One original work, made by someone you could meet.
Most homes have a wall that has been waiting years for a decision.
The hardest part is not choosing the work. It is knowing where to look.
Most people fill it with something from a homeware shop, chosen in an afternoon. That is not a failure of taste. It is what happens when the alternative feels like a world you need an introduction to.
There is another option, and it is more ordinary than it sounds: an original work by an artist living and working within an hour of your house.
The wall most households stop noticing.
Three words, used loosely. The difference decides the price and what you own.
No, and this assumption stops most people. Graduate shows, print editions, smaller works and emerging artists all sit well below what people expect.
PlotNua does not publish price guides. What a work costs depends on the artist, the medium and the size.
The same wall. A different room.
Not taste. Scale. A work that holds a gallery wall can look stranded above a sofa.
Over a sofa or fireplace, aim for roughly two-thirds the width of the thing beneath it. Mark it on the wall in masking tape before you commit.
The centre should sit at about eye level, roughly 1.5m from the floor. Most people hang too high.
Direct sunlight fades works on paper and damages varnish. The wall opposite a south-facing window is the one to avoid.
Someone makes it. You can usually meet them.
Artists open their working spaces and you can buy on the spot. Culture Night runs nationwide on 18 September 2026, free, through local authority arts offices — more than 1,800 events in 2025.
A gallery represents its artists and handles the sale. Visual Artists Ireland describes a 50/50 split as standard, though it varies.
Art Source fills the RDS each November. The RHA Annual Exhibition runs free through the summer, everything for sale. The RDS Visual Art Awards show graduate work each winter.
Many artists sell from their own website or studio. The full price goes to the person who made the work.
Buying locally keeps the money in the room. Under the Artists’ Exemption, an Irish artist’s income from original painting and sculpture is exempt from income tax up to €50,000 a year.
A commission means the artist makes a new work for a particular space — the answer when you like an artist but not the work currently available.
Not every artist takes commissions, and there is no obligation to. Ask early rather than assuming.
Expect a deposit and a timeline. Commissions commonly involve a deposit up front, an agreed size and subject, and a lead time in months rather than weeks.
Agree what approval means before work begins — whether you see it in progress, and what happens if the finished work is not what you pictured.
It stops being an event and becomes the room.
When this Discovery is ready, you’ll be able to explore whether it could work for your property. In the meantime, there is plenty to explore.
Recommendations cannot be bought, and payment never determines who appears or ranks more highly.
