Extract from RVB. 2004
ANNE & DENIS have lived and worked in Paris since 1990
They have two children, (their best work to date):
CV&BIO / PRESS / ARTIST’S STATEMENT / CONTACT
C&C working on the optics for the Meta-Perceptual Helmets
Paris, April 2014
Cleary Connolly’s multi-disciplinary exploration of the art and science of looking
Cleary&Connolly at the
Pompidou Centre, 2009
BIO
Winners of the AIB award in 2009 for their Pompidou Centre exhibition ‘Pourquoi pas toi ?’, artistic duo Anne Cleary and Denis Connolly share their time between Ireland and Paris, working internationally. Their works revolves around visual perception: how we look at the world and the way we understand it, each of us from our own singular perspective, exploring not just with our eyes but with our minds and our bodies, never fully capturing the complex world around us, but constantly interrogating it with our exploring eyes and moving bodies.
They are both architects by education and many of their works have developed in conversation with an architectural, and often urban, context: projected onto buildings, installed into interiors, exploring the city…
Recent projects include interactive light-artwork that has been shown as part of the Lumiere Festival in Derry, Durham and London; the ‘Metaperceptual Helmets’, a series of sculptural aluminium helmets that transform vision; a room for David Byrne’s ‘Theatre of the Mind’, an experimental project working with art and neuroscience in New York; ‘Self Perceptions’ at the Tate Modern in London, bringing together artists and perceptive psychologists; ‘Less than Thirteen’, a commission from the London Symphony Orchestra and the Barbican in London exploring the movements of conductor Sir Simon Rattle. They are currently showing ‘Invisible Light’ - seven new works exploring invisible parts of the electromagnetic spectrum - at the Crawford Art Gallery in Cork and this show will represent Ireland at Expo 2020 Dubai (now programmed for 2021).
In 2018 they founded the ‘School of Looking’ to focusing research, teaching and art practice on the eye and visual perception, and to create innovative multi-disciplinary and participative projects bringing together art, science, technology and people.