PHOTOGRAPHIC ARTIST JEANETTE Lowe has brought it all back home for her exhibition of images taken in Dublin’s Pearse House flats.

Lowe, whose grandparents raised a family in the flats complex, previously had one of her portraits from the flats selected for the prestigious Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize. It was displayed in London’s National Portrait Gallery as a result.

Her body of work from the flats will now be exhibited in possibly the most appropriate location of all – the flats themselves. From this evening until 22 July, members of the public will be able to see the photographs in situ. The ‘gallery space’ will in fact be the two-bedroom Flat 8E in Pearse House.

Dublin Lord Mayor Naoise Ó Muirí, who will launch the exhibition this evening at 5.30pm, said:

Jeanette’s exhibition offers a vivid glimpse into a vibrant community which exists almost invisibly within the heart of Dublin city.

Jeanette’s mother and siblings grew up in the flat directly above the one where she is showing her work. Jeanette said:

This exhibition is a journey back into the past. I have history here, in the flats. It’s now important to me to engage with the local community by bringing art inside the flats, and also to engage with those of us living outside the flats by giving us a reason to visit somewhere we may perceive as an alien environment. Ultimately, I want to change the perception of others, as mine have been changed.

You can go and see the exhibition, The Flats: Memories; Perceptions; Reality, at Flat 8E, Pearse House flats, Lower Erne Street, Dublin 2.  It is opened from 11am-6pm Monday to Saturday and from noon to 5pm on Sunday. It is one of the events in the current PhotoIreland Festival 2012 (click here for more information on that).

These are some of the images from Lowe’s exhibition: