Semantic Coherence: Butler Gallery – Signal Evidence & AI Readability

[H2] More to Explore
[H2] Projects
Butler Gallery works with artists to create projects you can participate in, enjoy and engage with.

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[H2] How to find us
Butler Gallery is located in the heart of Kilkenny City and is accessible by foot from everywhere in Kilkenny City Centre.

[H2] Evans’ Home
Find out more about the History of Evans' Home.

[H2] Learn & Engage
Learn about our collection and exhibitions, have direct contact with artists and enjoy great opportunities to contribute to our creative programme through participation in our pioneering workshops, classes and talks for all ages and interest levels.

[H2] The O’Malley Collection
The O’Malley Collection includes work from Tony O’Malley (1913 – 2003) and Jane O’Malley (1944-2023).

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[H2] Wild Flower Café
This airy light-filled space, with outdoor seating in our tranquil garden, is the perfect place to relax and enjoy the best of local produce along with speciality teas and coffees.
[H2] Heritage & Archaeology
Several archaeological digs were carried out from 2010 onwards as part of the Evans' Home refurbishment.

[H2] Become a Friend
Becoming a Friend of Butler Gallery is your opportunity to be part of a world of incredible art and creativity, and to support an organisation that is pivotal to the development of the visual arts in Ireland.
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[H2] Art in Your Inbox
Receive our monthly email newsletter and get all the latest Butler Gallery news, including event and exhibition updates.

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Opening Hours
Monday: Closed (except Bank Holidays when Sunday hours apply)Tuesday-Saturday: 10.00–17.00Thursdays: Late Night 10.00–20.00Sunday: 11.00–17.00Last admission is 30 mins before closing times.

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23rd May - 26th July 2026

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Main Gallery

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Photography’s uniqueness is its power to extract in a fraction of a second, the present, the past and the inevitability of the future.[i] Butler Gallery is pleased to present Meantime, a mixed media exhibition combining photography and film by David Stephenson with a selection of poetry by Mark Granier. The central theme of Meantime is transience—the spirit of passing and life’s marginality. As Seamus Heaney put it in his 1996 poem, Postscript, ‘You are neither here nor there, A hurry through which known and strange things pass...’.[ii]Stephenson’s portraits of people embody a kind of stillness and private reverie. His fascination with the contradictory aspects of existence, its ephemerality and its solidity, is also evidenced in his inclusion of damaged or archive photographs saved from old photo albums. Stephenson has always been drawn to the idea of a house as a soundbox, a witness to the lives that were shaped by that particular arrangement of walls and surfaces: the faces that peered through those windows, and what they looked out on. Houses generally outlast us. Compared to a house and its furnishings, we are ephemeral, speeded-up films, shadows in mirrors. Interspersed throughout the exhibition are prints of Mark Granier’s poems. These do not interpret or comment on the film or photographs, but compliment them tonally, encounters that are in the same orbit. Like Stephenson, Granier has always been drawn to resonant images that possess the ability to haunt and linger.     Meantime, the film, combines elements of Stephenson’s still photography with the moving image, merging city and country life. It wraps us in images of solitary figures, hands washing, scrolling or gently swaying in rippling water to the constant movement of nature. Granier’s poems, and Derek Mahon’s poem Dog Days, are beautifully read by the celebrated Irish actor Stephen Rea, who connects innately to the material and whose singular mellifluous cadence adds another layer of poignancy to the material. The engaging sound design, by Stephenson and Michael Higgins, creates a sense of place in city and country by introducing a myriad of sounds—from the strident ring of a fire truck and Garda siren, to the howling of wind and beating rain, to the haunting tinkle of a windup toy piano.This exhibition Meantime evolves as a series of visual thoughts and memories. Some images will stand alone, while others will appear in groups, with the narrative connections at times linked by the barest of threads.About the Artist & Poet:David Stephenson is a fine art photographer and filmmaker from Dublin living in Bray, Co Wicklow. His work has been exhibited at The Hunt Museum, Limerick; RHA Gallery, twice as invited artist; Municipal Gallery, DLR Lexicon; National Portrait Gallery, London; Angela Flowers Gallery, London; a group exhibition of works from Local Authorities’ collections (30 Years, Artists, Places); and a solo show Slant at Photo Museum Ireland.He was the winner of the National Gallery Zurich Portrait Prize, the Ballinglen Museum’s first biennial open exhibition photography prize as well as the Royal Ulster Academy open exhibition photography prize, all in 2023. In 2025, his commission of a portrait of the actor Stephen Rea was launched at the National Gallery of Ireland for their portrait collection. In 2025, Stephenson exhibited a selection of his photographic/film work at the Irish Cultural Centre, Hammersmith London. Stephenson’s multi award-winning short film Raymond is an elegiac portrait of an elderly man’s recollections of life on the Irish border in County Cavan. One of his current works-in-progress, Main Street Bray, is a film/ photographic project based in his hometown of Bray, Co Wicklow. His photographs are in private and public collections including Butler Gallery. Recently National Gallery of Ireland purchased four of his works for their Permanent Collection.Mark Granier is a Wicklow-based poet and photographer. His film-poem, Docklands, was awarded joint first prize in Doolin Writers Weekend and his work has been exhibited in The RHA. Other awards include The Vincent Buckley Poetry Prize and two Patrick and Katherine Kavanagh Fellowships. His sixth collection of poetry, Everything You Always Wanted To Know, was published by Salmon Poetry in 2025.   [i] Walter Benjamin, from influential 1931 essay ‘A Short History of Photography’ (Kleine Geschichte der Photographie)[ii] ‘Postcript’ from the collection ‘The Spirit Level’, 1996. Copyright © 2019 by Seamus Heaney; Farrar, Straus and Giroux.Artist TalkJoin David Stephenson for an artist's talk in Butler Gallery on Thursday 25th June from 6.00pm to 7.00pm. David will give an insight into his practice and work in the exhibition. This is a free, ticketed event with limited places available to book here.

