Scuan Eirigi,

2006

Layered, expansive, and elliptical, Timoney’s paintings are built from an eclectic inventory of text and graphics. In the case of Scuan Eirigi, some images were rendered by hand while others were transferred to canvas using photographic developer. Embedded in a dense, heterogeneous web of visual cues, much of which dissolves into abstraction, are depictions of birds, gridded squares, and stenciled word fragments that repeat elements of the title, some of them superimposed over swathes of yellow resembling tape or streamers. Despite its excess of visual information, Timoney’s painting ultimately withholds meaning, suggesting but never completing a narrative. "Scuan," is part of an Irish expression that means "there is neither tale nor tidings of him." Yet here it is paired with an unrelated word, "eirigi," Irish for the imperative "rise," most frequently used in the context of rebellions.