Sierra Leonean Art: A talk in Collins Barracks Museum, 15 November

Bill Hart plays a ceremonial horn

I got the following email below from my mother recently:

I am a member of the Sierra Leone Ireland Partnership which advocates for justice and civil and economic rights there. Like others in the group I worked in Sierra Leone for some years in the 1960s. The news from Sierra Leone is not good at the moment and we all hope that with help from all their supporters they will overcome this crisis as they have others in recent times.

Bill Hart plays a ceremonial horn
Bill Hart plays a ceremonial horn

Earlier this year before the Ebola outbreak the Irish Government opened an embassy in Freetown and we decided to celebrate by arranging a talk about the Sierra Leone collections in the National Museum of Ireland. It will be given by Dr Bill Hart, an academic with a lifelong interest in West African traditional art particularly Sierra Leone. He has published many articles on this subject. In the course of his research he discovered that there were a number of items from Sierra Leone in our National Museum which had been presented to the museum over the past 200 years mainly by Irish people working in the colonial service.

You are invited to attend this talk at 11.00am next Saturday Nov 15th in the National Museum Collins Barracks. Admission is free but booking is essential at bookingscb@museum.ie

Please tell any of your friends who might be interested about this talk.

Sounds like a fascinating morning sharing a positive side of life in Sierra Leone and Irish involvement there. If you’re curious to know more about Sierra Leonean Art you should book now before places fill up.

Review: Charolais, when a cow brought a tear to my eye

Charolais Photo by Sally Anne Kelly

I’m making a concrete effort this year to get to more shows in The Dublin Fringe Festival. Maybe I’m trying to make good on last year’s (yes 2013’s) resolution to see more theatre. I am the cultural bulimic that I may or may not have spoken about during my undergrad viva voce.

Wow, that sentence is full of hot air.

That sentence couldn’t be less like the lunchtime play I attended in Bewley’s last Sunday. Charolais is full of shit. And muck. And blood. Cows. Jeeps. Kitchen tables. In other words, very down to earth, realistic. It’s a one woman show about a love triangle between a woman, her man and his cow with a little bit of his mother thrown in for good measure. Hilarious (guffawing out loud hilarious) and moving, this Show in a Bag is technically excellent as well: minimal set and lighting are augmented by extremely clever but simple costume and hair changes. Written and performed by Noni Stapleton and directed by Bairbre Uí Chaoimh the site for this drama is very much Stapleton’s body, rather than any particular stage, which she uses to great effect. This in itself is a metaphor for the action of the play which is occurring in the bodies of the main character, Siobhán, and her farmer lad’s Charolais, who are both living that which is many females’ most physically dramatic experience: pregnancy.

Charolais Photo by Sally Anne Kelly
Charolais Photo by Sally Anne Kelly

It doesn’t escape my attention that the last play I reviewed was also situated in the drama of the female body and while Charolais is no less dramatic than Between Water and Trees, it is likely a far more accessible production. Interesting though that two productions that I have attended almost by accident have focused on this topic.

If you fancy a lunch time or tea time pick me up this week (check Fringe site for times) get yourself along to this most excellent and original production.

Buíochas le mo chomrádaí ollscoile a roghnaigh an dráma íontach seo dúinn. Go raibh maith agat agus ná ligimid chomh fada arís é!

Ironically this awaited me on my return home:

Roast beef
Roast beef

Next up I hope to see Eating Seals and Seagulls’ Eggs which I understand examines, amongst other things, our relationship with the most hated woman in Irish History: Peig Sayers.

Photo credit: Sally Anne Kelly

A letter from a lunatic

This poster from Copyblogger really resonated with this lunatic. After a week where life kept interrupting my writing most of these ten points are purely aspirational for me. However, as a big fan of checklists, I think if I could tick some of those boxes most of the time my writing environment could improve.

10 Rules for Writing First Drafts

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Cén áit don chultúr sa ré nua teicneolaíochta?

Ag taifead ag ceolchoirm

In this article for Beo! I write about the place of culture in the technological age. at the very botom you’ll find link to a previous blogpost that covers some of the same ground. I kick off here with a link to a great blog post by Aonghus Ó hAlmhain about developing programmers. I also write a little about the Stop SOPA Ireland campaign.

