‘where oxlips and the nodding violet grows’ | Joseph Heffernan
Exhibition dates: 9 May–6 June 2026
Official opening reception Saturday 9 May 4–6pm. No invitation needed, all very welcome.
Joseph Heffernan is an Irish artist based in Backwater Artist Studios, Cork. Working across painting, drawing, text and assemblage/installation his practice is concerned with identity, rituals, performance and how memory is constructed.
Heffernan’s sculptural work uses found, antique and reclaimed materials to examine how objects can carry meaning. They are often devotional in nature and question how we chose to assign significance to things in order to construct and poeticise personal narratives. These assemblages and installations provide a theatrical setting for his paintings, drawings and texts.
His current body of work and upcoming exhibition ‘where oxlips and the nodding violet grows‘ imagines a speculative narrative dominated by a game referred to as ‘The Ceremony of the Flowers’. While the rules of this game are only alluded to they seem to be an abstract synthesis of poetry, mathematics and esoteric knowledge that envisage the world as an abstruse place full of elaborate rituals involving obscure signs and symbols. It functions as an intercessor of sorts between the mundanity of the world and the quasi divine. In the process the work asks questions about belief and the things that we chose to put our faith in.
Curated by Aideen Quirke
Attached image: ‘I have looked at it so long I think is a part of my heart, oil on linen, 50 x 40cm, Joseph Heffernan, 2025
‘where oxlips and the nodding violet grows’ runs at GOMA Waterford from 9 May – 6 June 2026
Regular gallery opening hours: 11am–5pm, Tues-Sat | Free admission
Instagram @Josephheffernan.art Website http://www.josephheffernanartist.com