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MAKE is an artist development programme and residency initiative of Cork Midsummer FestivalDublin Fringe FestivalProject Arts Centre and Theatre Forum. It is open to artists for the purpose of generating new performance work outside of the traditional writer-led model at all career levels.

The 13th MAKE residency will run from 29 November – 3 December 2021. Following on from MAKE 2020, this year’s MAKE will continue in an online format, providing valuable time and focus for performance makers, wherever they are. International mentors will be on hand with support, provocation and guidance via digital channels.

Our mentors are Andy Field, Mojca Jug, and Ragnheiður Skúladóttir and our participants are Luke Casserly, Cristian Cruceru, Erin Fornoff, Beth Hayden, Shiva R Joyce, Ciaran MacArtain, Cathal McGuire, Michelle O’Rourke, Joanne Ryan, Mike Ryan, Martin Sharry, Róisín Sheridan-Bryson, Fergus Wachala-Kelly and Louise White.

MAKE mentors

Andy Field
Andy is an artist, writer and curator based in London. He has created performance work on his own and with a variety of collaborators since 2007. Andy creates formally unusual projects that invite us to consider our relationships both to the spaces we inhabit and the people around us. A key strand of Andy’s practice involves making work in collaboration with young people, with the aim of enabling children to meaningfully participate in the civic discourse of the cities and towns in which they live. Alongside his artistic practice Andy has written for a number of publications and is the co-director of the artist-led project Forest Fringe. In 2012 he completed a practice-based PhD with the University of Exeter, exploring the use of public space in the New York avant-garde performance movements of 1960s and 70s.

Mojca Jug
Mojca was born in Ptuj, Slovenia. She finished her primary and secondary education in Ptuj and from 1995 to till 2000 studied Special education at Faculty of education in Ljubljana. In June 1998 she started to work in Bunker as coordinator and administrator of the first edition of international festival of contemporary performing arts  Mladi Levi.

She has worked for Bunker ever since and her major preoccupations within Bunker are:

  • coordinating and artistic programming of Bunker’s venue, Stara elektrarna (an old power station)
  • programming and producing the festival Mladi levi
  • mentoring younger staff and volunteers
  • in the past years she was also the producer of Betontanc, Sanja Nešković Peršin, Jette Ostan Vejrup, Lyrical moments in the city…

She was also the executive director of production house Fičo balet (2003 – 2005) and is producing a cycle of contemporary piano concert by Milko Lazar , as well coordinating a jazz program in café Repete, Ljubljana.

Her programming work extends beyond Bunker and is invited as a curator and programmer to numerous festivals and platforms.

She lives and works in Ljubljana.

Ragnheiður Skúladóttir
Ragnheiður was born and raised in Reykjavík. She has a BA in theatre and multimedia from the University of Iowa and MFA from  University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. Following her studies she moved to New York City where she lived and worked for four years. In 2000, following a 13 year stint in the U.S, she moved back to Reykjavík after being offered the position of Dean of Department of Theatre and Dance at then newly founded Iceland Academy of the Arts. Ragnheiður worked at the Academy until 2011, initiating new programs in contemporary performance practices and contemporary dance. In 2008 she co-founded the LÓKAL International Theatre Festival, an annual event that presents new local and international work in the field of theatre and performance. She was artistic director of the Akureyri City Theatre from 2012 to 2015 and manager of Iceland Dance Company 2016-2019. She is currently the director of Festspillene i Nord-Norge / Arctic Arts Festival. Ragnheiður has years of experience as teacher and mentor (at IAA, University of Syracuse, Academy for Scenekunst in Fredrikstad, MAKE Ireland). She has also worked with various artists/groups as a producer and served as a critical friend (Kviss búmm bang, Dance for Me, Shalala, Margrét Sara Guðjónsdóttir).

