Bealtaine Interactive Exhibition at Uillinn 2023 
Celebrating creativity as we age
1 to 30 May 2023
Corridor Galleries

Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre is celebrating this year’s national Bealtaine Festival with a multidisciplinary exhibition, showcasing many of the art programmes and projects with older people that take place at the Centre and throughout the region. The Bealtaine Festival takes place each May throughout Ireland and involves thousands of participants in every art form.  The ancient festival of Bealtaine or Beltane, marked the midway point between the spring equinox and the summer solstice, and heralded the start of Summer. 

The Last Train to Nowhere – A series of 6 small pen and ink drawings, poems and a short film, made during Arts for Health sessions. ‘The Last Train to Nowhere‘ is a multi-disciplinary collaboration film exploring memory and imagination. Coordinated by composer and film maker Justin Grounds, with facilitation by artists Sarah Ruttle, Sharon Dipity and writer Elizabeth Murray, the film draws on poetry, drawings, musical soundscape and film made by participants in the Arts for Health program in Bantry, St. Joseph’s Unit, Schull and Skibbereen Community Hospital .

Graffiti (From Cave Painting to Graffiti Part 2.) – These mixed media pieces, created by residents of Skibbereen Community Hospital facilitated by artist Sharon Dipity, were inspired by graffiti from around the world. Over a series of Arts for Health sessions, participants explored Gelli printing, collage, rubber-stamp printing and stencilling to create these many layered compositions of colour and texture, adding their own personalised ‘tag’ to the pieces, to express their personality and the free spirit of the work.

Doorways – From midway into the month a new series of twelve paintings will be added to the exhibtion by Arts for an Active Mind Group exploring doorways, both as a physical object and metaphoric will be added to the exhibtion. The paintings will share both their developing skills as painters and a slight reflection of each individuals personalites within this dynamic and diverse group of creative older women based in West Cork. Arts for an Active Mind is a weekly session facilitated by Paul Cialis that has taken place at Uillinn on Monday mornings since 2002. Anyone over 55 can join, as long as there is room at the table.

Here’s where public can interact…

Salt and Pepper, LGBTQ+ Older People’s Project with Toma McCullim – In PRIDE month 2022, Uillinn announced, Artist, Toma McCullim invitation to people, over 50 who identify as lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transsexual, queer, funny or weird, and all those who wiggle around those labels – to come together. Over a five week period 21 participants contributed to a collective art project creating collective artworks which muse on our life journeys resulting in two large group works.

Creative producer and ‘artivist’- an activist artist, Toma McCullim is back in studio from 2 to 13 May. With the two large artworks and a chalk board framing the entrance to her studio, McCullim is inviting peers to continue the conversation and reflect on past and present challenges to celebrate older rainbow generation commonality and achievements.

Toma Open’s her Studio on Tuesdays and Saturday where she invites you to pop in to a tea and coffee after market social space. If this is a project you  identify with then look out for more events you can book into.

The Line has Two Sides – You can also drop in on Bealtaine Artist in Resident Sharon Dipity, for Thank Uillinn it’s Friday! Dipity intends to investigate the dynamic between the drawn line and body movement in the context of her own experience of aging. Both embracing and transcending the limitations of an old injury, she will explore and create her own fluid vocabulary of mark-making, movement and gesture.

Sharon is opening her studio and inviting the public to drop-in and collaborate with her in drawing and mark-making. Focusing on drawing from the inside out and a variety of drawing tools she will be exploring different ways to draw. Join her to create a small drawing to add to a collective wall-piece.
No drawing experience necessary. Perfect for those who can’t draw a straight line.
Friday’s from 5th to 26th May, 10 am – 4.30pm

For something more formal you can sign up to a workshop on Tuesday 16 May, where she invites participants to explore mark-making, movement and writing. Working with our own bodies to create drawings from the inside out, we will move and draw using a variety of drawing tools. How does it affect the way we draw if we translate our movement and body experience into mark-making?
No experience necessary. Wear comfortable clothes, that you are happy to get dirty. Book here: https://www.eventbrite.ie/e/bealtaine-roots-shoots-the-line-has-two-sides-with-sharon-dipity-tickets-603497004787 

Bealtaine Artist in Residence 2023 is in partnership with Cork County Council and Roots & Shoots workshop is supported by Age & Opportunity

All events are FREE of charge. To book or find out more contact:
info@westcorkartscentre.com or 02822090

Uillinn West Cork Arts Centre delivers this programme in partnership with Bealtaine festival organisers Age and Opportunity and Cork County Council