How and to what effect do we feel weather? How does it make us feel? What is the role of technology in the shared affective atmospheres central to both weather and scenography? Increased industrialization has impacted on climates, and passionate groups have responded vigorously to this situation. This installation uses a range of technologies to synthesize sensory experiences of weather that are co-created by participatory audiences. In doing so, it aims to probe the interrelationships of weather, technology, atmosphere and collective affect. Responding to the themes of weather and technology, curators Matthew Nevin and Ciara Scanlan (MART) used the following question as their initial provocation: “How can technology be used to disarm our notion of weather in space, a place people may never go?” Nevin and Scanlan then worked alongside visual artists Brian Duggan and Stephanie Golden and composer Tom Lane. The installation is accompanied by Noelia Ruiz and Siobhan O’Gorman’s film piece which also draws on these themes. Placing the visitor as a performer, the installation features elements of the weather and of its disruption/disturbance. We wish to examine the power of weather over human behavior and vice versa, creating shared experiences through changes in atmosphere and one’s place in space. We want to explore the relationships between weather and the creation of different performative environments. How does it inspire people and imaginatively evoke places? How are distinctive atmospheres created and what makes them palpable? In addition to engaging with the public, this work incorporates multiple disciplines in order to facilitate our audiences’ inhabitations, interactions and performances within an in-door, technologized sensory environment. While some visitors might become responsible for the disruption of our ‘weather’, others may respond to its disturbance. As such, we wish to promote shared sensory experiences that are both distinctive and transient, created anew each time through the diverse actions of our participants. Although the collective, participatory experience is central to our work, convergent and divergent activities/emotions also point to the agency of individual participants and their active roles in engaging with, responding to and shaping the atmosphere. We hope to stimulate consideration of how human behaviour and technologies influence space and weather, reassessing what it is to hold power over weather.
Matthew Nevin and Ciara Scanlan are co-directors of the Irish-based visual arts organization MART As a curatorial partnership, they have curated over 50 exhibitions nationally and internationally.
- Matthew Nevin
Specialization: art manager, set designer, media artist, scenographer, curator, visual artist
Education: MA, Art in the Contemporary World; BA, scenography and film & TV.
Awards: Culture Ireland, Arts Council Ireland
Additional information: He is working in Ireland, the UK and the US. He completed a degree in film & TV and scenography from UWA in 2006, and a masters degree in “Art in the Contemporary World” from NCAD in 2013.
- Siobhán O'Gorman
* 1983
Specialization: theatre theoretician, journalist, teacher, I am also a theatre historian, drawing archival materials to write the first history of Irish scenography.
Education: PhD, National University of Ireland, Galway, 2012 – thesis: Negotiating Genders from the Page to the Stage
Collaboration with theatres: Co-directed Bernard Field’s “The Juggler” at Galway’s Town Hall Theatre in 2012. Adjudicator for the Jerome Hynes One-Act Play competition in 2013 and 2014. Plays were publically staged at NUI, Galway. Co-organiser of the Dublin Theatre Festival’s “Performing Space” symposium (2014).
Teaching activities: I have 5 years of teaching experience. In my role as lecturer at NUI, Galway (2012-2013), I taught courses on 20th-century international practitioners, modern Irish drama, early modern drama, Shakespeare’s tragedies, and contemporary approaches to staging Shakespeare.
Participation in other important exhibitions: As co-organiser of the Dublin Theatre Festival’s “Performing Space” symposium, I facilitated and helped garner funding for an exhibition of the Pan Pan Theatre’s work, co-curated by Noelia Ruiz and Ros Kavanagh.
Continuing collaboration with directors: Directed Bernard Field’s The Juggler at Galway’s Town Hall Theatre with Suzanne Harbison (2012) Provided feedback to directors as part of Jerome Hynes One-Act Play competition (2013 and 2014) Facilitated key networking forums for directors and designer
Awards: Visual and Performing Arts Fund, Trinity College Dublin (2015); Theatre and Performance Research Association Interim Event Funding (2015); Visual and Performing Arts Fund, Trinity College Dublin (2014); Conference Ambassador Financial Support, Fáilte Ireland (2014); Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellowship, Irish Research Council (2013; 2-year award)
Additional information: She was a Government of Ireland Postdoctoral Fellow in 2013–2015. She is currently receiving funding from the Irish Research Council to conduct a full-time, two-year monograph project entitled A Stage of Re-Vision:
Scenography in Irish Theatre 1950–1990.
