About Our Exhibitions

Making art matters- but so does having somewhere to show it, and better yet, sell it. An exhibition brings work out of the studio, the sketchbook, or away from the kitchen table and puts it in conversation with other work, other artists and an audience.

It gives artists an opportunity to stand beside what they have created, to develop confidence in their own creative voice, and to experience the very special moment when something deeply personal to them finds a connection to with someone else.

For established artists, exhibitions provide opportunities to develop and present new bodies of work, make professional connections and extend their creative practice.

For emerging artists or those exhibiting for the first time, it’s something more, it’s an important moment of recognition, an invitation to say, ‘My work belongs here too’.

That matters hugely to us.

Our exhibitions are about much more than filling walls with beautiful creations. They are about visibility, opportunity, encouragement and belonging.

We create spaces where artists meet one another, where conversations begin, where collaborations, and friendships emerge, and where members of the wider community can encounter creativity in an accessible and welcoming way.

Our exhibitions bring art into different places, galleries and cultural venues, but also community spaces, heritage settings, festivals and events and unexpected locations, creating new relationships between art, people and place.

Whether you've shown for decades or never exhibited at all, you're welcome to apply — we don't select on reputation, only on how your work fits our themes.

Our Themes

Every HeARTlands exhibition is inspired by our three core themes. They overlap freely — one artwork can belong behind more than one door.

Landscapes

The physical places that shape us, and the inner landscapes of memory, identity and belonging we carry within.

Legends

The stories we inherit and the ones we're still writing — mythology and folklore, but also the real people whose lives become stories worth telling.

Love Stories

Understood widely: romantic love, but also the love of a parent, a friend, a place, an animal, a way of life.

Curious about the thinking behind these three themes? Read more here.

Our Exhibition Program

HeARTlands currently hosts two principal group exhibitions each year — our Summer Exhibition and Winter Exhibition.

Beginning in 2027 we aim to expand this into a four-season exhibition programme:

Spring • Summer • Autumn • Winter

Two of these exhibitions will take place nationally in Ireland, allowing us to continue showcasing and touring the work of artists from Ireland's Heartlands and building connections with audiences and cultural spaces across the island.

We also aim to host two international exhibitions, taking our artists, their work and our stories beyond Ireland and creating opportunities for genuine cultural exchange with artists, communities and cultural organisations elsewhere.

Alongside our four principal exhibitions, we will continue to consider pop-up and special exhibitions in response to festivals, cultural events, collaborations and opportunities that arise throughout the year.

From Irelands Heartlands to the World

We want Irish artwork to travel.

We want the stories of our landscapes and communities to be encountered elsewhere.

We want our artists to encounter new landscapes, histories, folklore and traditions and to allow those experiences to inspire new work and new ways of thinking.

And we want to bring the stories, perspectives and creative voices of other places back into conversation with our own.

Beginning in 2027, our international exhibition programme will take its first steps through renewed relationships with European towns and cultural communities, creating opportunities for our artists to exhibit internationally while building friendships and creative partnerships that can grow over time.

Ultimately, we don't see an exhibition simply as a destination for finished artwork.

We see it as a meeting place.

A place where artist meets audience.

Where one creative voice meets another.

Where communities encounter new ideas.

Where stories are shared.

And, increasingly, where one landscape meets another across borders.