https://ashleighlwilson.com Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer Tue, 14 Oct 2025 14:03:54 +0000 https://ashleighlwilson.com en https://ashleighlwilson.com/Homepage Mon, 08 Feb 2021 18:35:56 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/Homepage (‘post’) conflict narratives, (micro) histories &amp; (the politics of) visibility <img width="3000" height="2352" width_o="3000" height_o="2352" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/b4123f342e790488037f526132267ffce79ef7476222d1937f169818d3822ee8/Parliament-5.jpg" data-mid="98251249" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/b4123f342e790488037f526132267ffce79ef7476222d1937f169818d3822ee8/Parliament-5.jpg" /> ashleigh wilson https://ashleighlwilson.com/Selection-of-Work Tue, 09 Feb 2021 16:01:01 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/Selection-of-Work Selection ofWork <img width="3543" height="2953" width_o="3543" height_o="2953" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/d14bd4cb934dfd9f925c1f16dc86106d8a5689203399145c70d0ebf3d0f13b28/Of-Song---Suffering-00.jpg" data-mid="98347200" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/d14bd4cb934dfd9f925c1f16dc86106d8a5689203399145c70d0ebf3d0f13b28/Of-Song---Suffering-00.jpg" /> The Road to Purgatory (Archive) <img width="2418" height="2418" width_o="2418" height_o="2418" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/fc15d1fa4bbda32fb09126e74b8f18b7aadde02a42812c2163523fca31ef5752/Parliament-3-Sq.jpg" data-mid="193875768" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/fc15d1fa4bbda32fb09126e74b8f18b7aadde02a42812c2163523fca31ef5752/Parliament-3-Sq.jpg" /> The Road to Purgatory (Moving Image) <img width="1239" height="1239" width_o="1239" height_o="1239" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/f2d74654f2cab9e65cc205df40af8f3f30a5e50218546d58dd1559a179509919/Film-Still-1-Sq.jpg" data-mid="193884321" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/f2d74654f2cab9e65cc205df40af8f3f30a5e50218546d58dd1559a179509919/Film-Still-1-Sq.jpg" /> Unapproved Roads (Publication) <img width="2143" height="2143" width_o="2143" height_o="2143" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/6a51b60e26558a7b2ef741fbbe4eff3c3dc237c2d747ea97aa8cad7e04e6a722/Unapproved-Roads-31-Sq.jpg" data-mid="193884841" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/6a51b60e26558a7b2ef741fbbe4eff3c3dc237c2d747ea97aa8cad7e04e6a722/Unapproved-Roads-31-Sq.jpg" /> A Sunlit Absence (Archive &amp; Text) <img width="1702" height="1702" width_o="1702" height_o="1702" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/8ed54ec5042626e4b2884860b4079b8039e9e34a6c9086c2abbd38d552b8c9b2/SA_Monaghan-Town-1.jpg" data-mid="193792713" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/8ed54ec5042626e4b2884860b4079b8039e9e34a6c9086c2abbd38d552b8c9b2/SA_Monaghan-Town-1.jpg" /> Of Song &amp; Suffering; Tales from the Realm of the Abject (Thesis) <img width="2953" height="2953" width_o="2953" height_o="2953" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/af661b973edcdfb310c3e6d572398043f552951dae62ace1d1bdfb27b0070476/Of-Song---Suffering-00-Sq.jpg" data-mid="193884298" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/af661b973edcdfb310c3e6d572398043f552951dae62ace1d1bdfb27b0070476/Of-Song---Suffering-00-Sq.jpg" /> The Sponge, The Clay, The Brick and The Bridge (Exhibition) <img width="2443" height="2443" width_o="2443" height_o="2443" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/4ee3abc81eccf4496d291977b4330994e47bf077faf261df70560a9a20e75a98/SpongeClayBrickBridge_2019.JPG" data-mid="239371093" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/4ee3abc81eccf4496d291977b4330994e47bf077faf261df70560a9a20e75a98/SpongeClayBrickBridge_2019.JPG" /> Images Are All We Have (Exhibition) <img width="1664" height="1664" width_o="1664" height_o="1664" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a5c3d77f1385b50ff773c9e01c92c0d9ec09080b5722160df24314605208effd/PIF_2022-1.jpg" data-mid="239371092" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/a5c3d77f1385b50ff773c9e01c92c0d9ec09080b5722160df24314605208effd/PIF_2022-1.jpg" /> https://ashleighlwilson.com/The-Road-to-Purgatory Mon, 08 Feb 2021 18:35:57 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/The-Road-to-Purgatory The Road to Purgatory Archive material. 