The Act of Existing
Uillinn Dance Season 2026
The Act of Existing | Croí Glan
Saturday 7 November at 8:00 pm| 40min\1 hour | 18+ ONLY
Tickets available to purchase here.
A performance shaped by others.
In this provocative new duet by Philip Connaughton for Croí Glan, performers navigate a world of shifting rules, unexpected choices and uncertain outcomes. Blurring the boundaries between observation and participation, the work invites audiences into a live encounter where influence is never straightforward and responsibility is never neutral.
Playful, unsettling and revealing, this striking new work explores what it means to simply be ourselves in relation to others. As expectations, choices and boundaries shift, The Act of Existing asks whether the simple act of being can become something profound.
CREDITS
Choreographer: Philip Connaughton
Co-Artistic Directors: Tara Brandel, Bobbi Byrne
Dancers: Bobbi Byrne, Ben Sullivan (This work has been created in collaboration with the dancers)
Producer / LD / PM: Gearóid O’hAllmhurain
Designer: Emily Ní Bhroin
Composers: Luca Truffarelli, Federico Ortica
COMPANY HISTORY
Croí Glan is Ireland’s leading Integrated Dance Company, working with professional contemporary dancers with and without physical disabilities to produce bold, engaging high calibre productions for national and international touring and associated participatory work. Based in West Cork, CG is EDI Company in Residence at Uillinn; West Cork Arts Centre 2022-25. Nominated Best Performance Ensemble Dublin Fringe 2012 and 2016. Recent works include Tilt, an outdoor aerial dance theatre work celebrated for its approach to EDI; Armour Off a multi award winning film; and In Place presented at IMMA in 2021.
BIOGRAPHY
Tara Brandel is an award-winning choreographer, contemporary dancer, aerial dancer and contact improviser originally from West Cork. She has been choreographing extensively since 1990, with 27 works to date including 13 integrated dance works. Her integrated work has been commissioned by the Unlimited Festival/Cultural Olympiad London Southbank 2012; D-CAF Cairo; David Teevan/Junction Festival; and Propeller Integrated Dance Company in Ottawa, Canada.
Tara holds a Masters in Interdisciplinary Performance from UC Davis, where she was awarded the Della Davidson Award 2019, the Mondavi Fellowship, and the Women’s Research Center Fellowship for her show Circus, which toured to San Francisco International Arts Festival, Seattle International Dance Festival, Cork Midsummer Festival, Dublin Fringe Festival and FRESH San Francisco 2020. Her dance film CAR was Director’s Choice at the CDIFF in Toronto 2017.
Tara is also Artistic Director of Croí Glan Integrated Dance and for Croí Glan has most recently created TILT an integrated aerial dance show which has toured to Cork Midsummer, Tipperary Dance Festival and Dancer from the Dance Festival; In Place a site specific performance made at IMMA; and Unseen a multidisciplinary performance about plankton and enduring love.
Tara is currently developing an Environmental Dance training programme in conjunction with the Environmental Research Institute at UCC.
Phillip Connaughton is a celebrated Dublin-based choreographer whose work fuses creativity, collaboration, and innovation. After training locally and at London’s prestigious Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance, he has held roles including artist in residence at axis:Ballymun, associate artist with Dance Ireland, Platform 31 Artist for Dublin City Council, and Next Generation Artist for the Arts Council of Ireland. He is currently an associate artist at Project Arts Centre and a company artist with THISISPOPBABY.
In 2014, Philip founded his company with the award-winning large-scale piece Tardigrade. Since then, he has developed projects such as TROJANS (2023, Cork Midsummer Festival) and Party Scene (2022), which toured Dublin, Edinburgh Fringe, and Pumpenhaus Germany, along with Carousel: A Concert at Melbourne’s Princess Theatre.
Recent work includes No Control for Carlow Arts Festival, choreographing THISISPOPBABY’s arena show WAKE, and creating Love Songs for Project Arts Centre and Cork Opera House. Earlier, his company presented Mamafesta Memorialising (2019) and he developed acclaimed pieces like ASSISTED SOLO (2018), Extraterrestrial Events (2017), and Whack!! (2015) with Compagnie Kashyl.
Beyond dance, Philip works in theatre, opera, and visual art. His collaboration with visual artist Marie Brett on Yes, but do You Care? (2020/21) is part of the IMMA collection, and their latest project, Well, Well, Well?, is on exhibition at Siamsa Tíre. His theatre credits include The Threepenny Opera, Much Ado About Nothing, and ongoing projects with The Complex and The Abbey Theatre.
