Space at Castletown House, 21st March – 4th April It was bigger, bolder and even more exuberant than 2008. The SPACE Programme 2009 saw a whirlwind of creativity sweeping through Castletown House. Our ten participants from Ireland and abroad made the most of the opportunity to collaborate and explore. The 2 weeks saw a plethora of artistic discoveries, beautiful creations, challenging experiences and even some large-scale performances including a “Paper Ball” in Castletown House‘s grand entrance hall and a “secret gig” by the programme’s very own band.

Along with the chosen participants, the programme also had a number of external artists involved in order to help augment the work that was being created: Lorraine McCrann – Make-Up Artist, Evan Flynn – Video Editor, Bairbre Ní Caoimhe – Director/Performer, Alexis Nealon – Sound Engineer/Composer, Tom Swift – Writer.

Here’s some of the feedback from the artists of 2009:

“SPACE helped me to reach out beyond the boundaries of my artform and explore other approaches to work. I mixed with practitioners I never meet with in a work context and whilst learning to create in new ways, I also reflected on my own process and how it is viewed outside of my field. This was invaluable.”

“The SPACE Programme was an inspirational two weeks; meeting and working with other artists from Ireland and abroad during which I made an installation piece and wrote songs for the first time ever.”

“The SPACE Programme is a truly unique programme which allows practitioners across a range of arts disciplines to engage and explore the idea of collaboration in a challenging but safe place. The Performance Corporation excerises its generosity and ‘can do’ spirit in offering possibilities, facilities, ideas, feedback, opportunites and problems. A great, ambitious, daring (and well executed) project in an Ireland which is ever more tentative and conservative in its view of arts practice, in its questions about what is and isn’t art, and its ideas about what art is ‘for’.”

“The SPACE programme is an absolutely generous initiative which, an artist can not more than admire and thank. It recovers the playful feeling we should never loose while carrying creative processes and gives a totally unique opportunity to look at ourselves as social beings in the context of artistic collaboration allowing us to have a honest, fearless look at how we are and if there is anything we can do to strengthen our work and abilities for exchange. “

Further Reading

Blog post on Space 2009