This project was realised as part of Mark Garry’s solo exhibition A Winter Light at The Model Gallery  in Sligo.

Mark employs an unusual working process whereby the gallery becomes a studio, and many of the works that make up his  exhibitions are developed and generated directly in the gallery. This process of experimentation and collaboration continued beyond the opening of this exhibition. Mark brought together a temporary collective of musicians to compose works and record an album in response to the art works in the show.

This is the sixth collaborative recording project Mark has undertaken and these recordings involve a rather unorthodox  methodology, where a gallery or art space is transformed to become a fully functioning temporary recording studio. Mark works with a group of Irish and international musical collaborators – Karl Burke, Sean Carpio, Eileen Carpio, Fabien Leseure and Nina Hynes – who travel to these various locations and respond to a new set of conceptual criteria with each situation. For each situation Mark or members of the collective invite new musicians, to become part of these projects. For A Winter Light, the collective were joined by Oliver Alcorn, Cillian Murphy, Padraig Murphy, Robert Stillman and Claudia Schwab.

Prior to their arrival in Sligo, each of the musicians were made aware of Mark’s approach to this exhibition both conceptually and  materially. This set of concerns was used as a guiding framework where each participant was encouraged to bring one musical  response/idea to the project. This idea could then be expanded upon or completely new works could be generated during the project. This recording is a mixture of both of theses methods, where some works came to the project in an almost complete form  and some were generated by the collective in Sligo.

The music on this recording was created over four remarkably intense, fun-filled days; involving an incredible sharing of individual  skill and energy in service of the collective whole.