Sol Art gallery are delighted to bring together the exhibiton “Beneath the Canopy” by the artist Daniel Chester. This is Daniels second solo show with the gallery and brings together a body of new work that he has been developing over the past 12 months.

One of our deepest needs is for a sense of identity and belonging and A common denominator in this is human attachment to landscape and how we find identity in landscape and place. Landscape therefore is not simply what we see, but a way of seeing: we see it with our eye but interpret it with our mind and ascribe values to landscape for intangible – spiritual – reasons. Landscape can therefore be seen as a cultural construct in which our sense of place and memories inhere.

The Title “Beneath the Canopy” is a new body of work that Daniel  has created over the past tweleve months. The title itself  refers to the wild forested landscapes of rural Connacht and his own romantic and emotional response to this landscape, The spirtual and historical connection to the land and how it enters his practice

The title”Beneath the Canopy” is also a reference to the notion that not is all what it seems within this landscape, The overforestation of rural Leitrim, the removal of important natural habitats for birds, animals and insects for the plantation of  hundreds of acres of non native sitrik spruce, Its long term devastating effects on the soil and natural spring water,  How rural communities are in decline due to the vast consumption of family farms and the natural wild open landscapes, all for coporate greed and financial gain.