MAKE participants

Working individually (10 people): Luke Casserly, Erin Fornoff, Beth Hayden, Shiva R Joyce, Cathal McGuire, Mike Ryan, Joanne Ryan, Martin Sharry, Róisín Sheridan-Bryson and Fergus Wachala-Kelly.

Working in Duos (4 people): Ciarán MacArtain and Cristian Cruceru, Louise White and Michelle O’Rourke.

Luke Casserly
Luke Casserly is a theatre artist and director from Longford. His work to date has brought audiences on the DART to explore our national relationship to the material of plastic through sound (Mould Into Shape, 2019); sparked a national conversation around Ireland’s biodiversity decline through planting a network of wildflower meadows across Ireland (1000 Miniature Meadows, 2020); and documented the passing of time on a Midlands bog for an online audience over 6 days (Live Bog Project, 2020). Most recently, he collaborated with Shanna May Breen to create Root (2021) for the Dublin Theatre Festival, a performative inquiry looking at the importance of trees in our ecosystem sparked by the fact that Ireland currently has the lowest tree cover in the EU at just 11%. Luke holds a BA in Drama and Theatre Studies from Trinity College, Dublin. He is currently a Resident Artist at FringeLAB and Associate Director of Pan Pan Theatre.

Erin Fornoff
Erin Fornoff has published a poetry collection Hymn to the Reckless (Dedalus Press) shortlisted for the Shine/Strong Award, and a chapbook Folk Heroes (Stewed Rhubarb Press).  Called a ‘story-telling poet’ and ‘as close to music as poetry gets’ she has performed her poetry at hundreds of festivals and events including three times at Glastonbury Festival, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, commissioned for RTE Culture Night at Dublin Castle, and a national Irish tour with poet Hollie McNish. She has featured on BBC3 and her poems have been included in Best New English and Irish Poets 2016.  Her poem ‘Hymn to the Reckless’ featured on posters and curriculum nationwide for Ireland’s National Poetry Day. She has received Literature bursaries for her novel and play from the Irish Arts Council and her essays have been featured in Rogue, The Irish Times, Architecture Ireland, and Winter Papers.

Beth Hayden
Beth Hayden is an artist, exploring community, queerness and Irishness through contemporary performance making. Recent work includes: Abundance (Dublin Fringe Festival, 2021); Utopia or Bust: Manifestos for a New Era (Dublin Fringe Festival, 2020); Glitter Hole: Protest! (Irish Museum of Modern Art, 2020); Pucaparty (Dublin Fringe Festival, 2019); and The Fianna Fellatio Party Launch (Judges Choice Award winner, Dublin Fringe Festival, 2018).

Shiva R Joyce
Shiva R Joyce is a Writer and Printmaker who looks for stories in the periphery. She is developing her poetry and print collection exploring BrownSkinIslanderGal realities, entitled ‘Talanoa,’ at Oxford University.
Shiva has led Fighting Words Creative Writing and BEAG Early Years Sensory Arts programming with Graffiti Youth Theatre. She is a current Transform Associate Artist with Mermaid Arts Centre and WEFT Studio Artist with the Dublin Fringe Festival, and in her time as Features Editor for Good Day Cork worked to amplify underrepresented voices in the community, as well as spearheading the Dilkusha Award: the first Black & Brown Women/Transwomen specific year long Arts Scholarship in Ireland.

Cathal McGuire
Cathal is a Dublin-based theatre maker, dramaturg and facilitator. Under the company name Game Theory, he makes performances for all ages about the mysteries of the contemporary world. These including projects about the cultural history of the internet, Always Alone Together (Dublin Fringe Festival) and Welcome To The Memory Palace (Scene + Heard and Live Collision festivals.) Writing credits include the plays Short Lives, The King Sweeney and the radio play W.B. Yeats: Paranormal Investigator.
Most recently, Cathal directed MOOP, a show about playfulness and discovery for audiences aged 5+ as part of the Dublin Fringe Festival’s Young Radicals strand where it was nominated for Best Ensemble. He is currently developing his latest project for young audiences with the support of Branar’s Tiny Shows and Roscommon Arts Centre’s Hatch residencies, and via his participation in the Baboró Festival’s Grow Pathways to Production scheme.

