No show like a Jo show

A new exhibition has taken off at Cork Airport by an artist based on Sherkin Island.

Jo Ashby’s solo exhibition, ‘Heading West’ is on show at the airport runs until 28 June and her work is rooted in observation and drawing, capturing the patterns and rhythms of nature, in particular, the changing sea and landscapes of Sherkin Island.

Jo first came to Sherkin Island over twenty five years ago, where she has a home and studio. She has consistently drawn her inspiration from the coast, having spent time in her early years with her artist parents in Cornwall and Devon. Coming to Sherkin and West Cork has enabled her to develop further her visual relationship with land and sea.

She said: “My work is all about my responses to being in a particular place and getting to know it in all its guises from repeated small sketches and allowing my memory to crystallize my thoughts.

“I’m interested in the patterns of nature, when land and sea meet sky and the complexities of sharp focus and detail with softened wider horizons and blurred edges. It makes you realise how insignificant we humans are. I am a small speck finding ways to record transient moments of vastness.”