Brenda Aherne and Helen Delany, AKA electronic Sheep, are making waves in the international arena, as Hilary O’Kelly recounts
Adistinctive triangular neon-knit scarf is, so far, the greatest hit of Electronic Sheep, the design and art practice of Brenda Aherne and Helen Delany. Their recent retrospective exhibition at NCAD Gallery, however, showed how wide-ranging their work and ideas are, spanning comic book to fine-art print and fashion shoot to film. So, design or art, and is there still a boundary? It’s almost de rigueur now to see a fine-art resumé read: ‘XYZ works across a range of disciplines, from drawing and video, through installation to social intervention.’ Collaboration with fashion houses has become a staple of fine-art creative expansion – one that enhances both camps, while maintaining their distinction. Electronic Sheep have long been at home in this category-defying, positive mashup of forms, styles, sources and references. With electric colour, quirky imagery and narratives melding urban and rural, traditional and futuristic, their work embraces drawing, craft and digital technology, without hierarchy, to reflect a modern, metropolitan experience.
Stephanie McBride explores Deirdre Brennan’s photographic response to James Joyce’s Ulysses
