Artform School of Art Dunmore East has recently presented and/or supported a number of exhibitions in county Waterford – at The Strand Inn Dunmore East, Mount Congreve Kilmeaden, and The Riverside Cottage Dunmore rd Waterford. The owner of the two venues, Strand Inn and Riverside Cottage, has long been passionate about art, a passion that led to the collaboration with Artform. Now, he invites artists and art lovers alike to experience the powerful fusion of exceptional artwork and enjoyable dining be it in the warm and welcoming Riverside Cottage or in the stunningly located seaside Strand Inn Dunmore East. Current exhibition in Mount Congreve is part of Art in the Gardens – visual art program tailored by Artform for the renowned ‘gardens of the world’, aimed at putting in dialogue art with the natural beauty of the gardens.
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1- Exhibition of paintings by Carolin Beyer, The Strand Inn
Display of artwork by German artist Carolin Beyer, regular summer visitor to Dunmore East. The show, themed around seascape and human presence and absence, was invited by the owner of The Strand Inn. The exhibition is hosted at The Strand Inn (lobby) in Dunmore East co Waterford, and opens on 29 July at 6pm, all welcome. For opening hrs please see www.thestrandinn.com.
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in oils, periodically Dave works in other media such as pastel, fine art printmaking and watercolour.
“Landscape painting occupies a special place in my painting practice, I always loved spending time outdoors exploring and walking and was drawn to certain places: the coast, mountains and even nocturnal urban scenes, fascinated me by the interaction between place, layers of history, our human interaction with the landscape and its ability to evoke memory and emotion.”
Dave has been exploring and working across the south Irish coast for the past twenty years, with much of his painting executed ‘en plein air’ – involving working outdoors directly from the subject in all weather and lighting conditions. Dave first visited Dunmore East thirty years ago on a road trip with friends across Ireland, returning several times since then to paint and more recently through teaching and residency opportunities provided by ARTFORM.
Dave has exhibited widely across Ireland and the UK including the Royal Academy, the Royal Cambrian, Hibernian and Ulster Academies, the New English Art Club, Royal Society of Oil Painters and the Royal Society of Marine Artists (RSMA) of which he is an associate member, at the 2025 annual exhibition in London he won the ‘Artists Magazine’ Award for his large oil of “Boatyard, Dunmore East’. Dave is considered one of Ireland’s foremost ‘plein air’ painters winning a second prize in 2024, and first prize in 2017 and 2025 at ‘Art in the Open’, Europe’s largest plein air festival held annually for the past twenty years in Wexford.
4- ‘Paint Waterford’, Group Exhibition, The Riverside Cottage
Artform is pleased that the Waterford-themed exhibition originally curated by Artform tutor, artist Dave West for Art in the Gardens last year, has been offered a second, smaller iteration in a warm and welcoming ambience of The Riverside Cottage, Dunmore rd. Waterford. The exhibition includes works by 32 established and emerging Irish-based artists who for this show drew their inspiration from landscapes and landmarks of county Waterford. For opening hrs please see www.theriversidecottage.ie. BROWSE AND BUY ARTWORK ONLINE: www.artform.ie/gallery
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‘blossoms as light, blossoms as hope, after winter’s tunnel, after the narrow dark’ S. R. Armitage – Blossomise. Opening hours of Mount Congreve Gardens, Kilmeaden co Waterford are daily from 9am to 5pm. BROWSE AND BUY ARTWORK ONLINE: https://gallery.artform.ie/viewing-room/