The Memory of Water, a new exhibition from artist Rosie McGurran will run at Roundstone Community Hall from August 2-16.

“The work is based on my love for the sea and the ancient landscape of Connemara,” explains Belfast woman Rosie, who lives in Roundstone.

These paintings investigate the “ever-changing light on Dog’s Bay, gentle tides on hot days and the layers of colour in the water”.

Rosie has spent hours drawing and painting outdoors, trying to capture these elements on canvas. A recent trip to Paris reignited her interest in Impressionist and post-Impressionist art, leading her to experiment further with colour and composition.

“I have also become fascinated with the work of Ithell Colquhoun, an English surrealist artist whose work is now being celebrated at Tate Britain more than thirty years after her death,” says Rosie of the influential surrealist who spent time in Roundstone in the 1950s.

In her book, The Crying of The Wind, Colquhoun captured a Roundstone that is now long gone, recalling conversations about local folklore and revelling in the quietness of nature. ‘There is nothing pleasanter, should the weather be kind, than to lie on a hill in the hollow behind a rock or in a nook of the half-tropical shrubbery and gaze at the foreground of heathland and scattered boulders. Where better can one indulge the longing for tranquillity, for no mechanical noise will break the peace of bog and sky . . . The Gaelic word suaimhneas expresses this luxuriating in quiet,” Colquhoun wrote.

In this show, Rosie sets out to reflect the idea of ‘suaimhneas’, which for her, is “a time of simple, gentle engagement with nature and an appreciation of the riches of our environment”.

She’s had a busy year, with group exhibitions at The Chelsea Arts Society and London Fields Gallery in London, and at Pulchri Studio, The Hague. In September, she will be exhibiting as part of The Rose Project at 57W57 Gallery in New York. This project is a UK-based international artist-led initiative and the exhibition will be touring to Roundstone in 2026 with a series of events and workshops.

Meanwhile, The Memory of Water opens this Saturday at 2pm in Roundstone Community Hall, and all are welcome. It runs until August 16, with daily painting demonstrations at 2pm. There’s a guided tour of the gallery at 1pm on Saturday, August 10.

Pictured: One of the paintings from Rossie’s new show.