Nature's 'Souvenirs' — veteran artist, newcomer display disparate works

In her exhibition of paintings and photographs, "Souvenirs," at the Finch Lane Gallery, Maureen O'Hara Ure has exposed her Gaelic roots — deep roots, tangled by memories of childhood, Catholicism, pedantry and the runes of modern art.

"Souvenirs" — a visual account of the artist's visit to Scotland and Ireland with her husband Lincoln Ure, an Episcopal priest — will challenge viewers' perceptions of the British Isles. Here there is no travelog, calendar art, images of pubs with ruddy-complexioned denizens or demure lassies and strapping lades gazing out over green, lush hills and crystal blue lakes.

Like a great Druid priestess, O'Hara Ure flays the Earth's surface, revealing primitive tendon and sinew, bone, gland and capillary. Viewers will experience surreal landscapes inhabited by exotic birds, a bear, a lamb, crucifixes, monks, and even animals from the illuminated manuscript of the late 8th century Book of Kells.

"You would be hard put, say, if you and I had been in the exact same location, to identify a specific silhouette of a specific mountain. I'm drawing from my memory and a thousand pictures," O'Hara Ure told the Deseret Morning News.

O'Hara Ure sketched while on the trip (some of her sketchbooks are in the show), but she admits that accuracy has no particular appeal for her. "My husband and I both have a fascination with the theological, giving theology equal weight with other pursuits." They're involved with something that, on one level, "doesn't make sense to a large part of the population."

Her religious disposition helps O'Hara Ure create her enigmatic and singular images. In the three-panel work "The Travelers (Part I)," "The Travelers (Part II)," and "The Travelers (Part III)" — all mixed media on panel, and each 24 by 93 inches — she employs Celtic curiosities from the Book of Kells, marrying them with collages of exotic birds.

O'Hara Ure's panel surfaces are so masterfully created that one can practically smell the ink and stretched goatskin of ancient, medieval manuscripts. Symbolic images pounce from the panel, titillating and confusing with minutiae, speaking to viewers in a language with which they are unfamiliar.

"The Family Tree (County Mayo)" (mixed media on panel, 29 1/2 by 25 3/4 inches) is a fairly representational painting of a barren tree teaming with exotic birds. At the base of the tree, roots scavenge in the earth, thick with the bleached skulls of ancestors. Though barren, the tree remains a place for the beautiful birds to rest.

O'Hara Ure has included 5 photographic dye prints in the exhibit; something she's never done in one of her shows. Each measures 44 by 40 inches.