[H2] More Exhibitions

21st February 2026 - 22nd May 2026

[H2] Mind's EyeSimon Reilly

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Exhibitions

Ongoing

[H2] The O'Malley Collection Exhibition

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Exhibitions

Ongoing

[H2] Butler Gallery Collection Exhibition

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Exhibitions

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Jane & Tony O’Malley with their cat Gozo in the garden in Physicianstown, 1998

The Butler Gallery is honoured to have been entrusted to caretake the artworks of Irish artist Tony O’Malley, donated to us by his wife Jane O’Malley upon our move to Evans’ Home. In addition to her own life as an artist, Jane O’Malley worked tirelessly preserving the legacy of the work of her husband. Butler Gallery honours her work and dedicates this wing to the work of both artists.
[H2] Tony O’Malley (1913 - 2003)

Tony O’Malley is a highly respected and much-loved artist and a ‘Freeman of the City’ of Kilkenny. Self-taught, his artistic career took off in 1960 when a disability pension enabled him to retire from work as a bank official. This was the start of a most prolific career.
Tony met the Canadian painter Jane Harris in St Ive’s in Cornwall in 1970 and they married in 1973. Regular visits to the Scilly Isles, the Bahamas, St. Lucia and to Lanzarote inspired a range of colour and lush brushwork which married well with his observations of medieval and contemporary Kilkenny. Perhaps because he was self-taught O’Malley was remarkably open to experimenting with new forms of expression and the use of unusual materials.
While he found recognition among his peers during his thirty years among the artistic community of St Ives, Cornwall in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, the serious attention he deserved only came to him following his return to Ireland. In 1990, he settled in Physicianstown in Callan, Co Kilkenny with his wife Jane, and lived and worked there until his death at the age of eighty-nine in 2003.

