Erik O'Eir is a South African born artist living in Arklow, Co. Wicklow in Ireland. His art centres on studies of neolithic art found on stone monuments throughout Ireland. To create this art he uses a compound of his own creation which behaves like hard rock but can be moulded and carved to suit the work being done. His current series of works, called "Dendro-liths" are moulded to a similar shape to a painter's canvas resulting in sculptures that can be either left free standing or can be hung on a wall.
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Background
Erik O'Eir (né Erik Ivor Reinertsen) was born on 23 April 1964 in the town of Springs, Transvaal in South Africa. Born a 5th generation South Africa with strong ancestral links to Norway he moved to Ireland he adopted his "Irish" name of O'Eir by deed poll, and discovered an intense interest in Ireland's lost heritage.
Career
In the late 1980s, Erik developed an interest in growing trees from seed. It was this that led to his interest in making miniature ornamental trees and putting together the dishes for them to be kept and displayed in using re-constituted rock or purpose-built wooden containers. These containers would be decorated with patterns allowing the trees to reflect the artwork of "Standing Stones" and decorated "Kerb-stones" found throughout Ireland.
It was this project that led to the conception of the idea behind the Dendro-Lith series of works. By researching the neolithic stone monuments throughout Ireland Erik realised a close link between the monuments and the passage of the sun. His works mainly focus on the artwork in Newgrange, Knowth and Dowth as well as various sites throughout county Meath e.g. Loughcrew Mountains.
Other projects of Erik's include the research into how the sun was used to track the time of day as well as the time of year throughout the stone-age. This particular research involves tracking the path the sun takes on a day-to-day basis with the hope of constructing a complete chart of the sun's path through the sky of Ireland.
Ultimately Erik's interest in stone-age life and history that fuels his passion for his work. All of his projects are linked by his desire to understand stone-age humanity's coalition with nature to advance into the civilization we know today.
Erik's Dendrolith works received their first public appearance in the Riverside Gallery in Bridegewater Shopping Centre, Arklow, Co. Wicklow in Ireland in August 2013.
His interest in stone-age art lead to him researching how earlier civilisations recorded the passage of time. By using gnomons he created rudimentary sundials that helped him to track how the movements of the sun could be used to tell the time of day. After several months it became possible to tell the seasons throughout the year based on the length of the shadow cast by the gnomon. Having combined his research with his current artistic style Erik created a sundial that uses a gnomon cast from his little finger. It is his hope that the President of Ireland (Michael D. Higgins) with the hope of having it displayed in Áras an Uachtaráin.