Arts & Culture

MOUNTSHANNON Arts Festival is getting set to celebrate its 24th year, with an exciting programme for 2020. While the main festival take place from May 23 to June 1, organisers aim to have events running over the course of the year. Next month, for the first time ever, one of the key performances will take place later this month (March) at Glór in Ennis, as renowned pianist Alexander Ardakov makes a welcome return to Clare. Mr Ardakov, who lives in London, hails for the Volga region of Russia and as well as being an acclaimed musician is a Professor of Piano at a leading conservatoire. He played to a capacity audience in Mountshannon in 2019. The hope is that, by collaborating with Glór for a performance on March 28 – which is World Piano Day – people from across the region will get to hear him play. Roxanne Leonard who is a member of the Arts Festival committee had known …

The Clare Champion is delighted to sponsor a Book Cover design event to encourage children around the county to revisit their favourite book or discover a new one. This event is open to children aged between 5 and 10 years old. Frist Prize: €50 National Book Token and Sarah Webb books Second Prize: €25 National Book Token Third Prize: €25 National Book Token What to do: What’s your favourite story? We would love to see you draw and colour your own version of your favourite book’s cover. Make sure you put the name of the book and the author on the cover. All entries to be in The Clare Champion office before Friday, February 28 at 5pm

WHEN Wicklow playwright and actor Rose Henderson’s father was stricken by Alzheimer’s in his latter years, it meant a lot of challenges for her family, particularly her also ageing mother. She has mined the experience of her father’s last 15 years for the play Take Off Your Cornflakes, which she co-wrote with Fair City star Pat Nolan, and the two will also star in it at glór on February 21. An undeniably serious and sad theme, she says the play is also quite funny, and that humour is one of the best coping strategies for coping with something so devastating. “It as a horrendous thing to hit our family, the repercussions were just exhausting. He was a great Dad, very bright, he was an engineer and his memory had been his friend really. He just didn’t get it, that he wasn’t remembering things, even sequences. He’d look at the kettle and wondering how do you turn that on, is there …

A PAINTING by a young Clare artist and student of the Ennis Art School has been brought to life as part of a new television commercial. The painting by young Laurie Hehir, aged seven, was chosen to illustrate the promotion of the closing date for receipt of entries in the 2020 Texaco Children’s Art Competition. Her teacher, local artist Carmel Doherty told us, “This is a massive achievement for Laurie, her parents are delighted and very proud of her. She’s a very nice kid, full of beans and really creative. It’s marvellous to see her art work on the screen.” Screened here and in Northern Ireland throughout the months of January and February, its purpose will be to notify young artists, parents and teachers that the 66th Competition is underway. The commercial’s storyline centres upon Laurie’s painting of ‘Bobby’, her grandfather’s Friesian cow for which she was awarded a prize in the competition last year. Focusing on the characteristics that …

STUDENTS from four Clare schools won awards at the 56th BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition in the RDS in Dublin yesterday evening. Students from Mary Immaculate Secondary School, Lisdoonvarna; St John Bosco Community College, Kildysart; Coláiste Mhuire, Ennis; and St Anne’s of Killaloe picked up awards. The Clare students were recognised for their projects in the categories of: Biological and Ecological Sciences, Technology and Chemical, Physical & Mathematical Sciences. In total there were 17 projects representing Clare at BTYSTE 2020. Cormac Harris and Alan O’Sullivan, both fourth year students aged 16, from Coláiste Choilm, County Cork, took home the top prize for a project entitled “A statistical investigation into the prevalence of gender stereotyping in 5-7 year olds and the development of an initiative to combat gender bias”. The 2020 BT Young Scientist & Technology winners received the BTYSTE perpetual trophy and the top prize of €7,500. The lucky winners will also represent Ireland at the European Union Contest …

THE tragic loss of a number of people in the Cloughleigh area of Ennis this year has been the inspiration for the holding of a special concert of remembrance next month. Acclaimed singer / songwriter Kieran Goss will be the headline act for the concert in Cloughleigh Community Centre on December 6 which will also feature his wife Annie Kinsella, Damien Gormley, Siobhan Peoples and band The Citizens. The event, billed as a Concert of Remembrance and Hope has been organised by Fr Ger Fitzgerald along with a group of locals who knew many of those who have passed away. Proceeds from the event will be used to create a memorial to be erected outside Cloughleigh church. Fr Ger explained, “We have experienced in the last year or so a lot of people, young people in particular, that have passed away for one reason or another. We wanted to come up with something to honour their memory, to honour the …

SANTA Claus is coming to town on Friday, November 29, and will join Mayor of Ennis Municipal District, Cllr. Johnny Flynn, for the official switching on of the Christmas Lights and the launch of the ‘Christmas in Ennis’ programme in O’Connell Square from 5pm. The Mayor will be joined by two Students from Senior Infants in the Holy Family Junior school, showcasing their design & creativity in the painting of the hoarding surrounding the Christmas Tree, as Winners of the Ennis MD Art Competition. Colum McGrath will MC and Eimear Considine, AKA “the Eimearnator”, will be a special guest in an event not to be missed. Santa Claus is excited to attend the event which will also feature children’s entertainment, carol singing, hot chocolate, face-painting and much more. In conjunction with the switch-on of the Christmas Lights at 6pm, the Lions Club of Ennis will launch their Remembrance Tree intiaitive in aid of Cahercalla Hospice at 5.25pm. Road closures will …

CONTRACTS were signed on Friday by Clare County Council with Haley Sharpe Consultants to prepare a new Cliffs of Moher Strategy 2040. The consultants comprise a multi-disciplinary team who will devise the Strategy that will inform future developments at the Cliffs of Moher Visitor Experience. This is a joint initiative between Clare County Council and Fáilte Ireland. Deputy Mayor of Clare, councillor Clare Colleran Molloy, stated that the challenge of this Strategy, and its component master plan, is to deliver a world class visitor experience utilising best practice visitor management and environmental management practices to ensure the future of the natural asset is safeguarded. Clare county council Chief Executive Pat Dowling said that the opportunity is there to provide adequate facilities onsite while securing a continued contribution to the wider economy, to ensure commercial and environmental sustainability into the future, maintaining market positioning. The project value is €400,000 and will be completed over 15 months with key deliverables at scheduled …