Críochnaigh mé m’alt deiridh ar thaobh aibhéise de shaghas inar chuir mé tús le ceist mhór i leith oideachas na teicneolaíochta. Bhí roinnt plé ansin idir mé féin agus Aonghus i dtráchtaireachtaí leis an alt féin agus ar Twitter. I ndeireadh báire, scaoil Aonghus leis ar a bhlag féin inar mhínigh sé an scéal ar fad agus a thuras pearsanta isteach i saol an ríomhcláraitheora. Is spéisiúil an léargas é agus is fiú a léamh.

Sa bhlag mhír seo pléann sé na bunclocha atá de dhíth chun ríomhcláraitheoir a thógáil. Táim féin den tuairim gurb iad foighde agus stuacacht na tréithe is mó atá de dhíth ar ríomhchláraitheoir: foighde chun chur suas le cliaint dúra cosúil liomsa agus stuacacht chun leanúint leat i gcoinne constaicí loighice agus dothuisceana a bhíonn, go minic, féinchruthaithe.

Ach in ionad a bheith ag scaoileadh fúm is tharam anseo faoin droch-chaoi ina bhfuil oideachas na teicneolaíochta sa tír seo, tharraing scéal eile mo shúil le mhí anuas: is mise snag breac na teicneolaíochta amach is amach! Is mó constaic a pléadh sa nuacht teicneolaíochta le déanaí ó shocraigh roinnt comhlachtaí idirlín tabhairt faoi lá lándorcha in agóid ar SOPA. Rinne acht rialtas SAM “Stop Online Piracy Act” jab an-cheisteach de reachtaíocht cóipchirt don idirlíon. Fuair an reachtaíocht seo an-chuid tacaíochta ó na foilsitheoirí móra ceoil, scannáin agus téacs ach is beag comhlacht idirlín, ceoltóir, ealaíontóirnó foilsitheoir beag a bhí chomh tógtha leis. Is féidir an scéal ar fad a léamh is a thuiscint trí SOPA a chuardach ar líne. An fhadhb is mó a bhí ag lucht a fhreasúra ina gcoinne ná an tslí gur shocraigh lucht a dhréachta ar chasúr a úsáid in áit an chleite. A luaithe is a bhí ábhar faoi chóipceart scaipthe ar ghréasán bhí sé i gceist an gréasán sin a ghearradh ón idirlíon trí iarraidh ar ISP a chuntas a dhúnadh agus trí stop a chur le suíomhanna eile, beag nó mór, nascadh leo.

In Éirinn

Ag taifead ag ceolchoirmShocraigh brúghrúpa Éireannach StopSOPAIreland úsáid a bhaint as an spéis idirnáisiúinta seo i gcúrsaí dlí, teicneolaíochta agus cearta chunfeachtas tráthúil a sheoladh le haird a tharraingt ar reachtaíocht atá idir láimhe san Oireachtas faoi láthair. De réir mo thuisceana, tá deacracht ag an dream seo leis an mbealach ina bhfuil an reachtaíocht seo á achtú chomh maith le hábhar an achta féin. Is é bun agus barr an scéil ná nach ionann múnla gnó na gcomhlachtaí ceoil, scannáin, bogearraí is leabhair (EMI srl.) atá “ag cosaint a gcóipceart” agus comhshaoil réadúil an chultúir chéanna seo. Níl an t-airgead céanna le déanamh as an gcultúr seo a scaipeadh a thuilleadh agus tá an dinosaur ag fulaingt, ag casacht is ag rith ón scamall dubh atá ag alpadh a dhomhain. N’fheadar céard a bheas fágtha: cúpla puirtleog raithní, crogall agus armadillo? Ach fásfaidh bláthanna agus feilecáin, rud nár mhair faoi ré na ndionosár.

Abigail Smith and Sue Rynhart play origial music by Irish composersAn toradh is mó dar liom as an aird seo atá ar SOPA agus reachtaíocht digiteach, idirlín agus cóipcirt ná gur tharraing seo ceist na cruthaitheachta sa ré dhigiteach go lár an aonaigh arís. Ní haon saineolaí dlí mé ach tá deirfiúr agus triúr deartháir agam gur ealaíontóirí is ceoltóirí iad (Is mise caora bán na clainne – iad siúd na cuilthíní). Tá i measc mo chol ceathracha dearthóir faisin, ceoltóir eile, iriseoir, grianghrafadóir (atá pósta le grianghrafadóir): sin an-chuid daoine atá ag brath ar chultúr agus ar a gcearta mar chruthaitheoirí an chultúir sin le snáith a choinneáil faoin bhfiacail. Maith dom mar sin má bhraitheann tú go bhfuilim rud beag claonta ar cheist an chóipchirt sa ré dhigiteach.

