Sligo Events

27th – 29th July: The Irish Cloud Festival in Sligo and Leitrim

Gavin Pretor-Pinney, author of The Cloudspotter’s Guide, and founder of the Cloud Appreciation Society will once again speak at The Irish Cloud Appreciation Society Cloud Festival. This year the Festival will take place in the northwest of Ireland, in counties Sligo and Leitrim.

The Festival will bring together a collection of sky gazers, astronomers, meteorologists, artists and naturalists with an ambition to gain a better understanding of the world around us.

More info: http://www.ticas.ie/

A Day Fit For A Poet – the launch of Yeats Day on June 13th

The inaugural Yeats Day was launched last week in Sligo at the Yeats Building in Hyde Street.

Celebrating the legacy of WB Yeats in Sligo – his spiritual home – is a wonderful event for Sligo and for Ireland. WB Yeats always made clear his love of Sligo and the role it played in his written work over many decades. The Yeats Day event will be on W.B. Yeats’ birthday – Wednesday June 13th 2012. On that day, Sligo will set the spirit of Yeats free in his spiritual home.

The schedule of events for the day will run from dawn to dusk and embrace places and spaces in Sligo that were dear to Yeats. The day will encourage the community – young and old – to come out on the streets – to enjoy music, poetry, readings and much more – in celebration of a unique poet in a unique place. Yeats Day is a collaborative event – locally with Sligo County Council, Sligo Borough Council, County Library, the Hawkswell, the Factory, the Model, the Western Development Commission.

It is funded by the Department of the Arts and Failte Ireland and is the first time that WB Yeats birthday will be celebrated in this way in Sligo. On the day the Abbey Theatre, the National Library and the National Gallery will all take part locally in Sligo and the Japanese ambassador Mr Atsumi will be in Sligo to celebrate also.

Minister Deenihan will officially inaugurate the day at Drumcliffe where WB Yeats is buried. The event is supported by the esteemed Yeats Society. Its president Joe Cox said today that he is “delighted to see Yeats shared in the wider community. He is a wonderful poet and we in Sligo are proud of him and want to share his work and raise his profile – especially among children.” Senator Susan O’Keeffe said “this is an idea I had many years ago – to bring the love of Yeats onto the streets and for the community to be able to share this wonderful poet in many different ways. I am delighted to be part of a collaboration that will allow everyone – young and old – to celebrate this man and the contribution he made to Sligo and internationally to English literature. “

Regional director of Failte Ireland Martina Bromley welcomed the launch and added that “it is part of a new Yeats season that will see Yeats in Sligo across the summer. There is wonderful work taking place that will offer theatre, music and poetry that everyone can enjoy. Yeats Day will kick off that season in style.”

Programme of Events
11:00am – The Yeats Society
A special birthday celebration at the venerabel Society on Hyde Bridge.

11:30am – The National Library Collection
Exhibiting for the first time. The National Library brings some of its precious Yeats collection to the Pollexfen Building in Wine Street, home of WB Yeats’ mother’s family shipping business. Sligo IT will also exhibit some of it Yeats collection.

12noon - The Japanese Connection
Ambassador Atsumi opens a Yeats-inspired art exhibition by Irish-based Yoko Akino at The Hamilton Gallery on Castle Street.

1pm – 7pm  The Abbey Theatre performs at the Hawkswell.

2pm  The National Gallery celebrates at The Model

4:30-6:30pm - Happy Birthday Mr Yeats
The people of Sligo and beyond, young and old, gather in O’Connell Street to meet the Fiddlers and Fairies of WB Yeats imagination, to share birthday cake and balloons enjoy poetry and music on this very special day. Youth drama and visual arts group Branching Out and musicians from Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann will join the festivities. Local school children will decorate shop windows with their birthday cards.

7:15pm – Party Piece 
Your chance to perform and enjoy – song, music, reading, poetry in Hargadons with Shaun Purcell.

8:45pm – No Crows at Dusk
No Crows end the birthday with beautiful music at Sligo Abbey, Abbey St.

Plus: The Living Statue, music, choral Yeats, competitions, birthday cards, ‘Poem in my Pocket’

Follow Yeats Day online at yeatsday.com | @YeatsDay2012 | #yeatsday |

Summer exhibitions programme at The Model

The Model is delighted to present its summer season of exhibitions.

Currently showing until June 17, All Humans Do is the biggest Irish group show to have traveled to New York in over a decade.  Curated by Aoife Tunney, the artists in the show reflect on the everyday experiences of materials, of literature, music, our interaction with knowledge and the incomprehensible phenomena of aspects outside of ourselves, which we accept but may not understand.

Two separate exhibitions drawn from The Niland Collection, entitled Yeats & Son unveil simultaneously the artistic developments of the Yeats Family, through the work of John Butler Yeats and his son Jack B. Yeats.

Also showing this summer is one of the most exciting exhibitions of the year,  Up The Walls which will open June 30 and involves eight contemporary artists from home and abroad, all of whom are exploring painting in new and innovative ways.  It runs until September 1.

www.themodel.ie 

April 29th: The Sligo Antiques and Collectables Fair at The Clarion

via www.sligochampion.ie

The Sligo Antiques, Collectables and Vintage Fair will take place at the Clarion Hotel on Sunday, April 29th.

The 12th Fair at the Clarion will broaden the scope of the event. In addition to the usual range of quality antique and collectables items, the Fair will offer, for the first time, a range of vintage fashions and accessories from the middle years of the 20th century.

