Event type: Comedy

Kieran Murray is a visual explorer and documentarist.

He seeks to uncover stories that connect people to the abandoned houses he continues to witness within Ireland’s rural landscapes.

Kieran has an archive of hundreds of photos of these cottages, buried in the landscape from Donegal-to-Cork, Galway-to-Wicklow. Working with the Festival, Kieran has selected an image collection that focuses on the domestic, honouring the everyday items that we may not think we need, but miss when we leave. The items that create nostalgia, or a hunger for ‘home’. These images concentrate on objects that provided nourishment or succour, warmth and safety; the memories of which we associate with home, shelter and care.

Below are a handlful of Kieran’s images. For the Festival, the selection will be expanded to 50 images that refelect ‘hunger’; hunger for safety, home, domestic comfort and sanctuary. Be sure to come back to see the fuller exhibit.

This work contributes to our Heritage work strand.

Don’t miss our online event -Looking at Times Past Today- with Kieran at 2pm on 27 Oct 2022. Click here to learn more and book.

Click on any image to bring out a full screen version of the image, then scroll to see all images.
Gallery 1
This gallery has just 10 pictures, which have been up in the run up to the Festival. Gallery 2 has almost 40 more images, shared especially for #LIF2022. These will only be available until the Festival’s end.

Gallery 2
The selection made available below is in no particular order. The selection is taken from across many years and are of several houses, in lots of locations. We have chosen images that depict objects that prick our memory. Transformed by time and neglect, they remind of of things we use, see everyday and know, but that sit beyond use today. They tell stories of domestic life; celebrations past and lives come and gone. From the banal to the beautiful; the mundane to the iconographic… Kieran’s photography pays homage not just to the objects as he finds them, but the fingerprints of those that used and respected them, whenever that was.

After the interviews, the events, the laugher and the tears, The Mersey Mash reaches its destination: the final cut.

Doug Devaney and his trusty technical crew –Sean and Charlie- present their 2021/22 expedition; free to be watched by all and sundry! A document of Liverpool and its Irish community, The Mersey Mash bears witness to the people, places and events we share, along with the islands that influenced us all.

The Mersey Mash is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

This event contributes to the Festival’s Family and Heritage work strands. For more on Doug and his work, look up The Plastics Podcast, here.

Imprinted in spirals; whorls, cup and ring markings; Bridie’s (St Brigid’s) connection with Liverpool is made clear.

Brigid’s imprint can also be found in footprints marked on the ancient Calderstones; stones believed to come from a passage grave, like New Grange in Ireland.

See these images for more details: Calderstones image 1  | Calderstones image 2 | Caldestones image 3 | Caldestones image 4

Taking in Hope Street, walk with Judy Mazonowicz, long-time St Brigid champion and author of The Transformations of Brigid. Judy will discuss the different aspects of Bridie -also known as St Brigid and St Bridgitte- on a route bridging time and faith.

As has become tradition on Imbolc, the cross-quarter Pagan festival, you will join others at Bridie’s Well in St James’s Gardens at 1pm. Here, you’ll share poetry, songs, and contributions that celebrate the first stirrings of spring.

This is a significant year in the recognisition of St Brigid, as Ireland celebrates its first public holiday in her honour.

People wishing to join the walk should book here. Those who wish to meet at the well should join at 1pm.

Walk bookers will receive confirmation of the start point closer to the time of the walk. It will be on -or near- Hope Street. We advise you to

wear weather appropriate clothing
bring sunscreen/umbrellas (as conditions dictate), and
suggest bringing water to drink as needed
you are also invited to bring a canister to take water from the well.

The walk is funded by Arts Council England.

The original event was a drop-in live performance (beginning at 3pm on Fri 21 Oct) that allowed people to stay for as long or little time as preferred.

The performance lasted for roughly 120 mins. From Mon 24 Oct, a recording will be available (here),  which can be accessed virtually to accompany site visits.

