Birds, sheds and trees in egg tempera and linocut form the basis of Paula Pohli’s new exhibition “For A Good Man” dedicated to her late husband.

This exhibition, which is dedicated to Walter Pohli, opens in the Irish Architectural Archive, 45 Merrion Square East, Dublin 2, Ireland on March 3, when it will be opened by author Dr Edward McParland. The exhibition features new works of linocuts (handburnished), egg tempera paintings on panels and egg tempera brush drawings. A highlight is the mini retrospective of older linocuts of cityscapes, Irish and European landscapes and some abstracts. Paula Pohli tells us more about the exhibition and her artistic processes.

Your artworks are very much a response to where you live …

Yes, I make prints and paintings of our natural world as I want to capture its beauty before much of it is destroyed. I moved to the West of Ireland (Mayo) in 2011 from Dublin. This move was a confrontation with nature, plants, animals, birds, hedgerows, daylight and evening light, rain, wind, storms, floods, fog, and all kinds of weather. It inspired and inspires me to capture the vibrant lively beauty of ‘the country’ in prints, pencil and egg tempera with a defined image and a refined composition. “For a Good Man” expresses a love of wildlife, our natural world and nature that Walter and I shared together.

You have studied former artistic practices and work in egg tempera … 

Moving to the country initiated thought and innovation. I studied techniques and artistic practices prior to oil painting of the High Renaissance, such as the egg tempera panel paintings of the Sienese painters Duccio, Simone Martini, Lorenzetti brothers and also Fra Angelico and Stefan Lochner and combined my study with visits to the National Galleries of London, Cologne and Munich. I then began to paint in egg tempera which I found suits my graphic approach to art. I find it is an elegant, aristocratic, linear graphic form of painting. It is a beautiful medium for colour too.

How have your lino cuts evolved?

Personally speaking, technique in lino printmaking can often be mathematical, but in egg tempera painting it is lighter, expressive, freer and not so physically demanding as printing linocuts by hand! My portrait paintings of small song birds in egg tempera are executed with less mathematics and more with expression and feeling.

Tell us about your shed series?

In 2018 I reviewed the nature and plein air paintings of German Expressionism of the 1910’s. I found the colour of the young August Macke, Paul Klee, Lyonel Feininger and the water colours of Emil Nolde both beautiful and inspirational. As a result I created a series of small and large coloured sheds in egg tempera. These man-made sheds and barns are juxtaposed with the natural world.

Need to Know: “For A Good Man” by Paula Pohli is on at the Irish Architectural Archive, 45 Merrion Square East, Dublin 2 from March 3 – March 13, from 10am-5pm Monday to Friday. Works can also be viewed online until April 30, www.paulapohli-art.com

All images © Paula Pohli