Arts & Culture

CLARE artist Thomas Delohery has been selected as a finalist for a prestigious Australian portrait prize. Delohery’s portrait of actor Jared Harris is in the running for the Percival Portrait Prize 2022 which carries a $40,000 prize. The final exhibition opens on April 22. Harris whose credits include Chernobyl, Mad Men and The Crown among many others sat in person for Delohery in Limerick City in 2015. Delohery did two drawings from life of Harris and has done various paintings of the actor since returning to Australia. The last one he only finished a few months ago which is now in the running for the Percival prize. “Jared posed a bit of a challenge on the day of the sitting,” Delohery explained, “He is one of the hardest working Actors in Hollywood so he has trouble sitting still, a lot of nervous energy. “I knew what I wanted from the sitting and Jared takes direction really well which explains why …

BÉIDH go leor imeachtaí ar siúil i gContae an Chláir le haghaidh Seachtain na Gaeilge. The international celebration of the Irish language takes place until March 17, with events all over the county. The theme is ‘Amuigh Faoin Aer’, the Great Outdoors’. Numbers at all events will be limited so prior booking essential. All events free of charge and taking place at lunchtimes, roughly 12.30-2.30pm. If you fancy a round of ‘iomándraíocht’ (magic hurling) in Ennis, an amhrán at the Irish Seed Savers in Scariff, a siúlóid at the holy wells of Clare, or even a gentle Chi Gong seisiún at the Vandeleur walled gardens, then Clare County Council has something for you in this year’s Seachtain na Gaeilge programme. Diarmuid Lyng, hurling star and TG4 presenter, will present his new concept, ‘iomándraíocht’, a playful meditation on an ancient sport, open to anyone, a hurl will be provided for everyone attending. At the Irish Seedsavers in Scariff, Úna Ní Chiosáin …

TO celebrate the 60th anniversary the West Clare Drama Festival the critically acclaimed professional production Seven Ages of MAM will be coming to Doonbeg for one night only next Wednesday, March 9.  Billed as Mam’s hilarious and thought provoking, take on motherhood, sexuality, grief, infidelity, ageing, love, lust and loneliness, this new, laugh-out-loud funny yet poignant one woman play stars Pauline O’Driscoll. You may know Pauline from television as Pat Shortt’s wife in the IFTA nominated drama series Smalltown, or the hospital doctor trying to talk some sense into The Young Offenders in the Christmas Special of the popular TV series and yes that’s her cheekily swiping right in the Bord Bia Fish Advert too! Having been nominated best new play at Brighton Fringe in 2019, the play written by Mark Evans and Pauline only began touring Ireland at the end of 2021 (because of Covid ) and has been wowing critics and audiences alike and garnering 5-Star reviews along the way. “We’ve been blown away by the audience response. People are hungry for this type of show, something real but funny, something that makes them laugh and brings a tear to their eye. You just …

Jan Carson, who appears at Ennis Book Club Festival, tells Owen Ryan about her efforts to reflect all sides of the protestant experience WHILE they share the same island, it’s safe to say that most people at the Ennis Book Club Festival will know little of the culture of Antrim Presbyterian communities. Jan Carson, whose latest novel The Raptures has won widespread acclaim, is from such a background and it’s where she set the book, which tells the story of 11-year-old Hannah, in the summer of 1993. Hannah lives in the fictional village of Ballylack, and over the course of the summer her classmates begin to succumb to a violent and mysterious illness. Also in the village, tempers simmer, panic escalates and long-buried secrets threaten to emerge. The Republic was nowhere near as liberal as it is now in 1993, but the community Jan grew up in was far more conservative than anything the vast majority of people in Clare …

The West Clare Drama Festival in Doonbeg will be celebrating its 60th anniversary this March with plans to mark the milestone, writes Conor Clohessy. Commenting at the recent AGM, Chairperson John Keane said: “We are delighted to have reached our Diamond Jubilee. This is a significant milestone which has been achieved and maintained through the hard work and commitment of committees passing the mantle of keeping drama alive down through the years. “We are fortunate to still have three members of the original committee – Marie Shanahan, John Igoe and Murt McInerney.” Only a couple of weeks ago, a fourth original member passed away; Theresa McMahon had been the Secretary for over forty years, and Public Relations Officer Rita McInerney said that her passing will be poignant within the celebrations this year. In the middle of the festival on March 8, a dinner is planned to specifically mark the sixtieth anniversary and reward those who have worked hard in the …

Frank Golden launches his new collection ‘If You Tolerate This’ at Ennis book Club Festival. Here he writes of his love for barren and beautiful places IRAN had been a place of interest ever since the early eighties when I lived and worked in Kuwait. I had gone there to earn a little quick money and to pay off some debts. This was in 1981/82 during the Iran/Iraq war. The regular shelling of the port of Basra was audible in the coastal compound we lived in further down the coast. Each day we would be driven into the desert to Al-Wafrah which was in the neutral zone between Kuwait and Saudi. This was the area where US troops dug in prior to their offensive against Sadaam Hussein in 1990. Kuwait was an unattractive society on all kinds of levels but the desert was beautiful. The first serious rain in a decade fell that first Spring and the desert bloomed virtually …

CLARE’S Van Morrison fans will be delighted to hear that he will be performing live in the region this summer. The Belfast blues legend has announced news of a special outdoor performance at King John’s Castle, Limerick on June 29. With one of the most revered catalogues in music history and his huge talents as composer, singer and performer Morrison’s achievements loom large. Tickets go on sale at 9am this Friday via ticketmaster.ie.

A BOOKER prize winner, one of the most lauded writers in the English language today, John Banville says that every one of his books is a failure, and the act of writing leaves him constantly disappointed. He will be at Glór on Saturday, March 5, as part of the Ennis Book Club Festival, appearing alongside fellow author Kevin Power. Originally from Wexford, Banville’s first novel Nightspawn was published in 1971. His Revolutions Trilogy was published between 1976 and 1982, while his 1989 novel The Book of Evidence was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the Guinness Peat Aviation Award. In 2005 his thirteenth novel The Sea won the Booker Prize.  In addition, he publishes crime novels as Benjamin Black — most of these feature the character of Quirke, a pathologist based in Dublin. He has won numerous awards and was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2007, while Italy made him a Cavaliere of the …