FLOWER Power is a new exhibition of paintings by Helene Brunicardi, Vicki Crowley and Geraldine O’Brien that will run at the Frank Lewis Gallery in Killarney from this Tuesday, March 6, until the end of the month.

The official opening will be performed by Fr Michael Murphy, a former parish priest in Sneem and Kenmare who is now retired in Killarney.

In late April and May areas of woodland will be carpeted with acres and acres of bluebells and forest floors will be covered with the white flower of the wild garlic. These special places feature in the work of Helena Brunicardi who taught art at Killarney Vocational School and, later, at Killarney Community College for many years.

Geraldine O’Brien has been painting flowers that she has cultivated in her own garden for more than 70 years. She paints clumps of primroses that will begin to feature on ditches and in woodlands in the coming weeks.

O’Brien is particularly known for her paintings of flower arrangements, very often placed on a windowsill where the back lighting projects the image off the canvas.

Vicki Crowley achieves a luminously exotic effect, with a strong suggestion of stained glass, in her paintings on silk. Her paintings of flowers from the tropics – like the Bird of Paradise Flower – help to show that there is a good deal of the exotic in our native flora.

Fr Michael Murphy, who will launch the exhibition, is no stranger to flowers having been involved in the hugely successfully national Tidy Towns competition and the European-wide Entente Florale in Sneem, Kenmare and Killarney.

source : www.the-kingdom.ie