![]() ![]() It is within this frame that An Trinse explores Ireland’s violent history of colonial and religious oppression, incorporating iconography and the fossilised prehistoric culture of Ireland into his abstract excavations of cultural memory. By restoring them to the roster of cultural phenomena that force us to confront our ethical and aesthetic boundaries…excavates anew the question of what it means to be human.'” “They emerge as what Karin Sanders calls: ‘corporeal time capsules that transcend archaeology to challenge our assumptions about what we know about the past. ![]() “There is a general mystery surrounding these artefacts,” continues McLaughlin, “and it is unknown whether the bodies were the result of human sacrifice, a punishment for a crime worthy of shame or honour, but they have captivated artists and thinkers as diverse and Joseph Beuys, Seamus Heaney, Sigmund Freud and Karl Jung whose feud over the meaning of these bodies inspired my earlier work, Corpses From the North. “In their place are a species which degrades peat moss to form humic acid, which acts as a natural embalming environment similar to the process used when tanning leather.” This process can result in the perfect conditions for preservation, with ancient artefacts including bog wood, barrels of bog butter, entire farming landscapes enveloped by blanket bogs and bog bodies, with skin, hair and internal organs intact, having been found in incredible condition up to 5000 years after they were submerged in the wetlands. “Bogs themselves contain a unique environment free of oxygen which prevents the growth of bacteria which would normally decompose flesh,” explains McLaughlin. An Trinse sets a swirling soundscape of hypnotic drones, tumbling synthesis and double bass, courtesy of Maxwell Sterling, against stroboscopic fragments of 3D renderings of prehistoric sites, grainy, monochromatic fractals stamped with ancient glyphs and ancient, science fiction schematics.Īs An Trinse, Northern Irish audiovisual artist Stephen McLaughlin reckons with the cultural history of Ireland with sound and image, mapping what he describes as “the uneasy atmospheres and silences left in the Irish psyche in the aftermath of colonial and religious repression, using archaeology and ancient history as a conduit.” Of particular interest to McLaughlin are bog fossils, specifically, the incredible preservative effects that the anaerobic environment of bogs can have in relation to natural tannic acids that result from the natural degrading of peat moss. ![]()
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