Immaculate perception

The world of a religious order is usually a hidden one: interior, separate and devout. But Jackie Nickerson ventured inside the Catholic enclaves of Irish convents and monasteries for a rare and privileged glimpse, spending two-and-a-half years photographing what she found. Despite being packed with grand religious symbolism and iconography, her pictures dispel any aura of mystery with a healthy dose of mundanity. They show God's devotees simply pottering around in their earthly environment and going about their daily business (as in Washing Eucharist Vessels, 2006, above). This is faith not as exalted, ethereal revelation but as tangible, everyday vocation.

Holly Kyte