Description
SHADOWS+REFLECTIONS Is an anthology of photographs and writing inspired by the Irish National War Memorial Gardens, Islandbridge, a little known gem that sits on the banks of the River Liffey close to the heart of Dublin.
The contributors are all women, the contributors are all women established within their fields of expertise,each responding in their own way to the magic and mystery of the place. They include artists Rita Duffy & Sheila Gorman, poets Annemarie Ni Churreán, Maeve O’Sullivan, Jean O’Brien & Anne Tannam, city archeologist Ruth Johnson, storyteller Nuala Hayes, historian Fionnuala Waldron, and Gale Scanlan. Introduction by Elaine Sisson and a foreword by President Michael D. Higgins.
The book includes an historical account of how the Gardens were created using granite transported from quarries in north Wicklow and fashioned by master stone carvers and local labour, as well as a series of exquisite previously unpublished drawings of the Memorial structures by the architect Sir Edwin Lutyens which are held in the National Archives.
SHADOWS+REFLECTIONS is a collaborative production between Annie Dibble who took the photographs and architect Angela Rolfe, funded by the Decade of Centenaries Program.
“In SHADOWS+REFLECTIONS, the photographs illustrate with a stark beauty various elements of the approximately eight hectares of lands on the southern banks of the River Liffey that comprise the Irish National War Memorial Gardens in Islandbridge. Beyond that beauty, this important inter-disciplinary work, perhaps more poignantly, also offers an intriguing set of reflections drawn from the local, the national, the personal, the past and the architectural…The decision to include only women’s perspectives in this book was a deliberate attempt…to rectify how women’s voices have been largely absent from the history of the Gardens…The seasonal nature of the setting depicted in photographs…not only illustrate the Gardens’ stark beauty and splendour, it also mirrors the changing use of the Gardens over time.”
— President Michael D Higgins.
Reviews
“Shadows + Reflections is a recently published collection of essays brought together and collated by Annie Dibble & Angela Rolfe…what makes this book so moving are the personal recollections and poems which bring together experience and memory. The reflections are deeply inclusive…the book is infused with the wonderful photographs taken by Annie Dibble over a number of years…these individual stories and poems demonstrate why the gardens now exert a strong connection with the wider act of reconciliation which the country has undergone.”
— David Averill Archicture Ireland Magazine 2023
“SHADOWS+REFLECTIONS is a collection of some 60 photographs…captured over a period of 10 years…of the INWMG on the southern banks of the River Liffey…The images show the gardens in all its moods and seasons and were the starting point for contributions by 12 women in the form of essays and poetry; each section is a contemplation on what the Gardens mean to them…”
— The Irish Times Magazine 19 February 2022