Lost Lace Drawings – 2022
This series of drawings documented Miriam’s preliminary ideas for the outdoor installation Lost Lace in charcoal, colouring pencil and pastel. The drawings give a rare glimpse into the artist’s practice and thought process leading up to the finished installation. The project ‘Lost lace’ is a collaborative project between the visual artist Miriam Mc Connon and the poet Jessica Traynor with the engaged participation of the families who have lost loved ones to covid 19 in Ireland.
Miriam Mc Connon’s outdoor installation ‘Lost Lace’ is made up of approximately ten thousand white roses made by the artist from individual white handkerchiefs. The artist placed the roses around the two fountains at Dublin’s Iveagh gardens. The handkerchief roses will form a delicate pattern of traditional Irish Lace. Each Handkerchief rose symbolizes a life lost in Ireland and Northern Ireland due to the Coronavirus Pandemic.
Each single handkerchief rose in this installation references the small cloths or ‘clooties’ that were hung traditionally on trees near the site of holy wells in Pagan Ireland. The handkerchief was believed to drive illness away by absorbing it. The artist has chosen to place them in a floral lace pattern hinting at the concept of the man-made object imitating nature in an attempt to find resolve.
