DOMAIN of the Dinosaurs

Domain of The Dinosaurs exhibition which was opened by An Taoiseach Micheál Martin on the 15th. Nov 2025 and will run until the 12th. April 2026

Domain of the Dinosaurs: 

A pioneering exhibition of scientific and artistic displays that has been developed at University College Cork by Maria McNamara, Professor of Palaeontology, and Fiona Kearney, Director of the Glucksman. It features over 250 real fossil specimens from land, sea and air, bringing the world of the Irish dinosaurs to life.

Five Irish artists were commissioned to bring a creative lens to the deep time involved in paleontological research, providing an imaginative response to Ireland's rich fossil record that pre-dates the dinosaurs by millions of years.

The Glucksman

Clutch pencil on HP Waterford paper 300gms

Framed 92 x 92cm using museum glass

Artist statement:

A memorable moment perhaps in everyone’s growing up, is their first encounter with the entombed shape of a ‘thing’ which lived countless eons ago.  It is a moment for the child which is filled with electrified wonderment and curiosity about time and origins. 

These drawings relate to this moment.  These fossilised Brachiopods are entombed within their medium of rock and are quite literally drawn in the medium of themselves, Calcium Carbonate; limestone. The Glucksman has amongst its materials a delightful fossil rich limestone containing so many of these Brachiopod fossils both inside  and outside the building. 

The Glucksman’s dissected and expanded architectural appearance creates an intricacy of inner space and external surface which I love and from which I draw the similarity to the process of dissection used when investigating an object across its 3 dimensions.  An appearance, in this case, resulting from prising apart the dissected elements — the rock, as the substrate for the fossils.

It is often the case in my drawing that there will be a subtle indicator of a human trace. In this instance, it is the suggested evidence of vertical drill holes which indicate the possible means of splitting the original limestone block from a larger block or from the parent quarry. 

Gigantoproductus

Clutch pencil on HP Waterford paper 300gms

Framed 86 x 86cm using museum glass