Film and sound project that explores food, farming and climate crises comes to Kilkenny

Food production, farming and climate change are under the spotlight as part of a thought-provoking and exciting new sound and visual art project that began in The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art at Trinity College Dublin before embarking on a tour around key parts of rural Ireland, including Kilkenny.  

The Quickening is a nationwide project and the culmination of three years of research which included sculptural plantings, workshops and performative feasts held in the City Assembly House in Dublin and the Butler Gallery in Kilkenny under the banner ‘Sustainment Experiments.’ It runs at The Douglas Hyde until June 23 and encompasses a Walls & Halls Tour of rural Ireland from April 18  to May 4. It comes to The Powerhouse in Callan on Wednesday April 24, starting at 7pm, supported by Butler Gallery, Kilkenny. 

After the screening, writer and academic Patrick Doyle will respond to issues raising by The Quickening. His discussion of the film will be informed by his book, Civilising Rural Ireland: The co-operative movement, development and the nation-state, which explores the history of the co-operative and the role played by farmers in shaping everyday life across rural communities.

Presented for the first time in a major commissioned solo exhibition, The Quickening has now evolved into a must-see, must-hear multi-channel film and sound installation that explores the actions that must be taken around farming, food production and consumption in the face of present ecological and climate crises. 

Voices are central to creating engagement, renowned artist Deirdre O’Mahony,  explained. “The starting point has been multiple conversations between farmers, scientists and politicians at organised feasts that generated open and frank conversations about food production and current challenges.

“These were transcribed for a libretto, developed with writer, Joanna Walsh, along with some of Ireland’s most exciting singers and musicians, among them Siobhán Kavanagh and Ultan O’ Brien, each with a distinctive pitch, style, pace and vocabulary.”

She continues: “The sound we’ve created will communicate entangled human and non-human activities; sowing and harvesting, extreme weather and the hum of solar and wind farms, along with concerns about the reality of farming life; the volatile demands of the market, food regulation and policies.

“Within the soundscape, other voices are also being heard; breathing animals, insect and soil creatures, the assembled, complex mix of voices, accents and sounds, collective roots that unsettle ideological positions of purity and righteousness.

 “The Quickening represents a polyvocal response to the most urgent questions affecting land and its inhabitants, giving voice to the invisible protagonists that shape our earth's future and an idea of being-in-common that encompasses all earthly inhabitants,” Deirdre concluded.   

 The Quickening will tour to six rural locations in the East and South East, among them barns, farms halls and community centres. The Walls & Halls Tour runs from April 18 to May 4 and visits Rathanna Community Hall, Carlow; Coolydoody Farm, Waterford; The Powerhouse, Callan, Kilkenny; STAC Chapel, Davis Road, Clonmel, Tipperary; Foresters Hall, Aughrim, Co. Wicklow; Blackbird Cultur-Lab, Foulksmills, Wexford.

The Quickening was commissioned by The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art and is supported by Arts Council/An Chomhairle Ealaíon; The Douglas Hyde; Butler Gallery, Kilkenny; Carlow Arts Office; Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; Kilkenny Arts Office; Kunstverein Aughrim; Lismore Castle Arts; South Tipperary Arts Centre (STAC); VISUAL Carlow; Wexford Arts Office; and Wexford Arts Centre.

Research supported by Fire Station Artists’ Studios Residency and Sculpture Award; Kilkenny Arts Office/Centre Culturel Irlandais Residency Award, Paris; National Sculpture Factory, Cork; Butler Gallery Soil Residency, Kilkenny; Visual Carlow residency; UCD Parity Studios Residency in partnership with UCD Earth Institute and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council.

Deirdre O’Mahony’s The Quickening was co-produced by Georgina Jackson,  Éilis Lavelle and Deirdre O’Mahony. Libretto developed by Deirdre O’Mahony and Joanna Walsh with singers/performers Branwen Kavanagh, Michelle Doyle, Siobhán Kavanagh, Ultan O’ Brien and Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin. Film and photography by Tom Flanagan and Saskia Vermeulen. Sound recordist and audio post mix is John Brennan and the editor is Michael Higgins.