Founded in 2003 by Andy Parsons and Glenn Holman, Floating World is a collective of artists based in Ireland the UK, and Japan whose practices encompass painting, textiles, sculpture, video and performance. United by their use of the medium of Artists’ Books to explore areas of common concern, a major preoccupation of Floating World has been to present artist’s books in a gallery based context and to encourage critical discourse around the medium.
Much of their recent work has been specifically focused on democratising the production and consumption of contemporary art. As part of Opening up the Book, Floating World will be reprising their exhibition Unfolding the Archive held earlier in 2015 at the NCAD Gallery, Dublin and the F.E. McWilliam Gallery & Studio, Banbridge. Unfolding the Archive set out to investigate the archives at The National Irish Visual Arts Library (NIVAL) and explore the richness of the archive as a starting point for the creation of new artworks. Floating World’s artists developed new narratives in response to objects in the archive which are both local and international in their resonance.
Featuring new work by artists from Ireland, the UK, and Japan, the exhibition will demonstrate the breadth of engagement and the broad range of methods and materials employed by artists to represent the relationship between the record of past arts activity and their own contemporary practice.
Participating Artists
UK based artists:
Glenn Holman
Glynis Candler
Sarah Carne
Edwin Aitken
Simon Burton
Glenn Holman
Glynis Candler
Sarah Carne
Edwin Aitken
Simon Burton
Ireland based artists:
Andy Parsons
Elizabeth Kinsella
Diane Henshaw
Niamh O’Connor
Andy Parsons
Elizabeth Kinsella
Diane Henshaw
Niamh O’Connor
Japan based artists:
Hidehiko Ishibashi
