GALWAY ARTIST, Cecilia Danell, has been announced by the Royal Hibernian Academy of Arts as the winner of the 2022 Hennessy Craig Award.
The prestigious biannual award is based on the overall practice of the artist, and is open to any painter under the age of 35, who has exhibited in the open submission section of the Academy’s annual exhibition, with five painters shortlisted each year. The painter must have studied at a recognised art college in Ireland.
In 2020, the Hennessy Craig jury shortlisted five eligible artists from the 190th RHA Annual Exhibition and an additional five artists were shortlisted from the 2021 annual exhibition. The award exhibition is currently running at the RHA, Dublin, until March 27. “I'm really delighted about winning the award,” said Cecilia, “as it's a prestigious painting prize.”
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Winter Light. Oil and acrylic on canvas, 130x160 cm, 2021, by Cecilia Danell, one of the paintings featured in the RHA award exhibition.
Cecilia also has a current solo exhibition, ‘Tactile Terrain’, running at Luan Gallery, Athlone, featuring large-scale painting, tapestry work, and textile sculpture.
“The work was made throughout the pandemic,” she says. “This time of introspection and enforced solitude resulted in a deep engagement with painting, where the winter landscape further represents that sense of stillness. To counteract the feeling that we couldn't touch anything, I made soft, tangible textile objects to accompany my paintings.”
The exhibition runs until April 3. After that Cecilia will take part in group exhibitions in The Glucksman, Cork, and The Butler Gallery, Kilkenny, and she is due to have a solo show at Kevin Kavanagh, Dublin, in September.