Sound and space
An immersive sound installation featuring harp, vocals and live processing, unheard from is performed by composer Manon McCoy. This collaboration with Sweeney’s Unquiet Islands -Martin McCoy’s print exhibition- explores through sound the representation of landscape within the prints. unheard from responds to the textures, layers and movement found within the etchings and monotypes. Manon uses them as a lens through which to access the acoustic environments of these landscapes. The performance is built from drone-based textures; ambient found sounds; harp and vocal effects conjuring a sound world in which these images exist.

The installation involves spatialisation of sounds, interacting directly with the acoustics of the gallery space. The audience are invited to move through and explore the space of the piece. They choose where they are drawn to stand and by extension how they want to perceive the space.
Connection
Daughter of the artist, as well as a classically trained (Royal Northern College of Music) experimental harpist and vocalist, Manon has a background in traditional Irish music. Additionally, Manon has since studied genres; including improvised music, contemporary Jazz, Hindustani classical music and recently electronics and live processing.

Manon’s compositional work focuses on presenting personal experiences of the body, community, environment, womanhood, the experience of time and physical space. Through collaborative projects -involving interactions across art forms- she aims to actively explore creative solutions to shifting social environments; representing and acting for social change.

Manon is particularly interested in the uses of spaces, musical and physical, often designing pieces that rework performer-audience dynamics. She creates site-specific sound installations that explore the acoustic environments of her location. Doing so layers the compositions with a strong sense of storytelling and space sharing.

This event contributes to the Festival’s In:Visible Women, Family and Nook and Cranny Spaces work strands. ♀️❤️?

Using the classical grammar of the joke…
…its framing, telling and punchline -in a roundabout sort of way (the ‘telling’ was created first, followed by the ‘punchline’, followed by the ‘framing’)- Ciara Finnegan and Paola Bernardelli created a series of  jokes which they will post daily.
Bernadelli created and photographed the setups that form the tellings, while Finnegan responds with photographic inventions to form the punchlines and cooks up the framing text.

The make up of a joke
Known as The Daily Gag this relay will take place on Liverpool Irish Festival’s Instagram account (www.instagram.com/LivIrishFest) and can be found and followed using the hashtag #LIF2022Housing
Following her participation in Housing -a remote residency at Art Arcadia- Ciara Finnegan (artist) invited Bernardelli (founder/Director Art Arcadia) to play with the hyperbolic sculptural figures in the transparent plexiglass dollhouse, which Finnegan built in the exhibition space in Derry. See more on the exhibition origins here.

Play and references
Playing with the figures, the transparent structure of the house and the shift of light and point of view, Bernardelli staged (and photographed) a series of absurd scenarios. These setups serve as the ‘telling’ of a gag to which –drawing on Maggie Hennefeld’s** research on the physical comedy of early 20th century film comediennes- Finnegan and her 10-year-old daughter, provide a punchline.
As with her work on Housing within The Daily Gag sequence, Finnegan makes reference to Malcolm Turvey’s analysis of the comedy in the films of Jacques Tati and what he terms ‘comedic modernism’*, and continues to poke at issues around transparency and privacy in the contemporary age.
In the way that Tati’s films stimulated audiences to be alert to the comic possibilities of everyday life, The Daily Gag seeks to invite the spectator to participate in co-authoring the humour. It also laughs at itself (self-consciously aware that it plays on some of the more abstruse behaviours of contemporary art) and the audiences’ studious urge to ‘get’ contemporary art or, conversely, dismiss it quickly with “Yeah. I don’t get it”.
*Malcolm Turvey, Play Time Jacques Tati and Comedic Modernism (Columbia University Press, 2020)
**Maggie Hennefeld (2015) Miniature Women, acrobatic maids and self-amputating domestics: Comediennes of the trick film, Early Popular Visual Culture.

Laura Matikaite is the selected artist for this year’s In The Window, a month long exhibition of work, shown ‘in the window’ at Bluecoat Display Centre.

Join Laura and the Bluecoat Display Centre, in their gallery, for an informal conversation about Laura’s Lithuanian-Irish background and emerging ceramics talent.

