopped in Carlow town for lunch and afterwards paid a visit to the beautiful Carlow Castle. Believe it or not, this is very close to the centre of the town! I am happy to re-post this picture of the castle.

 After a morning in Waterford the following day, we took a drive in search of some dolmens, named in my monuments book (Guide to National & Historic Monuments of Ireland by Peter Harbison). It was yet another gorgeous day and while stretching our legs at a walk by a series of man-made ponds near Dunhill, Co. Waterford, we thought we could see a casle silhouette in the distance. My husband asked in the local pub if there was a castle nearby, and we got directions to Dún Aoill.

The three storey castle was at the top of a low hill but very accessible. There were a few families picnic-ing at its base and lots of children enjoying the ruin,

The view from the castle was lovely too.

Though not as large as my favourite castle what I loved about Dún Aoill was that you could climb up several floors, and be within the ruins, not just look at it from the outside. Ballycarbery Castle is definitely my favourite castle in Ireland. It is near Cahirciveen, Co. Kerry near to where I lived for three years in the mid-1990s, so I visited it regularly. I never really think of it as being so huge, until I see pictures of it, but the remains are only of one corner so the castle in its day must have really been gigantic. This castle is on a farmer's field and is only accessible from the road at low tide,