Athlone artist's 30-foot Shannon Callows work to display at Viking River Fest

By David Flynn

Artist and Athlone native Leila Henry is known for creating nature art on site - generally on several spots along the banks of the River Shannon.

During the Covid pandemic, Lelia built an art studio in her garden and set about creating a 30-foot panoramic view of the Shannon Callows.

Lelia's charcoal drawing of the Shannon Callows will be on display in the Dean Crowe Theatre as part of the Viking River Fest in Athlone this coming weekend (August 2 to 5).

The drawing will be on show throughout the festival. It will be officially launched at 3pm this Saturday in the theatre by Lelia and invited speakers who will talk about the artwork and the Callows.

The speakers will be ecologist and author Stephen Heery, who wrote the book, ‘The Shannon Floodlands: A Natural History of the Shannon Callows’, and Brian Caffrey, who heads up the Survey and Monitoring section of Birdwatch Ireland's Conservation Division. Everyone is invited to the gathering.

Lelia is a native of Coosan, and works almost every day of the year as a creative artist, mostly drawing the changing nature and landscape around the River Shannon in Athlone.

"I find this is the first year that things have really come back to normal after Covid. There were many negative aspects of it, but creatively it was a very good time for me, and I don’t think I would have done the drawing without having that time," she said.

"I had deadlines before that, with other work, and also I completed a Masters in Art and Process, from Crawford College of Art and Design in December 2019, and after that Christmas I was awaiting results.

"It was important for me to do the Masters because I had been many years working on my own and it helped me reinforce my work and my way of working."

Lelia had previously studied Visual Arts at the Institute of Art, Design and Technology in Dun Laoghaire and also completed a Certificate in Drawing and Visual Investigation at the National College of Art and Design, Dublin.

The story of Lelia’s drawing of the Shannon Callows is a long one, the Athlone artist explained.

"I wanted to do something special about the river, because while the Shannon is not a spectacular landscape, and without a 'wow' factor to it, there is something magical about it and I wanted to portray that," said Lelia.

She had planned originally to do a series of smaller Shannon-themed drawings, but it didn’t work for her, and didn’t convey the feeling of peace and serenity that she felt was important.

"I wanted to put the viewer where I was sitting when I was drawing," said Lelia. "It seemed like a mad idea at the time, while I was researching it."

The influence of the drawing for Lelia came from her study of panorama paintings, which came to prominence and popularity in the late 19th century.

"There was one in Salzburg, Austria, which was a 360-degree view of the city from its castle, and pictures like this would be on display in different places," she said.

"It was for the benefit of people who couldn’t afford to travel and they could see these places. It was the precursor to moving pictures!"

Lelia received the Thomas Dammann Junior Memorial Trust award to research panorama paintings in Salzburg and The Hague, in the Netherlands, and she spent three days in each city.

While studying for her Masters, Lelia used the first eight feet of her Shannon Callows drawing as her overall project. The drawing on display in Athlone is nine metres in length or nearly thirty feet.

"I did notice when I was doing it, that there was a loss of habitat and biodiversity around the Shannon and, sadly, the area is in decline," she said. "I would notice huge changes in the sounds down there. We are losing a lot, even though it is a Special Area of Conservation."

Lelia worked for the guts of four years on her lockdown project, which she combined with the building of a studio.

"I had been working in the box room in my house, but it was very awkward trying to work on the drawing there, and I was jumping from one side of it to the other," she said.

"I had to put it away, and once I had the space of a studio, I did it one section at a time. I had never seen the full drawing, until after I had finished it."

While she worked away on the drawing through lockdown and beyond, her dogs, Lucy and Aimee, accompanied her on the banks of the Shannon while she was working.

"I probably spent over two years doing loads of sketches and rough work, and working out the different pieces," said Lelia.

"I thought if areas keep declining, someday the only way we will see the region is through drawings and photographs, because it won’t be there for future generations."

Lelia's drawing of the Shannon Callows is set on the town side of the Lough Ree Yacht Club.

"It was a labour of love, in black and white charcoal," she said. "I am at the moment working on a series of drawings of trees."

Lelia is also currently working on artwork for a solo show she will be exhibiting at the Royal Hibernian Academy of Arts, Dublin in November 2025.