- Ciara Scanlan
* 1982
Specialization: art manager, visual artist
Education: MA, Art in the Digital World
Awards: Culture Ireland & Arts Council Ireland
Additional information: Ciara Scanlan works primarily with video, performance and web-based media. She is interested in the ever-present force of the mass media and its ability to both unify and segregate society.
- Noelia Ruiz
* 1975, Barcelona
Specialization: theatre director, theatre theoretician, teacher
Education: PhD, Contemporary Creative Processes in Contemporary Irish Theatre & Performance, University College Dublin, 2013; MA, Directing for Theatre, University College Dublin, 2007; ATCL Acting, 2006; BA, Philosophy, National University of Spain, 2003
Collaboration with theatres: Continuing collaboration with theatres: Co-organiser and digital branding manager for Performing Space, the first symposium on scenography in Ireland presented as part of the 2014 Dublin Theatre Festival. Project Arts Centre, Dublin, 2010. Performance reading group convenor with Willie White (Artistic Director, Dublin Theatre Festival), 2011. This monthly group was a space for conversation about topics relating to contemporary theatre and performance, from practical to theoretical approaches.
Teaching activities: Part-time lecturer and tutor, School of English, Drama & Film, University College Dublin; BA modules: Contemporary Theory of Performance, Postmodern & Postdramatic Theatre, Theatre Contexts & Conventions; MA modules: Issues & Perspectives in Theatre & Performance, Research and Analysis in Drama & Performance and Issues & Perspectives in Drama & Performance. Workshops in contemporary acting techniques (BA & MA)
Participation in other important exhibitions: Producer of Pan Pan Theatre’s participation in the Objects section of PQ2015. Props by Pan Pan’s scenographer and co-artistic director, Aedín Cosgrove, from The Seagull & Other Birds (2014). Co-curator of an exhibition on Pan Pan Theatre’s performance des
Continuing collaboration with directors: - Pan Pan Theatre – Producer, digital branding/social media & researcher (process documentarist and analyst) - Oscar McLennan – Kiss of The Chicken King (commissioned by Adelaide Festival 2014). Production Co-ordinator & Digital branding/social media man
Awards: Arts Council, Travel & Training Award for ImproEvents, Prague, 2011; Project Brand New GENERATION, Project Arts Centre, Dublin – a week-long residency involving 15 artists, from a variety of disciplines, spanning 3 countries and 50 years. Together, they work for one week exploring Historical Futures, Future Histories, and the Present Day. Project Arts Centre, Dublin, 2010; MAKE 2010, Annaghmakerring, Ireland: A 9 day residential laboratory by The Cork Midsummer Festival, Dublin Fringe Festival, Project Arts Centre and Theatre Forum, committed to the generation of new performance work. Convenors: Ant Hampton, Florian Malzacher and Vivi Tellas, 2010; Leonardo da Vinci Mobility Programme in Commedia dell’Arte, Padova, Italy, 2006.
Additional information: Noelia is a theatre-maker, part-time lecturer at University College Dublin, producer and digital branding manager. Recent directing projects include Animus (2013), Better Loved From Afar (2011) and The Cappuccino Culture (2010), Dublin Fringe Festival.
- Brian Duggan
* 1971, Perth
Additional information: He lives and works in Dublin. His work is included in the permanent collections of the Hugh Lane Gallery, the OPW national collection and the Irish Museum of Modern Art. He has undertaken residencies in ISCP New York, IMMA, CCI, Paris.
- Stephanie Golden
* 1989
Specialization: visual artist
Education: IADT Dun Laoghaire, Visual Arts Practice
Additional information: She graduated from a BA course in Visual Arts Practice in Dun Laoghaire in 2012. Her work is primarily installation-based, and she has recently expanded her practice into set design for live performance.
- Tom Lane
* 1984, Bristol
Specialization: composer, sound designer
Education: University of Oxford, London Royal Academy of Music, Berlin University of the Arts, University College Cork
Collaboration with theatres: Abbey Theatre, Dublin, Gate Theatre, Dublin
Teaching activities: University College Cork, undergraduate teaching
Continuing collaboration with directors: wayne Jordan, Conor Hanratty, Maeve Stone
Additional information: He lives and works in Dublin. Previous work includes: HARP, A River Cantata (Ulysses Opera Theatre), Between Trees and Water (Painted Bird, nominated for Best Sound Design, 2014 Irish Times Theatre Awards),
Twelfth Night.