Laura’s ceramic vessels explore the versatility of clay and ideas of duality – juxtaposing polychromatic collections with monochromatic versions. Consumed by one palette for a time, Laura grows to miss the other, switching between the two as her hunger demands.

This event is free to attend.
Please book your place by calling us on +44 (0) 151 709 4014 or via email at crafts@bluecoatdisplaycentre.com
“My work goes through a cycle, in which, after a season of monochrome, monotone, creating surfaces on the spectrum of Black to White, I hunger for colour, and this sparks a new range or multitoned, coloured and playful ceramic work.
“Before long feeding back into the sophistication and elegant simplicity of monotone. Allowing the form to say something else.
“Colour has the ability to create a mood, I use this to my advantage when creating a body of work, that refuels the making process.
“It is through a balance of expressing developed design ideas and creative intuition that I absorb the nutritious versatility of clay and glaze chemistry.” – Laura Matikaite
Laura’s work is currently on display ‘In the Window’ on College Lane throughout October. A selection of her work will also be available to purchase via the Bluecoat Display Centre’s online shop soon.

The Mersey Mash hits #LIF2022.

Following months of interviews, podcasts, trips across the country -not to mention a pandemic- Doug Devaney presents The Mersey Mash.

A magazine-style film and performance, The Mersey Mash collects and relates the tales community members have told him over the last two years. For those involved, the evening presents an opportunity to see yourself onscreen and witness stories from your community. For others, it’s a chance to revel and reflect -chat, critique and add your own voice- in the welcoming surroundings of the Liverpool Irish Centre and the people who make it great. This is an exchange between audience and documentarist; people and places. After tonight, the show will be remastered for an online release, ensuring the stories of The Mersey Mash last forever.

The Mersey Mash is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

This event contributes to the Festival’s Family and Heritage work strands. ❤️? For more on Doug and his work, look up The Plastics Podcast, here.

This event will be followed on 10 Nov with an online watch party of the full feature.

This event is copromoted with Black History Month.

After the interviews, the events, the laugher and the tears, The Mersey Mash reaches its destination: the final cut.

Doug Devaney and his trusty technical crew –Sean and Charlie- will finally let their 2021/22 expedition fly into the ether; free to be watched by all and sundry! A document of Liverpool and its Irish community, The Mersey Mash bears witness to the people, places and events we share, along with the islands that influenced us all.

The Mersey Mash is supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

This event contributes to the Festival’s Family and Heritage work strands. For more on Doug and his work, look up The Plastics Podcast, here.

 

How has Brexit affected Irish identity?

PhD researcher Niamh Lear presents on her paper Irishness in England post-Brexit, looking specifically at regional perspectives on Irishness in England.

Following her presentation, Niamh will be interviewed by Catherine Harvey, actor, writer, broadcaster and producer of Tongue and Talk: The Dialect Poets. Over the course of the interview and following Q&A we’ll attempt to draw some comparisons between Niamh’s work and the Liverpool Irish experience, fielding questions from the audience.

This is a live online event, hosted on Zoom. People will book via an Eventbrite link (available here shortly) and Zoom details will be sent closer to the date with links to join. Zoom is free to use, but users will have to have downloaded and installed the software ahead of the event.

This event contributes to the Festival’s In:Visible Women, Family and Heritage work strands. ♀️❤️?

Recording of the event

Liverpool Irish Festival invite you to meet our volunteer History Research Group, led by ArtsGroupie Director John Maguire.

Responsible for unveiling the research that now populates the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail’s site information, this group have been central to the Trail’s revitalisation, collectively spending 850+ hours on research! Closely linked with the development of this year’s book release -Liverpool Irish Famine Trail: Revive- the team discuss their findings and research activity in a presentation followed by a Q&A session. Details will also be shared about how to apply to be involved in the next stage of work, as we continue to develop the Liverpool Irish Famine Trail. For more information on the Trail visit liverpoolirishfaminetrail.com All the Festival’s Trail work has been supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

This event contributes to the Festival’s Heritage and Irish Famine work strand  (?) and takes place as part of the Family Day at Museum of Liverpool. The Family Day is sponsored by Tourism Ireland.