A number of the top vintage and collectable dealers will be introduced to the Sligo public. With the recent resurgence in interest in fashions of yesteryear, individual items of vintage clothing and accessories are highly prized.

The Fair opens at 11a.m. and closes at 6.00p.m. Admission is €3.50 (€2.50 for students and OAPS). Children under-16 are admitted free and welcome when accompanied and supervised by an adult.

May 1st – 31st: Bealtaine at The Model

‘Celebrating Creativity As We Age’ 

The Model Sligo is delighted to present a series of events ‘celebrating creativity as we age,’ for Bealtaine 2012.

Bealtaine is a nationwide festival that promotes a greater participation of older people in society.  The programme features a documentary about the intrepid travel writer, Dervla Murphy, a studio visit and talk with the artist, Michael Wann, a screening of ‘Estella ‘with an introduction from director, Steve Woods, a reading from Dermot Healy and lots of free tours of The Model’s forthcoming Niland Collection exhibition ‘Yeats & Son.’
Full programme info and booking: www.themodel.ie or larabyrne@themodel.ie

Bealtaine Artist Talk: Johnnie Lawson
Free/25 Apr. 2012, 1pm

Kicking off the Ruby Blue series, artist Johnnie Lawson will give a talk in The Model’s Education room on 25 April at 1pm. Lawson has recently completed a residency at The Leitrim Sculpture Centre. His exhibition, ‘Once I was a Child’ is a poignant portrayal of older people’s memories of childhood. The Artist has been invited by The Model to share his experience of the development of his work.
Tea and scones will be provided. Booking is advised.

Bealtaine & Ruby Blue screening: Seeing The Hidden
Free/28 Apr. 2012, 1pm
A collection of short films commissioned by Sligo Arts Service for Bealtaine Sligo 2010. It explores the cultural wealth of the areas of Killavil, Skreen, Ballinafad, Gleniff Horseshoe Area (Ballintrillick) and Sligo Harbour. Artists collaborating on the project are filmmaker Caroline Clancy, visual artist Catherine Fanning, writer Maura Gilligan, photographer James Fraher and writer & poet, Dermot Healy.

Bealtaine Launch: Film & Talk. Who is Dervla Murphy?
€4/Sat. 05 May 2012, 5pm
Dir: Garret Daly, Ire. 2011, 60mins
Dervla Murphy is Ireland’s most prolific travel writer. A fiercely independent woman who turned her back on societal conventions at a time when few were as brave, this documentary explores the woman behind the words. Featuring footage from her home in Lismore; this documentary allows us a new insight into Dervla’s unique life. The programme features interviews with her daughter Rachel Murphy, broadcaster and travel writer Manchán Magan, her publisher John Murray as well as Dervla herself.  This screening includes a talk with the director, Garret Daly.

Bealtaine Artist Talk: Michael Wann – Artist studio visit
Free/Wed. 09 May, 2012. 1pm
Artist, Michael Wann, is a prolific artist, who explores the surrounding North Sligo landscape through the medium of charcoal, water and pencil. The studio visit and talk will provide a unique insight into the processes of his work.  The talk will coincide with his solo exhibition in The Model throughout the month of May.

Bealtaine Film & Tour: Estella
Sun. 13 May, 1pm
€4/ Dir: Steve Woods, Irel., 2000, 60min
With six major works of the artist Estella Solomon’s in the Niland Collection, now the documentary ‘Estella’, brings her amazing life as an artist and revolutionary to life, with interviews from Brian Fallon and Hilary Pyle. The screening will be followed by a tour of the current Niland Collection exhibition ‘Yeats & Son,’ examining the works of John and Jack B. Yeats.  The screening will begin with an introduction by director, Steve Woods.
(Estella’s portrait of Jack B. Yeats is part of the Niland Collection.)

Bealtaine Film with Reading by Dermot Healy: The Writing in the Sky
Sat.19 May 2012, 5pm
€4/ Dir: Garry Keane. Irel., 2011, 54 min 4
An award-winning Arts Lives documentary, this is the story of the outstanding poet, biographer and novelist, Dermot Healy.
The documentary introduces you to Dermot Healy’s home and its surrounding landscape, to his horse and dog and to the extraordinary flight of 3,000 migrating barnacle geese.
This is a film to warm the heart on a late Spring evening and is followed by a reading with Dermot Healy, renowned poet and Sligo-based writer.
“I think of Dermot Healy as the heir to Patrick Kavanagh” – Seamus Heaney

Free/ Tours
Sun. 13 May. 2pm
& Thur. 24 May at 1pm
Bealtaine tours of the current Niland Collection exhibition ‘Yeats and Son’, examines the work of John Butler Yeats and his son, Jack B. Yeats.  This exhibition looks at the artistic achievements of both father and son.  This informal tour is an opportunity to enjoy the works and the stories behind them.
Booking recommended for all events.
For any more additional information, see www.themodel.ie or contact us on 071 914 1405 or email: larabyrne@themodel.ie

Sligo Tidy Towns Fundraiser & Volunteer Call Out

Sligo Tidy Towns are doing a bag packing fundraiser in Tesco on
Thursday April 26th, Friday 27th & Saturday 28th .

They are looking for volunteers to help us raise funds for Sligo Tidy
Towns, all funds raised will go back into making Sligo a nicer place
to live in and visit.

If you are available and willing to donate 2 hours of your time please
let us know. Email: sligotidytowns@gmail.com

Date                           Time
Thursday 26th      4-6pm
6 – 8pm

Friday 27th            4 – 6pm
6-8pm

Saturday                 11- 1pm
  1 – 3pm