Bog Cottage—Queer na nÓg: 4ever young

Pallas Projects/Studios are pleased to present Bog Cottage—Queer na nÓg: 4ever young, the 3rd exhibition of our 2023 Artist-Initiated Projects programme.

Opening Party: 6–8pm Thursday 15th June

Exhibition continues: Friday 16th–Friday 23rd June

Gallery Open: Thursday-Saturday 12-6pm, and 11am-5pm Saturday 24th June.

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"Last November, I spent three weeks working with Bog Cottage alongside Grace Jackson as part of the first iteration of Queer na nÓg at PSSquared, an artist-led space in Belfast. Queer na nÓg wasn’t the only outcome of those three weeks - a fantasy woodland of pink and green - but also the friendship and collaboration that developed from the period. Many hands created a place of love and companionship.

Whilst trees outside were being stripped of leaves, flowers browning and becoming mulch, and mushrooms reverting to their underground networks, we were inside, creating an everlasting season of abundance within PSSquared’s project space. We collectively built trees out of cardboard and paper mache forms, forged a patterned dolmen and designed a pretty pink car using old election posters, and constructed a sexy darkroom from a pleather-esque black tarp. It may have been cold and heavy outside, but inside we were shedding our winter coats, adding colour and warmth to the Irish winter.  

Just like the first hints of spring, working ~and being~ with the Bogs was uplifting, filling me with a familiar joy. Those weeks weren’t just about working with one another, hanging out and forming a friendship were just as important as, and deeply entwined in, any final outcome. We found a new routine for our collaboration, sharing daily lunches of cheese sandwiches and supermarket soup, taking breaks to smoke on the roof of PSSquared whilst laughing over funny stories, and testing different ways of making the woodlands’ slowly developing landscape. Together, we formed a nurturing environment, where checking in on energy levels and wellbeing surpassed the desire of slickness or perfection. I miss being with the Bogs, sitting in the pub together and learning about crochet techniques and knitting patterns. For those three weeks, our collaboration became our own mythological world, somewhere open, generous and outside of it all..."

Excerpt from text Bog Cottage commissioned curator and writer Cecelia Graham

Read more here: https://pallasprojects.org/project/bog-cottagequeer-na-ng