Andrew Folan

Dance of the Mayflies

Dance of the mayflies is a sound and light interactive floating sculpture, that captures the erratic dance of mayflies during their mating season. The work consists of a pair of mirrorpolished, stainless steel wings, a raft and LED lighting. It is provided with power and sound-to-light conversion from a shore-based unit – containing photovoltaic cells and electronic circuitry.

The unit will charge during the daylight hours and emit a projected and reflected light pattern during the early hours of darkness.

The laser-cut pattern is derived from a Mayfly, trapped by the artist during a fishing trip, when he brought nothing home but an idea for this sculpture.

Andrew Folan has exhibited his prints and sculpture internationally. He practices in traditional printmaking, print-related new technologies, photo-montage and sculpture. He is interested in the interrelation of image and object realities; how the art-making process is both enabled by human action and promotes our interaction. His photomontage work combines prints and objects in the production of layered composites. His rapid-prototype sculptures are virtual conceptions made into actual objects. An active collaborator in scientific, medical and architectural projects, he participated in the Digital Surface presented at Tate Britain in 2003. He completed a commission for the Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast in 2008 – using Computer Axial Tomography as the central research method. He presented a paper, Grasping the Untouchable at The International Symposium on Electronic Art, Belfast, 2009.

He exhibited his Laser-sintered digital sculptures at the Glucksman Gallery, Cork in 2017. His work is included in state collections at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Trinity College Dublin, University College Dublin and the Department of the Taoiseach.

He is a member of the Royal Hibernian Academy and is Head of Print at the National College of Art and Design Dublin.

Andrews work may be seen at his personal website: http://www.seeingnotbelieving.com