2020. Do wars really end? The road to Purgatory was paved in 1998, the year the Good Friday Agreement sought to bring an end to three decades of conflict in Northern Ireland. However, the political institutions that were subsequently established were built on the idea of forgetting, instead of resolving. Voices were lost. Truths never emerged. These photographs trace the origins of Northern Ireland’s political Purgatory back to the peace agreement of 1998 through the use of archive material. Details of the local Parliament buildings taken with film rolls that expired in 1998 sit uncomfortably alongside personal family archives depicting intimate moments of every-day life during this period of political upheaval. Stone juxtaposes flesh, highlighting the gulf that persists between legal and lived realities. Installation Views: The Royal Academy of Art The Hague, 2020; slides 7-11 Nederlands Fotomuseum Rotterdam, 2021; slides 12 &amp; 13 &nbsp; https://ashleighlwilson.com/The-Road-to-Purgatory-film Mon, 08 Feb 2021 18:35:57 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/The-Road-to-Purgatory-film ‘The Road to Purgatory | Single Screen Film | Ashleigh Wilson 2020’ from ashleigh wilson on Vimeo. The Road to Purgatory Single Screen Film. 2020. Do wars really end? The notion of Purgatory, this nothing place between heaven and hell where sins must be repented, provides a framework to explore life ‘after’ conflict. This video work documents the physical journey to what is believed to be the earthly location of Purgatory, an island on the Irish border. Along the way, short stories interject, casting the shadow of a conflict that lives on. Read the short stories featured in the film. https://ashleighlwilson.com/Unapproved-Roads Wed, 31 Mar 2021 15:34:08 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/Unapproved-Roads Unapproved Roads Publication.2020.A mountainous stretch of green flesh stretches into grey, spattered with a tapestry of veins spiralling across and alongside this borderless borderland.These little veins remember the years they bled out; slit, punctured, ruptured. The soil that was spilt nestles below the tarmac surface - pain is harboured here, humming beneath the black earth.There was a hard border on the island of Ireland once before. During the early period of the conflict in Northern Ireland, the British Army detonated hundreds of the sprawling roads that traversed the southern border. In defiance, the local communities collected every handful of dislodged soil they could find and rebuilt the roads from the same material that was blown out of them, risking their lives in the process. Today, the Irish border is one that oscilates between presence and absence. In the landscape it is mostly absent, save for the continuous appearance and disappearance of the Irish language from traffic signage as you weave north and south. As such, this investigatory dig into the Irish border mostly consists of my search for it. Is it beyond that hedge or before the gate? Welcome to the new, elusive and crumbling edge of the European Union. https://ashleighlwilson.com/A-Sunlit-Absence Mon, 08 Feb 2021 18:35:57 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/A-Sunlit-Absence A Sunlit Absence Archive &amp; Text. 2018. During the 30 years of conflict in Northern Ireland, my father was one of many who were abducted by a paramilitary organisation.&nbsp;This work considers the image as an act of violence, archive as a manifestation of trauma and exposure as means of erasure. These ideas are discussed through the delicate objects I have constructed with archival photo paper and sunlight from the locations of disappearances. https://ashleighlwilson.com/Of-Song-Suffering Tue, 09 Feb 2021 00:54:30 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/Of-Song-Suffering Of Song &amp; Suffering; Tales from the Realm of the Abject Bachelor Thesis. 2020. A bachelor thesis and a collection of short stories about the place where meaning collapses, history retreats and identity dissolves.&nbsp;This thesis poses the question, whether or not conflicts can ever be 'post', by using the unresolved conflict in Northern Ireland as a case study of sorts. Parallels are drawn between the abject, trauma, violence and the medium of photography. These four elements become irrevocably intertwined, acting as synonyms for each other. This research is constantly interrupted by short stories, that almost act as images in themselves. Their voice adds another layer, rooting the research in reality by exploring the lived experience of the aftermath of conflict. Find it&nbsp; @&nbsp;Stroom, Den Haag [SOLD OUT]@&nbsp;Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam https://ashleighlwilson.com/The-Sponge-The-Clay-The-Brick-and-The-Bridge Tue, 14 Oct 2025 14:03:03 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/The-Sponge-The-Clay-The-Brick-and-The-Bridge The Sponge, The Clay, The Brick and The Bridge Group Exhibition.Co-curated by Ashleigh Wilson. 