Poetry Day 2019: A response to David Fox’s show An Altered Land

To celebrate Poetry Day Ireland 2019 and in conjunction with Poetry Ireland‘s chosen theme this year: ‘Truth or Dare‘, the Olivier Cornet Gallery, in collaboration with the poet Orla Grant-Donoghue, has invited a group of poets to respond to David Fox’s current show at the gallery.

The poets will be reading their work from:

Time: 7.00pm
Date:  Thursday 2nd May 2019
Venue: The Olivier Cornet Gallery, 3 Great Denmark Street, Dublin 1

All welcome to this free event but we advise reserving a place by emailing info@oliviercornetgallery.com.

‘An Altered Land’ is an exhibition of recent works by David Fox, showcasing a selection of the artist’s current painting practice.

While living in Belfast, Fox made paintings of the well-known Peace walls, plus other social/political ‘barriers’ that are still maintained and divide local communities. During this time, he was working part time as a driver and daily trekked from one side of the city to the other, thus gaining great insight to the back streets of the city. He travelled back and forth from his hometown of Tullamore, inspiring some of these desolate motorway and road scenes. Also, frequently travelling through the Irish border, he then began documenting various border crossings. These works intended on highlighting the vulnerability of an intangible frontier now challenged by an uncertain future. As is also evident in these paintings, the artist has a love of the great outdoors. As a frequent traveller, he often spends down time exploring rural Ireland, often hiking mountains, country walks, or other various leisure activities.

The confirmed poets presenting are Eileen Casey, Susan Condon, Catherine Ann Cullen, Doreen Duffy, Eoin Flynn, David Grant, Orla Grant-Donoghue, Brian Kirk, Éamon Mag Uidhir, Jasmina Šušić, Christian Wethered and Micheal J. Whelan.

Eileen Casey
Poet, fiction writer, journalist and publisher, Eileen Casey lives in South Dublin. Poetry and prose collections are published by Arlen House, AltEnts and New Island. Her work features in anthologies by Faber & Faber, Poetry Ireland, Dedalus, New Island, The Nordic Irish Studies Journal, among others. Literary prizes include The Hennessy Emerging Fiction Award, A Patrick and Katherine Kavanagh Fellowship, The Oliver Goldsmith Prize, The Maria Edgeworth and Cecil Day Lewis Award, among others. Her independent press, Fiery Arrow won the 2017 CAP Awards (Carousel Creates) sponsored by Dubray Books and Easons. A recently published response anthology to the poetry of Patrick Kavanagh, features over 60 poets, together with the original Patrick Kavanagh poems, courtesy of The Jonathan Williams Literary Agency.

Susan Condon
Susan Condon was awarded a Certificate in Creative Writing from NUI Maynooth. Her short stories have won numerous awards including first prize in the Jonathan Swift Creative Writing Award. Publications include Ireland’s Own Anthology, My Weekly, Boyne Berries 22, Live Encounters, Flash Flood Journal, Spelk, Flash Fiction Magazine and The Flash Fiction Press. https://susancondon.wordpress.com/

Catherine Ann Cullen
Catherine Ann Cullen is an award-winning poet, children’s writer and songwriter, and recipient of a prestigious Kavanagh Fellowship 2018/19. Her three poetry collections include The Other Now: New & Selected Poems (Dedalus 2016). She is joint winner of the Joyce-Cycle Poetry Prize 2019 and won the Camac Song Contest 2018 and the Francis Ledwidge Award 2016 and 2009. She is Goodbody Writer in Residence at St Joseph’s School, East Wall, for which she won the 2017 B2A Award for Best Use of Creativity in the Community. Her latest book, All Better! (Little Island, 2019), poems for children about illness and recovery, is reimagined from Latvian. She has published two other children’s books with Little, Brown in the US. She is part of Revolting Women: A Rebel Cabaret in the Dublin Gay Theatre Festival, May 6th to 11th. https://catherineanncullen.wordpress.com/

Doreen Duffy
Doreen Duffy studied creative writing and poetry at Oxford online, UCD & NUI Maynooth. Published internationally, she won The Jonathan Swift Award and was presented The Deirdre Purcell Cup at Maria Edgeworth Literary Festival. She was longlisted, Over the Edge New Writer of the Year 2017, shortlisted, Francis MacManus Competition 2017, her story ‘Tattoo’ was broadcast on RTE Radio One. http://doreenduffy.blogspot.com/

Eoin Flynn
Eoin Flynn is a visual artist who uses writing as a part of his practice. Most recently, he was invited to show a series of his psychogeographical ‘Landscrapes’ at the Liverpool Independents’ Biennale 2018. It was only through the encouragement and example of Platform One Writers’ Group that he dared to turn a pen to poetry. He was raised in County Monaghan by a Kavanagh-adherent teacher of English and now works as a freelance designer of books and more.

