Arts Festival The Power of Local

THE POWER OF LOCAL, taking place over a period of four days, August 4th - 8th, across multiple venues in Ennistymon.  The festival will present art, live-performance, food, video, panel discussions, an open-air market, outdoor screenings, open studios and artist talks, exploring the rich complexities of the Local (and the trans-local). Invited contributors include the artist group Liquid (Estonia), Dr. Igor Calzada, Associate Researcher at the Center for Basque Studies-University of Nevada, Reno (USA), Outrider Artists (Ireland), Ground Up Artists Collective (Ireland), and The Trans-Local Condition, a screening of international artist films curated by Fiona Woods. 

General Program of the festival:

Thursday (4th Aug) in the evening, grand opening in the gallery and outdoor film screening in the Square.

Friday (5th Aug) Exhibitions/Film screening in the gallery and on location, in the gallery at 5pm an artist talk by Gareth Kennedy

Saturday (6th Aug) Exhibitions/Film screening in the gallery and on location, OPEN STUDIOS, Outdoor Market, Panel discussion on The Power of Local (afternoon)

Sunday (7th Aug)  Exhibitions/Film screening in the gallery and on location, OPEN STUDIOS, Outdoor Market. - closing of exhibitions.

Monday (8th Aug) Peer Critique for Studio Artists with Dougal McKenzie 

THE POWER OF LOCAL

The move towards a sustainable society is producing new forms of thinking and organising at local level all around the world, part of a dynamic of social and cultural change. These forms of organising recognise that community is something that is practiced; by forming ourselves into porous and active communities - artist collectives, transition town networks, farmer’s markets, discussion groups – we can begin to generate change through actions and events in local and trans-local situations that will make a difference to our world. Artists are making art increasingly in response to local situations where they are living. This is notable particularly in relation to rural situations where the interface between human society and the state of the land is so apparent, something that brings the relationship between art and ecology into focus. 

The Festival THE POWER OF LOCAL, is an event exploring the power of local by bringing together a range of thinkers and makers, producers and artists, organisations and businesses from local, national and international contexts to consider some of these questions. Taking place over a period of four days (August 4th – 8th), the Festival will happen across multiple venues in Ennistymon, Co. Clare presenting art, live-performance, food, video, panel discussion, an open-air market, outdoor screenings, open studios and artist talks. The Festival will include invited contributions from the artist group Liquid (Estonia), Dr. Igor Calzada, Ph.D.Lecturer &.Associate Researcher at the Center for Basque Studies-University of Nevada, Reno (USA).Outrider Artists (Ireland), Ground Up Artists Collective (Ireland), and The Trans-Local Condition, a screening of international artist films curated by Fiona Woods.   http://www.collectionofminds.net/ #4

Everyone is local to somewhere; this festival is an opportunity to engage with the rich possibilities of local, to consider local as a way of taking action, producing culture and encountering difference in association with others.  Everyone is included. 

The Festival THE POWER OF LOCAL is devised and directed by Trudi van der Elsen. 

                         

The topic for the panel discussion is The Power of Local.

Panel: Fiona Woods www.fionawoods.net

           Marge Laast, Liquid Group Estonia http://www.vedelik.edicypages.com/en

           Dr. Igor Calzada http://www.igorcalzada.com

           Transition Town, Roisin Garvey

           X-PO, Kilnaboy

          

Guests on Skype: Evelyn, MOKS, Estonia (tbc)

CD Launch Paddy Mulcahy - Trouble Instigator- 23rd June at 9 pm - free of charge

Fiona Woods - extended interview on ABC Radio National Australia

Artworks Feature: Rural artists with a wide orbit

 This week in Artworks, a feature about art and rural communities, art and agriculture.

Last month in Swan Hill, a town on the Victorian/New South Wales border, an assortment of artists, arts organisations, farmers, historians and other interested locals gathered to talk about cultural life in rural communities, and to hear guests from around Australia and abroad. The event was called ACRE 2 and, at a time when so many rural communities around Australia, and indeed around the world, are undergoing huge changes, one of the major question posed was: what's the role of art and creativity in re-imagining the landscape? 

For Artworks, Michael Shirrefs went to the Swan Hill Regional Art Gallery, on the banks of the Murray River, to speak to some of the participants. And he was amazed at the range and scope of the discussions, which clearly mark a big shift in the way rural arts communities see themselves.
Please see following Link:

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/artworks/stories/2011/3237586.htm

The Outside is Inside

The Outside is Inside

New Works by Martina Cleary  

   

Opening Reception Friday 3rd June at 7pm

The exhibition will be opened by Elaine D’Alton, Clare Women’s Network

 

The work presented in this show has  evolved through a collaboration with Clare Women’s network based in Ennis, beginning in 2009. The large tableaux photographic images, while collaboratively constructed are inspired by real life events. Part of this project was initially presented as a series of posters, released daily with statistical information during the 16 Days International Campaign against Gender-Based Violence in November 2009. Subsequent research, supported by the Create Artist in the Community scheme has sought to focus on exploring how perceptions of safety and threat correlate with womens lived experience of both private and public spaces within the local community. While some of the works in this show are constructed or performed, others are inspired by over sixty individual interviews and are more documentary in nature. Part II of this body of work will be presented as a solo exhibition at the RHA Ashford Gallery in November 2011.

Artist’s Bio

Martina Cleary is a multi-media artist working with photography, video, drawing and text as her primary media. In Ireland she attended NCAD and The Crawford College of Art & Design, followed by post-graduate studies at The Academy of Fine Arts and The Alvar Aalto University, Helsinki. Beginning in the early 90’s, her work has been shown and collected in Ireland, Finland and Germany. Recent shows and awards have included; The Irish Arts Council Project Award 2010, the Create Artist in the Community Award 2010, the Roscommon Arts Office Art@Work Residency 2009,  EV+A 2008 at Limerick City Gallery, Impressions 2008 All Ireland Print Show (First Prize) at Galway Arts Centre and ‘Things That Go Bump’ a solo show at Monster Truck Studio & Gallery, Dublin in 2008.

Martina’s work deals with investigating what lies hidden beneath the surface of the everyday, particularly with respect to the construction of stories, histories and knowledges of place which inform the creation of individual and collective identity. Her work often brings together memories, associations and perceptions attached to particular sites, whether historical or contemporary to discover the relationship between place, power and the potential of the individual to affect change.  

 

Martina’s work has been supported by The Irish Arts Council, Clare County Council, The Finnish Arts Council, The Finnish Cultural Foundation, The Finnish Institute in London and a number of other Arts organizations in both Ireland and Finland. Along with her work as an artist, Martina is currently Head of Photography at Burren College of Art and also works as a lecturer in Critical & Contextual Studies at Limerick School of Art and Design.

Further information about this artist is available at www.martinacleary.com