Níl aon cheist gur gá le hathbhreathnú ar dhlithe cóipchirt atá de dhíth mar nach n-oireann dlí analógach don ré dhigiteach; dlí a scríobhadh in am an leabhair, na téipe agus an cheirnín. Sa ré úr seo, is féidir cóip dhigiteach fhoirfe a dhéanamh go síoraí. Nuair is féidir é sin a dhéanamh, druideann costas tairgeadh an bhunruda i ngar do neamhní. Conas gur féidir luach a chur leis an mbunrud mar sin? Ach fós tá costais ag baint le cruthú cultúir: go bunúsach, caithfidh ealaíontóir ithe agus ar thaobh eile an scéil, is gá foireann a íoc i dtionscail idirnáisiúnta an cheoil is na scannánaíochta.

Na Duartain in Aisce

Pret a mediatiserIs minic anois go mbíonn sé indéanta cóip a fháil go ‘mídhleathach’ nuair nach féidir aon ní a fháil go dleathach: féach mar shampla an clib TV ar do chuid iTunes: níl faic ann ach is féidir duartan a fháil den tsraith is nuaí ar teilifís áit ar bith ar domhan: ná caill do shobalchlár Filipíneach is ansa leat arís go brách! Nó an raibh tú féin chomh díomach is bhí mé féin faoi raon clár a bhí ar fáil ó Netflix nuair a seoladh iad le rí-rá mór anseo le déanaí? Is cinnte go luíonn bochtanas an rogha seo ag doras na gcomhlachtaí móra foilseacháin agus rialtas na tíre seo mar nach féidir leo réiteach a shocrú le leitheidí iTunes, Netflix, Spotify srl. a ligfeadh dóibh a gcatalóg a roinnt anseo. Céard é an dara rogha mar sin? Fan go dtí go bhfuil an t-ábhar ar fáil ar DD nó ar DVD?

Ach ní ceist teicneolaíochta seo ar fad dar liom. Is gá dúinn, in ionad léimt isteach ar an scéal, smaoineamh ar céard tá uainn. Tá fonn orainn éisteacht le ceol, leabhair a léamh, breathnú ar scannáin agus bogearraí áisiúla a úsáid. Tá a leithéid ann agus tá siad ar fáil go dleathach. Tá roinnt den ábhar seo agus luíonn a gcóipceart leis an duine a chruthaigh é ach tá cuid eile de agus is le comhlacht a luíonn an cóipceart. Is iadsan atá ag seasamh an fhóid i leith a gcóipceart ar son na gcruthaitheoirí agus ar ndóigh, ar maithe le leas a bhaint as an gceart céanna sin.

Tionscal Faoi Stró

Dublin City Jazz OrchestraMar sin is ceist oideachais agus moráltachta atá ann dar liom Má mhúintear go bhfuil luach ag baint le gach píosa ábhair a chruthaítear. Ach an ionann an luach a chuirtear síos do scannán nua Martin Scorsese agus céimí scannáin nó saothar Crash Ensemble agus buaiteoir X Factor? Gach seans nach gcuirfeadh formhór mór na ndaoine luach le haon cheann díobh. Sna argóintí seo freisin, bíonn an iomarca béime ar cheol: píosaí trí noiméad a d’fhéadfadh, ar lá maith, scríobh i maidin amháin, in aon uair amháin. Ach tábradaíl ar siúl ar scannáin, leabhair, bogearraí agus ar chláracha teilifíse, cnapáin chultúir a ghlacann na céadta uair an chloig ar na céadta daoine lena gcruthú. Teipfidh ar an tionscadal seo munar féidir múnla agus bealach nua a chruthú chun idirbheart an chultúir a chur i gcrích.

