Siamsa Tíre supports artists by offering a range of both long and short-term residency programmes.
Dancer in Residence
Dancer Catherine Young is currently embedded in a long term residence with us. In 2022, she will begin research and development on Ritual, a new work that pulls from her practice in African dance, taking us back to the body, rhythm, visceral movement, and the natural world in an age that sometimes seems entirely digital.
That’s not all she has planned. She will continue the ongoing development of dance in Kerry by working with local partners such as Kerry County Council, Kerry Education and Training Board, Kerry College of Further Education, Munster Technological University, and others.
She will also continue to develop The Welcoming Project, an inclusion project with asylum seekers, refugees, and locals which uses dance as a tool for communication, expression, understanding, and ultimately social inclusion.
Exchange Residencies
We are also introducing short-burst exchange residencies in 2022.
Like any dynamic and evolving art form, folk requires encounters with fresh perspectives for new ideas to form and grow. In 2022, Siamsa Tíre’s in-house artistic team will collaborate with four other professional artists one-on-one in a burst of week-long research and development, with the aim of drawing inspiration from each other’s practice.
Our Artistic Director Jonathan Kelliher will work with musician and dancer Aoife Ní Bhriain to exchange practice and perspectives on sustaining traditional music and dance. Both are firmly rooted in the traditions yet interested in engaging with new audiences and pushing the boundaries of what the traditional arts are perceived to be.
Training and Development Officer Anne O’Donnell will partner with composer, sound designer, and musician Alma Kelliher. Using voice, they will work together on a folk song using a loop machine to combine Anne’s pure traditional singing with Alma’s sound design expertise.
Catherine Young and Joanne Barry share an interest in authentic rooted rhythm and sound. Their work is informed by folk dance, movement, and song. This development week will further enhance what is an already established creative relationship and give both artists the space to develop new possibilities and to examine the links between the folk arts and contemporary dance practice.
Musicians Ciarán Mulderrig and Tom Hanafin will join forces to explore the complexity and versatility of the piano versus the simplicity of the tin whistle. The pair hope to step outside their own comfort zones as they look at how traditional Irish music can be interwoven with an eclectic mix of musical genres.
Siamsa Tíre’s folk artists Joanne Barry and Anne O’Donnell will collaborate with spoken word artist Ciara Ní É to interrogate the many dialects that have sprung from the deep well of the Irish language and the writing that has emerged under its influence over the centuries. Through Ciara’s play with language and the folk artists’ exploration of song and dance, together, they will examine the syntax and rhythm of the Irish and English languages, revitalising the folk arts in an imaginative new way.
These short-burst exchange residences are scheduled to begin at the Spring Equinox and they will culminate in a sharing of ideas around language, performance, and heritage as part of Siamsa Tíre’s Culture Night 2022 celebrations.
