Scholars have described it as probably the most refined example of this strange category of carving, which makes the fact that most visitors walk past it, or past the building entirely, without knowing it exists, rather striking. A sheela-na-gig is a stone carving of a female figure explicitly displaying her genitalia; they appear on churches, castles, and town walls across Ireland and Britain, and their precise purpose remains genuinely unresolved, with interpretations ranging from apotropaic warning figures to fertility symbols to survivals of pre-Christian belief worked into Christian architecture.

This particular figure was carved in relief on a slab and originally formed part of the walls of Ballylarkin medieval abbey church in County Kilkenny. Scholar Barbara Freitag, writing in 2004, describes the carving in careful detail: an oval head with large ears, ovoid eyes, a small long nose and a slit mouth, set on a thick neck. The body is notable for its precisely rendered ribcage, which visually dominates the torso, reducing the tiny pendulous breasts almost to afterthoughts. The arms are held akimbo, with the right hand placed on a bent knee, while the middle finger of the left hand delicately touches the pudenda. It is an image of considerable deliberateness, the anatomy selective and the pose calculated rather than crudely executed. Cherry, writing in 1992, confirmed its presence in the National Museum collection, where it has been kept since being removed from its original ecclesiastical context.

The National Museum of Ireland's Archaeology branch on Kildare Street in Dublin city centre holds the collection. The sheela-na-gig is a small object by the standards of monumental stonework, so it rewards patience and close attention rather than a quick scan of the room. Those interested in the wider context of such carvings might also investigate the site of Ballylarkin abbey church in County Kilkenny, with which this figure is formally cross-referenced in the archaeological record, to get a sense of the architectural setting from which it was removed.