Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation Heather Humphreys TD and Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Josepha Madigan TD at the launch of the AR Programme with Andrew Hetherington and Charley Carroll

Business to Arts in partnership with the Creative Ireland Programme’s National Creativity Fund announced that they are seeking expressions of interest from businesses that would like to develop new (or significantly enhance their existing) CSR activity through the AR Programme.

The AR Programme will cover a broad spectrum of activity and opportunities for artists and companies. Host companies will offer artists a working environment or a structure for engagement with their organisation’s CSR Programme and a selected local community organisation.

Up to €7,500 will be provided for the creation (or enhancement) of three AR Programmes in a Corporate Social Responsibility context. Selected programmes must involve a minimum of eighteen-months of community engagement, staff engagement or work-place creativity activities by the host companies and artists. Priority will be given to AR Programmes where a significant portion of the associated activity occurs in regional areas. 

At the announcement, Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Josepha Madigan TD., commented:

“The National Creativity Fund enables the Creative Ireland Programme to activate, enable and support a range of innovative initiatives which have creativity and wellbeing at their centre.  As a Programme which has collaboration and community engagement at its core, I am particularly pleased that this initiative of Business to Arts, which encourages and enables active partnerships between business, artists and local communities, is one of the priority initiatives of the Creative Ireland Programme in 2019.

Through initiatives such as this Business to Arts artist residency, we want to encourage ambition, risk and innovation by harnessing the incredible talent and passion of our artists, our creative communities and local business innovators.  I look forward to following the progress of this initiative over the coming weeks and months and to sharing the outcomes of the projects when they come to fruition in 2019.’

Minister for Business, Enterprise and Innovation Heather Humphreys TD also commented:

“Through Ireland’s national plan on CSR, ‘Towards Responsible Business’, the Government’s vision is that Ireland be recognised as a Centre of Excellence for responsible and sustainable business practice.  I want businesses to realise that CSR creates a meaningful win/win for business, by supporting and protecting the community and environment in which they operate; while at the same time making businesses more competitive. I warmly welcome this collaborative CSR initiative by Business to Arts with the Government’s National Creativity Fund, and in particular its regional focus.”

Andrew Hetherington stated:

‘Having piloted a number of artist in residence programmes in the Dublin Docklands area under the Docklands Arts Fund, we are excited to expand to other regions across Ireland. Through the AR Programme we look forward to working with businesses, artists and local community groups, fostering an environment of collaboration, learning and wellbeing through creative practice.’

FAQ’s and application details can be accessed here.

Artist Deirdre Byrne with Vincent Harrison, Managing Director, Dublin Airport Business to Arts DAA Picture Conor McCabe

Today, Dublin Airport and NCAD have announced that artist Deirdre Byrne, a NCAD graduate has been selected to have her artwork displayed at Dublin Airport. The work, ‘High Flyers’ which is displayed on a 7m x 2m billboard at one of Dublin Airport’s boarding gate piers, is part of a partnership between Dublin Airport and NCAD known as Creative Journeys. Dublin Airport held an open call this summer inviting anyone to submit a piece of work which would be displayed in Dublin Airport over 1 year. Over 100 entries were received.

As an Irish artist from Wexford, based in Spain, Deirdre was inspired by her journey’s returning to Dublin: “I often look out and try to spot landmarks below. When I learned of the open call, I thought this familiar landscape would make a good image for the billboard. The kites in the image that fly over the coastline were inspired by the work of the Wildlife Control Team in Dublin Airport that use kites depicting birds of prey to deter actual birds from the runway.”

At the unveiling of the work, Deirdre Byrne noted:“I’m really delighted that my work was selected by NCAD, Dublin Airport, and Business to Arts for the Creative Journeys Billboard Project. My work has never been printed to such a large scale before and it felt great to see the finished billboard in place at a busy spot in Terminal 1 where it will be seen by so many people passing through.”