[H2] Jane O’Malley (1944 - 2023)

Jane O’Malley was born in Montréal, Canada, in 1944. From 1969 to 1990 she lived and worked as part of the artists’ community in St. Ives, Cornwall. Jane and Tony worked side by side throughout their life together. Just as she devoted herself to his health care during his lifetime, Jane O’Malley has been hugely responsible for preserving the legacy of her late husband’s work, and has donated this estate to the Butler Gallery. Her own importance as a champion of Tony’s life work often meant that she did not promote her own paintings and prints as she might otherwise have done. Much of her work documents their shared life and the wonderful garden she created around their home in Physicianstown, where she lived until her death at the age of seventy-nine in 2023.
Jane O’Malley has shown widely in the UK and Ireland, with solo exhibitions at Taylor Galleries, Dublin; Riverrun Gallery, Limerick; Montpelier Studio, London; Stour Gallery, Warwickshire; as well as Plymouth Arts Centre, the Salt House Gallery and Penwith Gallery in St. Ives.. Her work has been included in group exhibitions at the Stour Gallery, Warickshire; Dyehouse Gallery, Waterford; Black Church Print Studio, Dublin; and the RHA Gallagher Gallery. O’Malley’s work is part of private collections in Ireland, America and Europe, and features in the public collections of AIB, Bank of Ireland, the OPW, Dublin City University, the Arts Council of Ireland, Prudential Life Assurance and Kelly’s Strand Hotel, Co. Wexford.
Both Tony and Jane O’Malley are represented by Taylor Galleries, Dublin.
Guided Tours of Butler Gallery are available every Saturday and Sunday at 3pm. More details here.For Collection related enquiries please email [email protected].

[H2] Work by Tony O'Malley and Jane O'Malley

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Tony O'Malley (1913 – 2003): 'Winter Landscape-Ireland II', 1962, Mixed media on paper, 50.4 x 76.1cm

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Purchase an O'Malley Fine Art Print and support Butler Gallery.

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Jane O'Malley Editioned Print

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[H2] Joseph Evans Gift to Kilkenny

During the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland in the 1600s, many English people were granted land across the country, including in County Kilkenny, and settled in what was a new English Commonwealth. Joseph Evans was the descendent of an English soldier who had come to Ireland with Oliver Cromwell and been granted land in Kilkenny.
In 1818, the year Joseph Evans died, he willed his entire fortune and extensive properties to charitable purposes. These included a school, support for orphans, apprenticeships and marriage dowries for the poor and a home for impoverished domestic servants.
There were plenty of servants in 19th century Kilkenny, many of whom had no family to support them in old age. In 1831 the census reported 276 males, and 1,038 female servants in a population of nearly 24,000.
Evans’ Home was built in 1818 at a cost of £5,000 on the former site of a military barracks. It was designed by the Kilkenny Architect William Robertson to provide a home for twelve men and twelve women. In 1911, we know that Evans’ Home had a matron, Margaret MacFarlane who in turn had her own domestic servant. The building would later accommodate an infant school, and the overflow holdings of the adjacent Carnegie Library.
As a protestant landowner, Evans’ stipulated that ‘in the selection of the objects and inmates of which asylum, a preference be given to protestants’. As the protestant community in Kilkenny declined, the Evans’ Home admitted increasing numbers of catholics.
Joseph Evans financed Evans’ Home well enough for it to survive until the 1990s. The building remained in use as a Care Home until the 1996 under the provisions of the trust.

[H2] Evans' Home to Butler Gallery, 1997 - 2020

Evans' Home came into Council ownership in 1997 and various proposals for a new use were considered before agreement was reached in 2009 to develop it as the new Butler Gallery in a partnership with Kilkenny Local Authorities. The development of a cultural quarter was prioritised as key to the economic and cultural development of Kilkenny City & County.
The Butler Gallery is regarded as playing an integral part in this development for Kilkenny and thus this project received unanimous endorsement by the Elected Members of Kilkenny County Council. It was always important that the building be adapted for an appropriate use and in a sensitive manner.
McCullough Mulvin Architects were contracted by Kilkenny County Council to transform Evans' Home into use as a cultural space and in July 2018 ground was broken. The works have transformed the existing building, its gardens and boundary walls into a destination for art, archaeology, history, education and leisure and brings a very significant building in the City’s history back into public use.
For more information about the conservation of Evans' Home and the approach taken by McCullough Mulvin Architects, see below:
PDF Download: The New Butler Gallery at the Evans Home: A Transformative Project for Kilkenny. By McCullough Mulvin Artchitects.
PDF Download: Conservation and Extension of Evans’ Home, Kilkenny for the new Butler Gallery. A report by Evelyn Graham, FRIAI. Kilkenny County Council Project Liaison Architect.
The conservation and transformation of Evans' Home was made possible due to funds generously committed by Kilkenny County Council (c. €3m), the Department of Culture, Heritage and Gaeltacht (€2m) and Fáilte Ireland as part of Irelands Ancient East Initiative (€1.135m).

