COUNTY Clare’s artistic and cultural creativity has been highlighted on IrishCentral.com, a US-based website with more than 3.5 million visitors per month and a social media following in excess of 750,000.
The website, the leading news source for the Irish diaspora around the world, is partnering with Creative Ireland, the Government’s five-year initiative, to place creativity at the centre of public policy.
As part of this programme, IrishCentral featured the 2017 Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann. It also looked at Sparks Youth Film Festival, which offers animation and film workshops from October to November to encourage creative expression in young people aged six to 18 years, as well as the Inisowiacy-Polish Folk Dance Group, who will be organising workshops in Ennis in September, showcasing the culture and traditions of folk dancing in Poland.
Commenting on the partnership from New York, Mike Rich, IrishCentral CEO, said, “IrishCentral.com is the leading Irish website in the US, with a loyal readership base in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Boston, Philadelphia and across Irish America. We are at the very heart of the global Irish community that is rightly renowned for its creativity and genius.
“Our team here is dedicated to connecting the Irish with everything that’s going on back home. There’s a growing excitement across the global Irish about the potential and promise of the Creative Ireland initiative and a burning desire to find out more about what’s happening in County Clare and right across the country,” he said.
Creative Ireland is a five-year initiative, running from 2017 to 2022, which places creativity at the centre of public policy. It is built around five pillars: enabling the creative potential of every child; enabling creativity in every community; investing in our creative and cultural infrastructure; Ireland as a centre of excellence in media production and unifying our global reputation.
Details of the programme are available online at Ireland.ie
A native of Ennis, Colin McGann has been editor of The Clare Champion since August 2020. Former editor of The Clare People, he is a journalism and communications graduate of Dublin Institute of Technology.