Conas gur féidir a leitheid a mhúineadh agus cé leis an “curaclam”? Thuig Tim O Reilly an cheist nuair a dúirt “Obscurity is the problem, not piracy”. Má tá saothar á chóipeáil, á íosluchtú, go dleathach nó mídleathach tá agat; is é an fhadhb is mó nuair nach bhfuil tóir ar an saothar; nuair nach bhfuil sé sa bhfaisean. Agus i gcomhthéacs cultúr an X-Factor, nach leor luach teachtaireacht téacs ar do chuid saothar? Nach “leo” siúd a vótáil ar a son buaiteoir an chomórtais?

Ní hé seo an chéad uair a scríobh mé faoi luach chultúir agus ealaíne agus táim cinnte go dtiocfaidh mé ar ais chuige.

Art for art’s sake?

I’ve had an interesting week of culture in the last week that really got me thinking about the value that we place on culture. Every thought I have makes me think of more values that society and individuals place on culture. For example, describing my week chronologically I could start by telling you about “The Pitmen Painters“. Every year a good friend of mine books my group of friends a set of tickets for one show in the theatre festival. She’s a friend of the festival so she gets a nice discount for us. She goes to loads of shows during the festival and really puts me, the Drama Graduate, to shame. I use my kids as an excuse for my lack of cultural get-up and go. Nice of me eh? This friend says she’ll happily spend all this money as the Theatre Festival is like her Electric Picnic. I can see the attraction and understand her analogy entirely. She’s happy to spend money on events she finds fulfilling, thought-provoking, social and very often exhilarating. And there is rarely much muck involved.

That’s the value she places on the culture she enjoys: the same value others place on a weekend at Electric Picnic.

There are many reviews of The Pitmen Painters online including on Culch.ie which reviews the production on the very same night that I saw it. I really enjoyed the show. I laughed out loud and was interested by the characters and their journeys. The play is written by Lee Hall who also wrote Billy Eliot, a play and then film which, like The Pitmen Painters, examines the nature of culture and questions whether appreciation of culture, whether being cultured, is innate or learned. The Pitmen Painters is based on the true story of a group of coal pit workers in a town called Ashington who undertake a course in painting and art appreciation. The play focuses on 6 characters from amongst the group, how not-a-professor Robert Lyon brought the group along a journey from art ignorance to feted artists in Britain between the wars. The play addresses the pre-conceived notions about what is art, a question that was common in many art forms at the time, not least of all theatre. One of the aspects of the play that I really enjoyed was its nod to theatre practitioners of the time with its Brechtian set & scene changes, but socially realistic via its costume and props then sliding into socialist didactism and educational lecture style presentation. It even took the form of a processional or pageant at one point. (I’m really dredging this up from the far reaches of my BA in Drama Study memories!)

All of these forms were used to great effect to remind us of the types of theatrical culture that these men might have been exposed to themselves. The culture that they were exposed to or not was of great importance to the story and the play’s themes. Using varied forms and breaking down the fourth wall of realist theatre could have forced the audience to think about their role in the creation of meaning, “What does it mean?” being the first question that the Pitmen asked of their not-a-Professor. What does the story of a group of uneducatated, often illiterate pitmen mean to us today who, even in the roughest and most poverty stricken lives in Western Europe, have a far greater quality of life, greater access to education and more safely guarded rights and freedom than anything of which the pitmen could have even dreamed? Does it mean that we should re-examine what we consider artistic, cultural now? Much of the play’s dramatic tension came from the fact that the value being placed on the art that they examined was far in excess of what they might hope to earn in 10 years never mind in one pay packet. One of the painters, Oliver Kilbourn, is offered patronage by a woman of independent means, Helen Sutherland, and eventually turns it down, despite conflicting advice, from his friends and his mentor, Lyon. He chooses to turn down the patronage, which is about 2 shillings extra a week than he earns down the mines, because it will create too much of a difference between him and his society. He was concerned about becoming one of Them as opposed to remaining one of Us. There were many other ideas and themes throughout the play that were just touched upon(the value of lives half-lived, the use of men, the place of women, class, war, modernism, the list goes on…) but I want to keep a focus on the value of art because the next event I went to got me thinking about it again.

(Edit the next morning: I also forgot to add that the irony was not lost on me that we had paid €32.00 each for our front and centre seats. Four weeks ago in a one income household I would not have dreamed of shelling that out on entertainment or even art!)