[H2] Evans' Home Photography Commissions - Before & During Restoration

Gypsy Ray (1949 - 2020) was commissioned to create a series of images of Evans’ Home in 2012, as part of the Re:Collecting project.
Brian Cregan was invited by Kilkenny County Council and Butler Gallery to document the physical changes to the Evans’ Home as it underwent a transformation to become the new Butler Gallery.

[H2] Gypsy Ray Photography Commission

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[H2] Brian Cregan Photography Commission

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[H2] Social History

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As part of the refurbishment of the Evans’ Home, archaeological digs were commenced in 2010. These digs sought to confirm the locations of the buildings previously on the site. The biggest discovery was unexpected with 150 medieval burials found when the gas connection was dug along Barrack Lane in 2018.
The early archaeological digs from 2010 onwards carried out at the Evans’ Home site, established the orientation of various parts of the former Augustinian Priory of St John the Evangelist, and an 18th century military barracks. The archaeologists found pottery and remains of meals dating from both of these buildings, along with evidence that one building was built on top of another, using the stone from the previous building. The discovery of human remains underneath Barrack Lane in 2018 required an extensive dig to fully excavate the burial site. These burials date from the 13th or early 14th
century, leading us to believe that the original St. John’s Priory, dating back to 1240, extended through Barrack Lane.

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Archaeology undertaken by:Archaeology Projects Ltd.Archer Heritage PlanningColin O’Drisceoil.

Ongoing

[H2] Butler Gallery Collection Exhibition

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Exhibitions

Ongoing

[H2] The O'Malley Collection Exhibition

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Exhibitions

21st February 2026 - 22nd May 2026

[H2] Mind's EyeSimon Reilly

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Exhibitions

23rd May - 26th July 2026

[H2] MeantimeDavid Stephenson

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Exhibitions

Fridays 8th, 15th and 22nd May

[H2] Hand-crafted Jewellery Coursewith Emma Jane Champley

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Events

Tuesday May 12th, 19th & 26th

[H2] Sketching Historic Kilkenny: 3 Days, 3 Venues- with Gráinne Bath Enright

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Events

Saturday 23rd May

[H2] Colour in Nature Masterclasswith Eamon Colman

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Events

Sunday 24th May

[H2] Bealtaine 2026 - Taking a Line For a Walkwith Caroline Schofield

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Events

4th June - 3rd July

[H2] Creative Spaces 5-Week Course- with Rachel Burke

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Events

Saturday 6th June 2026

[H2] Cruinniú na nÓg:Gather to welcome The Guardian

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Events

Thursday 25th June

[H2] Artist TalkDavid Stephenson

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Events

Saturday 28th - Sunday 29th June

[H2] 2-Day Thread Drawing Masterclass- with Ciara O'Connor

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Events

Monday July 13th - Friday July 17th

[H2] Children's Art Summer Camp- July

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Events

Monday August 10th - Friday August 14th

[H2] Children's Art Summer Camp- August

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Events

2nd Saturday of each month

[H2] Queer Art Club- at Butler Gallery

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Events

2nd Wednesday of every month

[H2] Play Space - Parent and Toddler Group

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Events

3rd Sunday of every month

[H2] Art Start: Children's Programme

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Events

Various Dates

[H2] Dementia Inclusive Programme:Azure Tours

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Events

Available ALL YEAR

[H2] Tours and Groups

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Events