In 2023, President Michael D. Higgins said,

“We have to reject the suggestion that war is the natural human condition or indeed that xenophobia is a natural human condition, or that people of different religions or cultures cannot reconcile (and) live harmoniously…We have to pursue a new symmetry. Our very species’ survival depends on that, as does our relationship with other species.”

What do we want? is a mixed-media exhibition that includes drawing, photography, sculpture and assemblage. Each artist presents work that reflects a personal and creative response to current geo-political threats. Overall, the exhibition is one that promotes a dialogical rather than didactic approach to answering the question what do we want? 

Jill Gibbon, for example, exposes the reality of war as a commodity. Disguised as a respectable businesswoman who works in the arms trade, she visits arms fairs in Europe and the Middle East, drawing the attendees in concertina sketchbooks and collecting ephemera and ‘gifts’ from the stalls. Bombs are displayed on pedestals, hostesses serve champagne, Mozart plays from the back of a military truck. As Jill says “Nothing conveys the chilling priorities of the arms trade as clearly as its marketing”. Her pretence (i.e. artist performing the role of arms trader) is a metaphor for the façade of respectability in the industry.  

Eoin Mac Lochlainn’s series of charcoal and wash drawings explore the trauma of the Irish Civil War. These are not traditional portraits of recognisable victims, rather they are haunted reminders that violence persists into the present and that the identity of many victims from current conflicts will not be known. For Eoin ” Each piece is an attempt to represent a soul, someone with dreams and ambitions, someone whose life had been cut short by conflict” and for him, this work is relevant today because war, no matter its cause or location, marks a failure of empathy and a failure of our most fundamental humanity.

Tom Molloy addresses contemporary geopolitics in drawings, photographs and paper sculptures. His practice is concerned with the examination of power in a political and historical context and how it can be, and has been perverted, which raises philosophical questions about morality. Tom challenges the observer’s perception by creating ambiguous works that investigate the overlap between representation and association. For example, in ‘Contact’ (2010) he creates a contact sheet of 36 iconic war images which are out of chronological order so that, in reality, it is an impossible roll of film to have taken. His work creates a new narrative of the history of war which tests our understanding of linear temporality and representation.

Gail Ritchie’s work is a response to the most recent prediction by the Doomsday Clock that humanity is now ninety seconds from midnight, where midnight is the nuclear apocalypse. This work is an installation of made and reconfigured clocks and drawings of time-keeping devices that address the impact of conflict through a personal, political and environmental lens. As part of an ongoing series ‘Chrono-centric’, Gail considers the colonisation and commodification of time from an other-than-human perspective. What will we do when there is no more time? Will there ever be a time without war?

Oliver Cornet is the founder of the Olivier Cornet Gallery which is located at 3 Great Denmark Street in the Parnell Square Cultural Quarter, Northside Dublin. The gallery is one of Ireland’s most exciting contemporary fine art galleries, representing accomplished visual artists working in a variety of media such as painting, sculpture, ceramics, photography and fine prints. The gallery hosts solo exhibitions as well as curated group shows. Olivier collaborates with other cultural workers and practitioners of diverse art forms to engage with the public in new and very promising ways. He conceived the concept for ‘What do we want?’ and the exhibition was first shown in the Olivier Cornet Gallery in April/ May 2024.