Penumbra is an open ended video Triptych that has been evolving since 2008. It will be continuously edited and added to over the period of the artist’s lifetime.  Paul Murnaghan has been using the garden at the rear of his home/studio as a form of ontological notebook. Ideas that developed in parallel to experiment and exhibition are reconsidered and articulated through the lens in this small suburban space. The work’s content includes both recordings of opportune moments and structured scenarios, which reflect a glimpsed understanding of things peripheral to knowing, in an attempt to reveal the visible and the invisible through a multitude of methods. 

Though the artist’s practice takes many different forms and disciplines, each public presentation endeavours to articulate elements that vibrate at the core of belief. Each action explores fragmentary points of intersection between the spiritual, scientific and psychological. Recent works consider an aesthetic of emphatic certainty and frequently attempt to re-inhabit a thinking that has lost contemporary credibility.

With this ever evolving project, Murnaghan reverses the process of previous works such as Memorious (2005), Neocredo (2008) and Map of the Empire (2010), as these were spread over several countries, engaging, interacting and posing questions to numerous participants. Penumbra is devoid of human presence or dialogue, with the camera never straying far from the confines of a small suburban garden in Dublin.