The genesis for Glynn’s series of copperplate etchings & aquatints ‘Empty Spaces, Human Traces’ was a visit to St. Ita’s Psychiatric Hospital at Portrane, Co. Dublin in 2012 to document the decommissioning of the hospital before its expected closure in 2013 or 2014. Glynn was inspired by the building’s narratives of past lives that seemed to seep out of every crevice. St. Ita’s Hospital, built in 1896, was the largest capital investment that the British empire made in Ireland. Located on a peninsula and surrounded by a 300-acre farm, this collection of red-brick buildings included two churches, a bakery, ballroom, butcher, hairdresser, tailer, shoe repairer, fire station, morgue and graveyard and was home to over 2,000 patients. St. Ita’s is in a state of transition: the patients have now moved out and within the building itself areas are succumbing to closure, abandonment and decay.
Empty Spaces, Human Traces: The Sinks
Printed in 2013
Etching & Aquatint, Copperplate Intaglio print on Archival Paper
27.5w x 14.5h cm Unframed, 48w x 35h cm Framed
Edition of 10
Framed
€190
Empty Spaces, Human Traces: The Meeting Room
Printed in 2013
Etching & Aquatint, Copperplate Intaglio print on Archival Paper
14.5w x 22.5h cm Unframed, 35w x 42.5h cm Framed
Edition of 10
Framed
€180