Orla Grant-Donoghue
Orla Grant-Donoghue’s first collection of poetry The Frayed Heart (Fiery Arrow Press) was published in 2018. Her haiku poetry on Ulysses was included in installations by artist Nickie Hayden at the Olivier Cornet Gallery in 2018 and at the James Joyce Centre in 2019. She wrote and recorded two poems “The Reflective Eye” and “Chroma” as part of the 2019 Poetry M’app project to celebrate Poetry Day Ireland http://www.poetrymapp.com/ Her poetry is anthologised in outlets such as Circle & Square (Fiery Arrow Press), WOMb: Celebrating Mothers (By Me Poetry) and more recently The Lea-Green Down (Fiery Arrow Press). She has broadcast memoir pieces on RTÉ Radio 1 Sunday Miscellany and published in the Irish Times (Family Fortunes). http://www.orlawrites.com

Brian Kirk
Brian Kirk is a poet and short story writer from Dublin. He was shortlisted twice for Hennessy Awards for fiction. His first poetry collection After The Fall was published by Salmon Poetry in 2017. His poem “Birthday” won the Listowel Writers’ Week Irish Poem of the Year at the An Post Irish Book Awards 2018. Recent stories have appeared in The Lonely Crowd and online at Willesden Herald New Short Fiction, Fictive Dream and Cold Coffee Stand. His story Festival was longlisted for the Galley Beggar Press Short Story Prize 2017/8. He blogs at www.briankirkwriter.com

Éamon Mag Uidhir
Dubliner Éamon Mag Uidhir first published a poem in 1969 in the broadsheet Book of Invasions. He edited Icarus and TCD Miscellany while at TCD during the 1970s, currently edits the quarterly poetry ‘narrowsheet’ FLARE, fitfully curates the online sonnet repository at www.sonnetserver.com, and has had poems published in many magazines. He made his reading debut in the 2015 Poetry Ireland Introductions Series and has since read at many sessions and open mics in Ireland and also in Paris and Barcelona.

Jasmina Šušić
Jasmina Susic (Dharma Rain Jazz) was born in Croatia. She has published three books of poetry: Nebo boje peperminta (Peppermint coloured sky), Liber, Belgrade, Serbia 2010; Osjecam se kao space shuttle (I feel like space shuttle), Slusaj najglasnije – Bratstvo dusa, Zagreb, Croatia, 2012;
Atomske bombe s Plutona (Nuclear bombs from Pluto), DADAnti, Split, Croatia, 2014. She travelled around Europe performing her poems and sharing her screams and finally settled in Dublin, where she still lives, dreams and runs the poetry & spoken word event Just Words in The MART Gallery, Rathmines. She is also dedicated to her spiritual journey through reiki, astrology, tarot and channeling. Her rants were seen and read in Germany, UK, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia and Ireland.

Christian Wethered
Christian Wethered has been published in the UK and Ireland. He features in the ‘Best New British and Irish Poets 2018’, and was also selected for the ‘Poetry Ireland Introductions Series’. His debut pamphlet, ‘I Don’t Love You’, was shortlisted for the Melita Hume Prize, while his poem ‘Lethe’ was submitted for the Forward Prize 2018 (Best Poem Category).

Michael J. Whelan
Michael J. Whelan is a historian and soldier-poet living in South Dublin, Ireland. He deployed as a United Nations Peacekeeper with the Irish Defence Forces to the conflicts in Lebanon and Kosovo in the 1990s. He holds a Masters Degree in Modern History from NUI Maynooth and is keeper of the Air Corps Military Museum and collector of oral history for the Military Archives of Ireland Oral History Programme. His poems are published Australia, Paris, Mexico, USA, UK, South Africa and Ireland and included in ‘And Agamemnon Dead: An Anthology of Early Twenty First Century Irish Poetry, (Paris 2015) & ‘The Hundred Years War: Modern War Poems’ (Bloodaxe UK) 2014. He was selected for the Poetry Ireland Introductions series and was 2nd Place Winner of the Patrick Kavanagh & 3rd in the Jonathan Swift Awards. He has featured on T.V. and radio and at literary festivals and his debut collection ‘Peacekeeper’ was published in 2016 by Doire Press. He is currently working towards his second collection ‘Rules of Engagement’ to be published in 2019.
http://www.doirepress.com/writers/m_z/michael_whelan/
and www.michaeljwhelan.wordpress.com