Temple Bar Gallery + Studios announces the recipient of the TBG+S/HIAP International Residency Exchange 2026

The TBG+S/HIAP International Residency Exchange gives an Irish or Ireland-based artist the opportunity to spend three months at HIAP - Helsinki International Artist Programme. The selected artist has access to production facilities, visiting curators and an international network of artists. In return, TBG+S hosts a Finnish or Finland-based artist in Dublin for two months, kindly funded by the Finnish Institute in the UK and Ireland. In 2026, TBG+S, HIAP and the Finnish Institute celebrate a twenty-year partnership of building artistic relationships between Ireland and Finland.

Expanding from the formal language of sculpture, Katie Watchorn utilises materials, urban memorabilia or objects often connected to larger industrial systems. She re-encodes them into large-scale installation works that trace the contours of their settings while undermining their expected meanings. Through indirect manifestations of the body, she creates configurations where a transference can happen between these selected materials and the viewer, shifting their perception.

Solo presentations include dry brimmings, mother’s tankstation, Dublin (2024); Commuter, Shimmer, Rotterdam (2024); Offspring Underbelly, De Ateliers, Amsterdam (2024); Get Away From It All, Leitrim Sculpture Centre (2022); and Zero Grazing, Studio Pavilion, Glasgow International (2021). Group exhibitions include Move-Set-Move, The Complex, Dublin (2023); Don’t Look A Gift Horse in the Mouth, Woonhuis, Amsterdam (2023); and From Here to There, The Douglas Hyde Gallery (2021). Katie is the recipient of a number of Arts Council Bursaries, including the Next Generation Award, 2017. She has been awarded residencies at the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2019); Fire Station Artist’s Studios, Dublin, (2019-2022); and De Ateliers, Amsterdam, (2023-2024).