The Golden Thread Gallery at 84–87 Great Patrick Street, Belfast, still seems, for some, difficult to find but once you do, you wonder how you missed it in the first place! It is actually a huge building, a wonderful exhibition space — it was the old electricity ‘switch room’ — and sits back, clearly visible, but off the main thoroughfare on Gt Patrick Street.

As I said, it is a great big space, very suitable for exhibitions like the current one, a large, mixed show. Entitled Isolated and curated by Peter Richards, it is the visual reactions of eight artists to “the feeling that you are all alone, that you are not being understood... that nobody understands”.

Each artist has a very different approach, all dealing, in a variety of different techniques, with very individual and personal aspects of the same subject. One may choose to explore the artist’s relationship with his or her subjects while another deals with the fear isolation can bring and yet another with memories related to times of isolation.

None of us is immune from such feelings in some form, perhaps simply just actually being alone or the feeling of being outside everything that is going on around you — whatever way we empathise with the subject there should be an expression of it here.

To quote the written summary, “We have attempted to create a space, regardless of how uncomfortable, in which the viewer can engage in the processes, the complexities and the sensitivities...” and they do it very well, reminding us “of the invisible suffering that can further detach the individual from the societies that they, we, occupy”. The exhibition continues until March 5.

Just a word, now, about the Old Museum Arts Centre which always was and still is, a wonderful supporter of, in particular, the performing arts. Which is just the point I want to make — what has happened to the visual arts in their programme for the first quarter of 2009? It is, as far as I can see, non-existent.

I have been viewing their shows, strange as they frequently are, for years and years and, although I may not particularly like a lot of the work they choose to show, I would hate them to stop showing visual art altogether. No comment so far from the venue but perhaps they’ll get back to me before next week.

elizabethobaird@googlemail.com