Vincent Harrison, Managing Director, Dublin Airport said: “We are delighted to feature Deirdre’s work here in Dublin Airport as part of our Creative Journey’s partnership with NCAD and Business to Arts. The finished piece is hugely impressive, and it is notable how many passengers are stopping to take it in. The various installations that form part of the Creative Journey’s partnership are individually and collectively transforming the visual landscape of Dublin Airport for our passengers. Dublin Airport provides the first welcome and last goodbye to Ireland for tens of millions of people every year and ‘High Flyers’ is already a firm favourite among both passengers and staff – our wildlife control team included.”

Supported by Business to Arts, the Creative Journey’s partnership will deliver a full public art programme at Dublin Airport over the next two years. Seven sites have been chosen across the airport campus to host works within Creative Journeys. The sites are located in landside and airside areas to allow both departing and arriving passengers to view the works of art. This enables members of the public who are at the airport but not travelling to view some of the installations. For full details see below.

(LtoR)Padraic Rowan, Andrew Hetherington, Gerard McNaughton, Ruth McCarthy, Clare Monnelly, Rory Nolan & Jamie O Neill at the TileStyle showrooms. Picture by Shane O’Neill, SON Photographic

For our final 30^th Anniversary event, we collaborated with TileStyle our long-term patron. This event included performances by Rory Nolan, Clare Monnelly & Jamie O Neill and bass-baritone Padraic Rowan. Guest were taken on a theatrical promenade through the TileStyle showrooms with each performance located in a different section – bathrooms, wood rooms and stone rooms.

Introduced by Tony Award winning, Artistic Director of Druid, Garry Hynes, Rory read a emotive excerpt from Tom Murphy’s ‘A Whistle in the Dark’. This was followed by beautiful performances of ‘Non piu andrai’ from Le Nozze di Figaro and ‘The Lark in the Clear Air’ by Jim McNaughton/TileStyle Bursary winner, Padraic Rowan, accompanied by Mairead Hurley. Our final performance of the evening saw Clare Monnelly and Jamie O Neill perform scenes from ‘Minefield’, a new work by Monnelly who is also a past McNaughton/TileStyle bursary winner.

Here are some thoughts from Andrew on the occasion:

“My sincere thanks to all our performers and contributors tonight to Gary Hynes and Rory Nolan and the team at Druid Theatre Company and to the talented Clare Monnelly and Padraic Rowan. 

For me, Rory’s reading from ‘A Whistle in the Dark’ is particularly relevant. The play was written and developed between 1959 – 1961 by Tom Murphy and made the audience think about the impact of power structures on Irish society at the time. Move forward almost 60 years and the arts and cultural industry continues to refocus our attention on the importance of diversity, inclusion and equality in modern Ireland. Over recent years, the Business to Arts team have been proud to support initiatives such as Waking the Feminists, Women on Walls, Gaze Film Festival by securing financial and other supports to develop their mission’s and to make Ireland a more inclusive and equal society.

As you may know, this year is Business to Arts 30^th Anniversary year and we have hosted a range of events in corporate settings. For this our final event of 2018, a special thanks to our hosts, TileStyle and our Chair, Ger McNaughton, Michele, Robin, JP and Ruth for everything they do to support Business to Arts. I also feel it is important to remember our former Chair Jim McNaughton. I did not meet Jim, but everyday, I am reminded of his impact on and importance to Business to Arts.

In an article from 1991 about Jim he discussed art and his involvement with Business to Arts. He said he had “started visiting places and seeing sights that he had never seen before”. He had spent too much of his life by being so “completely involved with the world of work and that there was this wonderful world waiting out there” in the arts. I believe each one of us know what he meant by that.”

Jamie O Neill & Clare Monnelly perform excerpts from ‘Minefields’. Picture by Shane O’Neill, SON Photographic

Business to Arts’ next member’s event will take place on February 6^th at 14 Henrietta Street.