Performing North Leitrim

Performing North Leitrim is a community-based performing arts collaboration between Leitrim Sculpture Centre & The Glens Centre in Manorhamilton, North County Leitrim. This ongoing collaborative partnership explores site-specific engagements with ‘place’ through a creative collaboration between the two Centres advancing cross-disciplinary support and participation through the sharing of resources, knowledge, expertise and skills. Drawing on the idea of collective creativity within the visual and performing arts traditions - including theatre, performance and installation art, street performance, story-telling, sound and music generation, and the performance of the everyday - the project develops opportunities for artists to collaborate with local communities on a cross artform basis using the resources of the two Centres. (Sean O’Reilly, LSC 2019)

Performing North Leitrim was financially supported by Creative Ireland under the Creative Counties project organized by Sarah Searson, Director, The Dock, Carrrick on Shannon, 2019.

Project 1: Traces
Traces explores the historical resonances of place through the use of different found materials, collected stories and local songs. During the first part of the project artist Sandra Corrigan Breathnach recorded 9 stories from the HSE Kilgar Active Age Group relating to the history of specific locations and buildings across the town. These stories formed 9 boxed sound-installations positioned at the relevant locations and activated by the passing public. The boxed-housing for these speakers was designed and built by local artists in collaboration with the artist. The installations were complimented by a series of print workshop in the LSC Community Pop-Up Shop on Main street. Photographic details of old buildings in the town were used to inspire a series of lino-cuttings made by members of the Womens Centre, Manorhamilton. The lino-cuts were subsequently exhibited at the LSC gallery along with a series of willow sculpture and a crotchet-performance piece involving 4 members of the Womens Centre. The exhibition involved participation from members of the Kilgar group and focused on how memory, materials, movement and song can influence our conception of place. The final work in Trace took place at the Samhain Parade on Nov. 1st at Manorhamilton Castle. This consisted of a special choral work written by theatre director Declan Drohan and performed by members of the Manorhamilton Choir. The performance coincided with a large burning Willow Dome made by the specialist Creel maker Tom O’Brien in collaboration with members of the Womens Centre and the artist.

Culture Night 20 sept, Gallery and Town Soundscape Presentation
1st November, 2019 , 8.15pm Manorhamilton Castle Choral Performance Work

Project 2: The Return Of The Lesser Known Púca Ó Ruairc’ & ‘The Tin Tabernacle Of Tunes
The performing artist Little John Nee developed a video project with the North Leitrim Men’s Group entitled The Return of the Lesser Known Púca Ó Ruairc. The Púca Ó Ruairc is a tired old soul who has been damaged and disempowered by past experiences, trauma, and his own outmoded attitudes. His return to his old haunts and the incidents he encounters allows him to be radically transformed and to have his integrity as a Púca shapeshifter restored by these experiences in a town that has never been better.

A central motif in the finale of the “Púca Ó Ruairc” story was the “The Tin Tabernacle of Tunes”. The “Tin Tabernacle” is a small tin shed structure built by the Mens Group and inspired by the Chapel of Ease at Lurganboy. The structure was accessible to the public, where up to five people could enter and play music together on metal drums/chimes/instruments tuned to a pentatonic scale which allowed five strangers with no musical experience to play together spontaneously and in harmony. Alongside this main structure was a number of additional smaller sound sculptures all of which could be played simultaneously by the visiting public.

The Tin Tabernacle of Tunes occured at the LSC Gallery on Friday November 15th 5 – 8pm and Nov 16th 11am-4pm, 2019.