Waterbased follows from the highly successful and critically acclaimed Cladach exhibition by Gwen O'Dowd at the Vanguard Gallery in 2005. This new series of paintings continues her personal artistic exploration of our environment and the elements that shape it. The exhibition sets out to capture the energy and vigor of water and its part in defining our natural world. In O'Dowd's large-scale paintings, the fluid forms and organic colours that emerge from the layers of oil create virtually abstract landscapes and seascapes. O'Dowd has said that her work is concerned not with specific places, even though it is derived from them, but with "selected environmental experiences, relating more to self-explorations than to direct representation." As well as a number of large canvases, the exhibition will comprise a series of stunning of watercolours on paper, all framed under glass. These were made as initial studies for the Waterbased series of canvases that followed but truly stand as powerful individual pieces in their own right. They have a spontaneity that the watercolour medium lends itself to, at the same time are as assured and accomplished as her works on canvas. This exhibition runs in the Vanguard Gallery in Cork from 11th September until 4th October.