Creativity as a way of life was brought into sharp focus for me as a result of an event I attended on Saturday afternoon. Unfortunately although I had a notebook I forgot to bring a pen so I couldn’t take notes so please either correct me in the comments below or get in touch if I go very much astray. As part of Darklight X I attended (as I indicated in a recent blog post on The Dublin Blog). I got myself along to 2019 AC: After Copyright which was basically a public interview of Anna Troberg (also on Twitter) by Jim Carroll. Anna Troberg is the Vice-Chair of The Pirate Party. I thought Carroll did a poor job interviewing her as he maintained no objectivity. At one point he referred to lawyers as pompous and while I do not have any particular grá for lawyers I also don’t have a grá for biased stereotypes. To be fair he did push her for an answer on the final question from a member of the audience about the recent revelation that a new member of the German Pirate Party had been removed from his previous political party for an alleged child pornography conviction.

But all this is neither here nor there in my current rant! While I admire the idealism of the Pirate Party I did not hear anything revolutionary in terms of how they are going to ensure a way of life for, among many others worldwide, my artistic and musical siblings. Those most at risk are, of course, those who produce work which is digitally reproducible. Once a work of art can be reproduced digitally, it can be reproduced infinitely and any product that can be infinitely produced at no cost reaches zero value. As physical infrastructure and display technologies improve, the quality of the  reproductions will be indistinguishable from the original, certainly to the untrained eye or ear. As society inches closer to this reproduction zen, digitised culture (music, film, writing) becomes, in economic terms, worthless. The Pirate Party wish to accelerate this process by revising copyright laws in Europe and by doing away with Digital Rights Management. I agreed with Troberg’s points on Saturday that the punishment for downloading copyrighted files must fit the crime. I agreed also that royalties should only be paid to living artists as directly as possible and no third parties should gain from art they have not created (meaning that the artists employ their record labels, not the other way around). I also agree that the times they are a-changing and that many will rail against these changes. But the railing is borne of fear and the fear is, I think, mostly a fear of the unknown and artists live with many more unknowns than the rest of us, even in these straitened times. The unknown is a workable alternative and I did not hear an alternative on Saturday. I did try to make my point on Saturday but I didn’t feel like I was getting a lot of support from my fellow audience members.*

Am I like Oliver Kilbourn, the aforementioned Pitmen Painter plucked by Lady Luck from amongst his peers, am I like him, so far and so long down a mineshaft that I cannot imagine this brave new world?  Will it not become the case that choosing a creative career path will revert to the privileged classes  (conceding that it ever really included anyone else)? And what if those privileged enough to create art or patronise it suddenly take up with another? Will the artist’s (he)art be broken? In the future how much amateur guff will we have to sift through to reach the gems? (There’s gold in them hills for creators of filtering & sorting software! And I use the word creator there deliberately.) Will those gems ever be seen or heard on this island when the economies of scale do not make it commercially viable to perform here when performance becomes the paypoint? And what about the monkeys who can’t or won’t perform? Or who won’t perform in a manner that appeals to the groundlings and the toffs? Is it off to the mines with them to live a benighted life listening to endless X-Factor phenomena surrounded by advertising aimed directly at the individual consumer thanks to the generous sharing of their Facebook profile? I’m all for the shock of the new but I’d prefer it to be a nice gentle surprise of the Oooh-that’s-clever flavour.

I think doing away with copyright or shortening it to a term shorter than the average life would have grave economic implications. It would open a whole can of worms about not only how we value art but also about how we value work and how we define it; about the meaning of creativity (is not a web developer a creative? Is not a parent creative?) It would raise questions about our motivations, our self respect and our worth. As society becomes more and more automated this question will loom larger and larger as more people have more time to spend on education, leisure and the arts. There was little mention of the role of education in tackling copyright infringement on Saturday which surprised me. I do wonder if I came from a country of nine and a quarter million who spent EUR 2.1 billion on the arts as opposed to a country of around four million who spent EUR75.7 million on the arts then I might also be more idealistic about the future careers of artists.

* I also pushed on to The Geek Lounge where many of the same questions were discussed: how do digital creatives extract payment when anyone with a digital camera is a media outlet? I got chatting to a real pragmatic graphic designer at the end of this session who said, “I’m just sick of working for free.” I asked her had she been to the Pirate Party session and she said, “No but I heard there was this wan in the audience who just went on and on.” I said, “Yes that was me.” It’s all about perception eh?