The 2023 exhibition Interwoven brought work by 20 Cork makers to the new Kinsale Library during Cork Craft Month.
The display included ceramics, woodwork, textiles and other forms of contemporary and traditional craft.
Craft embedded in social life
The exhibition examined the relationship between Irish making and the communities in which objects are produced and used.
For centuries, craftspeople had created functional and decorative work reflecting local materials, beliefs, needs and visual traditions.
Interwoven placed those inherited techniques beside new design approaches developed by contemporary makers.
The result was not a division between historical craft and modern innovation. Traditional material knowledge remained active through new forms, uses and audiences.
A new public building becoming an exhibition space
The presentation took place in Kinsale Library’s James O’Neill building in Church Square.
Using the newly opened library gave the makers access to an audience extending beyond specialist craft collectors.
Visitors encountered objects while entering a civic space designed around reading, learning and community activity.
Cork Craft & Design had supported professional and semi-professional makers in the city and county since 2005.
The organisation created exhibition, retail and networking opportunities while promoting Cork as a place for making, learning and collecting.
Interwoven gave that mission a clear visual form. Twenty practices appeared together to show how craft connects individual skill with regional identity and how older techniques continue to change as society changes around them.