2019. In this site-specific outdoor project, realised together with UNSEEN curators Amelie Schüle and Beatrice Lontani, students from KABK, Rietveld and HKU staged a performative intervention to offer an ironic, yet serious reflection on the concept of “development” in relation to art academies and photographic processes, in order to enquire about the systems we use to develop, to grow, and to “become”. Throughout the event, they questioned the logic of development in art education and the photographic process, as both an abstract and personal matter. Each day during the festival, they focused on one object, beginning with the sponge and concluding with the bridge, as a way to engage in a conversation about contemporary image-making, learning and teaching methods. Glasshouses at Westergasfabriek, UNSEEN Photo Fair.Open 11am to 10pm, 19 - 22 September 2019. https://ashleighlwilson.com/Images-Are-All-We-Have Tue, 14 Oct 2025 14:03:54 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/Images-Are-All-We-Have Images Are All We Have Group Exhibition.Assistant-curated by Ashleigh Wilson. 2022. Images Are All We Have traces the thematic development of the discipline of photography and contextualises its historical background, bringing together the diverse and socially engaged set of contemporary art practices that define Irish Photography today. It proposes new ways to understand and celebrate the discipline; structured around a set of themed galleries, visitors are invited to tease out new connections between narratives depicted, as much as to gain a broader understanding and appreciation of the practices presented. The ambitious survey highlights a selection of works on loan from several National Collections and Archives, from private collections, from the artists themselves, as much as many newly created work exhibited here for the first time and it involves artists spanning several generations, practices, and backgrounds. The Printworks at Dublin Castle, PhotoIreland Festival.Open 10am to 5pm, Monday through Sunday. On view from Friday 8 July until Thursday 25 August 2022. Read VAI’s review here. https://ashleighlwilson.com/Information Mon, 08 Feb 2021 18:35:58 +0000 Ashleigh Wilson | Artist, Researcher & Cultural Producer https://ashleighlwilson.com/Information Ashleigh Wilsonb. 1995, &nbsp;N. Ireland Artist, researcher &amp; cultural producer based in Belfast; thinking, writing &amp; making through photography’s historical &amp; political contexts. Interrogating archives, text, photographic materials &amp; installation to illuminate the lingering embers of conflict in N.Ireland &amp; centre the interior lives of those caught at the peripheral intersection of personal &amp; public histories. Currently NEW CURATING 2026 @ CCA x NI Screen Gallery &amp; Collections Assistant @ The Naughton Gallery Studio Holder @&nbsp;FLAX Art Studios Previously 2025-26 Assistant Curator of Art @ National Museums N.I. 2023-25 Gallery &amp; Collections Assistant @ The Naughton Gallery 2023-24 Internship Provider @ The Royal Academy of Art, The Hague 2021-22 Researcher &amp; Curatorial Assistant @ PhotoIreland2021-22 Ireland Correspondent @ The Pupil Sphere Enquiriesxashleighwilson@gmail.com(+31) 640 633 784 Education 2017-20 Royal Academy of Art The Hague: Bachelor of Design (Photography) First Class Honours (8.5).2015-17 Belfast School of Art: Bachelor of Arts (Photography with Video) Achieved the Dean’s List &amp; completed the Erasmus exchange programme. Awards 2026 CCA x NI Screen NEW CURATING 2026, Selected. 2024 National Lottery Support for Individual Artists Programme, Recipient. 2020 Steenbergen Stipendium, Nominee. 2020 Royal Academy of Art Thesis Award, Winner. 2018 Breda Photo Talent Award, Finalist. Selected Exhibitions&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;2022 The Road to Purgatory, The Black Box, Belfast. 2022 Here’s Me Here, FLAX Project Space, Belfast. 2021 Steenbergen Stipendium Award 2020, Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam. 2021 Out of Print @ ART The Hague, Fokker Terminal, The Hague. 2021 Re-Vision Performing Arts Festival, Belfast. 2019 A Series of Contradictions, Billytown, The Hague. 2018 KABK x AUNS, Kulturni Centar LAB, Novi Sad. Curatorial Work 2026 IT’S NOT CLEAR FROM HERE, CCA Derry~Londonderry, Derry. 2025 Bed and Soil, Ulster Museum, Belfast. 2022 Images Are All We Have,&nbsp;PhotoIreland Festival, Dublin Castle, Dublin. 2019 The Sponge, The Clay, The Brick &amp; The Bridge, UNSEEN Fair, Amsterdam. 2019 In Orbit: Catalyst Arts Member’s Show, Catalyst Arts, Belfast. 2019 Lykke Sønderkær: Connecting Body, Catalyst Arts, Belfast. Publications &amp; Texts 2022 The Trouble with Archives, The Pupil Sphere, Online. 2020 Of Song &amp; Suffering, Self-published, Stocked by Stroom Den Haag. 2019 Burial Ground / Tulaigh Charnáin, Self-published, The Hague. 2018 Sine Zine, Self published by Forgetful Number Collective, The Hague. Artist Talks2021 The Hague Contemporary Art Tour @ ART The Hague, Fokker Terminal, The Hague. 2018 A Sunlit Absence, LUCA School of Arts, Brussels.