VESSELS: NATURE MORTE

Click to view catalogue online

Art Space Gallery | Michael Richardson Contemporary Art | London

6th September -15th October 2016

In these paintings Nick Miller, draws on this facility to connect to his mother during her terminal illness in London. The key to the works are the vessels: vases and bottles that she had gathered around her in a lifetime; holding memory and meaning without sentimentality. Carried back to his studio after every visit to London to see his mother, they would be filled with whatever cuttings from nature were available and painted as a studio still-life.

A 56 page hard back publication includes new texts by Nick Miller, author Colm Tóibín and an essay by Sean Rainbird.



View exhibition catalogue on-line | Art Space Gallery | Press Release (PDF)

Vessels-Nature Morte: Publication (PDF)

REVIEW 03/09/16 : Financial Times | Critics Choice.


Art Space Gallery | Michael Richardson Contemporary Art | London


6th September -15th October 2016


Sean Rainbird, Director of the National Gallery of Ireland writes, ‘This series is a personal response to the passing of life, to slowly letting go, while celebrating life’s fragility and tenacity. ....With this moving group of still lifes, Miller closes the circle of return to the place he left to start out on the road’.


The alliance of painting with remembrance is not new. In these paintings Nick Miller, draws on this facility to connect to his mother during her terminal illness in London. The key to the works are the vessels: vases and bottles that she had gathered around her in a lifetime; holding memory and meaning without sentimentality. Carried back to his studio after every visit to London to see his mother, they would be filled with whatever cuttings from nature were available and painted as a studio still-life. Miller describes the urgency of; ‘seeing the fullness of life before it passes. Making paintings this way offered some release in the face of transience and mortality, while still gambling on an afterlife in pigment itself’.


A 56 page catalogue includes a new text by the Irish author Colm Tóibín and an essay by Sean Rainbird.


View exhibition catalogue on-line


Art Space Gallery

Stacks Image 84095

Catherine Hammond Gallery | Skibbereen | West Cork

21st July- 10th August 2017

Running during Skibbereen Arts Festival a show of new and unseen works from the Vessels series, most being shown for the first time in Ireland.

To be opened by Sean Rainbird, Director of the National Gallery of Ireland who writes in the catalogue for the London showing: ‘This series is a personal response to the passing of life, to slowly letting go, while celebrating life’s fragility and tenacity...With this moving group of still lifes, Miller closes the circle of return to the place he left to start out on the road’.



More info: Catherine Hammond Gallery

Irish Times | Arminta Wallace | 22/07/17
Irish Times | Gemma Tipton | 26/07/17
The Sunday Times | John P Sullivan | 30/07/17

Blackthorn Blossom. 2014 Oil on linen. 61 x 51 cm

Art Space Gallery | Michael Richardson Contemporary Art | London


6th September -15th October 2016


Sean Rainbird, Director of the National Gallery of Ireland writes, ‘This series is a personal response to the passing of life, to slowly letting go, while celebrating life’s fragility and tenacity. ....With this moving group of still lifes, Miller closes the circle of return to the place he left to start out on the road’.


The alliance of painting with remembrance is not new. In these paintings Nick Miller, draws on this facility to connect to his mother during her terminal illness in London. The key to the works are the vessels: vases and bottles that she had gathered around her in a lifetime; holding memory and meaning without sentimentality. Carried back to his studio after every visit to London to see his mother, they would be filled with whatever cuttings from nature were available and painted as a studio still-life. Miller describes the urgency of; ‘seeing the fullness of life before it passes. Making paintings this way offered some release in the face of transience and mortality, while still gambling on an afterlife in pigment itself’.


A 56 page catalogue includes a new text by the Irish author Colm Tóibín and an essay by Sean Rainbird.


View exhibition catalogue on-line


Art Space Gallery

VESSELS: NATURE MORTE | selected paintings

Paintings |  Vessles : Nature Morte

VESSELS: NATURE MORTE:


Selected related shows



VESSELS : NATURE MORTE | Catherine Hammond Gallery | Skibbereen | West Cork ( 21st July - 10th August 2017)
ABSENT Vandernoot Gallery | Lesley University | Cambridge MA | USA (May-June 2017)
VESSELS: NATURE MORTE Art Space Gallery | Michael Richardson Contemporary Art. London (Sept 6th -Oct 15th 2016)
VESSELS: NATURE MORTE (I) RHA Gallagher Gallery | Foyer Gallery, Dublin (Jan 15th- April 26th 2015)
IF I SHOW YOU THE ROSES Rubicon Projects | Hexagonal Room | Irish Georgeion Society, Dublin (December 2014)

VESSELS : NATURE MORTE - links

Selected Press
The Sunday Times (pdf) | John P Sullivan | 30/07/17
Irish Times (pdf) | Arminta Wallace | 22/07/17
Irish Times (pdf) | Gemma Tipton | 26/07/17
Financial Times | Critics Choice 3/9/16
Irish Times (pdf) Online 3/2/15
Irish Arts Review Summer 2015
Texts & Publications
Vessels-Nature Morte: Publication (PDF)
PRESS RELEASE Art Space Gallery
INVITATION: New Year at RHA
INVITATION Rubicon Projects (PDF)
PRESS RELEASE Rubicon Projects (PDF)
PRESS RELEASE RHA (PDF)