Artists: Felicity Clear, Michele Horrigan, Maurice O’Connell, Andy Parsons, Clea van der Grijn, Corban Walker

This ambitious exhibition represents a year-long collaboration between architects, artists, scholars and institutions in reimagining the potential of the North West region, seeking new territories of experimentation with ideas of site, place, and of enduring relevance to the community.

The starting point of the process was both the place and the poem The Lake Isle of Innisfree by WB Yeats. The exhibition combines commissioned new work by six noted Irish and international artists alongside entries to the international architectural competition for the design of a temporary intervention for the island of Innisfree. The curatorial intention is to reflect a dialogue—one that prioritises process as a discussion. This interdisciplinary venture offers an opportunity to encourage both social engagement and future dialogue regarding the creative flux of the region. It provides the chance to address key issues of global importance such as memory, identity, sociopolitical nuances, and sense of place and exploring its relevance for future place-making through the use of creative practices.

Artists & Practitioners: Felicity Clear, Michele Horrigan, Fergal MacCabe, Maurice O’Connell, Andy Parsons, Clea van der Grijn, Corban Walker, Oonagh Young.

Curatorial Team: Cliona Brady, Bernadette Donohoe, Megan Johnston, Marianne O’Kane Boal, Michael Roulston, Clea van der Grijn.

Opening Night Performance

Maurice O’Connell: Should I stay or should I go now

Saturday 12 September, 6pm

Maurice O’Connell will illustrate and explore the grand dilemma of Yeat’s poem. A dynamic revealing of the crisis within our relationship with landscape and place. Mans eternal hope to transcend the mudanity of life in a place of sublimity. Of course subject to regulation, permissions and state oversight. The presentation will use the entire space with the aid of ladders chalk, his tarpaulin from his woodland retreat and the wet suit he used to invade the Lake isle of Innisfree earlier this year…approx 40mins in duration mobile phones optional.

This project has been made possible by the support of Hazelwood Demesne Ltd, Yeats2015, IT Sligo, Western Development Commission and The Model.