Mike Ryan
Mike Ryan is making, experimenting and collaborating, in Cork City. He earned his BA in English and Music, as well as his Postgraduate Diploma in Ethnomusicology, from UCC.
In 2016, he was selected for Fishamble’s director mentorship programme. In 2017, he was assistant director on Corcadorca’s award winning production of Far Away, by Caryl Churchill. In 2018, Mike was selected to take part in Tessellate, and was mentored by Julie Kelleher at the Everyman, and Lorraine Mae at Cork Midsummer Festival. In 2019, he was shortlisted for Abbey Works, the Abbey’s competitive emerging playwright programme. In 2020, he was awarded two Gap Days by Mermaid Arts Centre.
Most recently his work has explored storytelling (Haunted, 2016), interpersonal relationships (Clowns On Fire, 2017, & Running and Talking, 2020), and neurodiversity (Rut in E Major, current).

Joanne Ryan
Joanne is a Limerick-based theatre artist with a track record of making work in socio-political contexts that is inspired by her own life and by the intersection of art and health. She is currently a Six in the Attic artist at Irish Theatre Institute and an Artist-in-Residence at Ormston House.

Her debut solo show Eggsistentialism premiered in 2016, was part of Culture Ireland’s 2017 Edinburgh Showcase and has toured extensively since. It has won the Lustrum Award for Best Festival Moment and Best Storytelling Bouquet at Edinburgh, The Melbourne Fringe Tour Ready Award, The Sydney Fringe Critics’ Pick Award, the Strollers Network Touring Award and was nominated for Best Performance at Melbourne Fringe.

In addition to her work as a maker Joanne has also worked as performer with a number of companies and in 2014 was nominated for an Irish Times Theatre Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role.

Martin Sharry
Martin Sharry has worked in theatre since doing a Masters in Drama and Theatre Studies at NUI Galway, 2008. He wrote and performed his one man show I Am Martin Sharry in Dublin Fringe 2012. Martin’s work has been presented in Galway Theatre Festival, Dublin Fringe and the Dublin Theatre Festival. He is also interested in live art and installation work – he’s participated in Live Collision, GIFT and Tulca.
www.martinsharry.com

Róisín Sheridan-Bryson
I am a Queer writer, director, and theatre-maker usually found in Dublin and Edinburgh. I graduated from Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh in 2019 with a First Class Honours in Drama & Performance, and am currently studying for an MA in Theatre Practice at UCD and the Gaiety School of Acting.
Since graduating I have been produced and commissioned by Stellar Quines as part of their Letters To and Make Do and Mend projects. I was also featured in their recent How To Change The World zine. As part of the Make Do and Mend project in 2020, I was commissioned to give free online workshops on Autobiographical Theatre and the creation of alter egos in performance. This project was a development of my own work as a drag artist, and of my undergraduate dissertation on the same topic.
I am taking part in this year’s Gap Day project, and will be supported by the Mermaid Theatre in Bray. Additionally, I was longlisted for the Scottish Portrait Award and most recently I was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize for Poetry.
Currently I am developing performance work on Queer love, time travel and alternate universes, and my experiences living in Edinburgh as an international student.

Fergus Wachala-Kelly
Fergus is an award-winning illustrator, animator and actor, currently based in Belfast. His work has a distinct style that blends the literal with the surreal while having a specific focus on mental health. Having studied Architecture at Queen’s University, Fergus moved to Rotterdam to further his training in the commercial world of building design. It was here in one of the architectural capitals of the world that that he rediscovered his passion for free-flowing illustrative design. Since returning home, Fergus has had his work featured in the international publication, ‘Drawn 4: Leaders in Contemporary Illustration’; had his work displayed in LUSH, Oxford Street, London; created posters and album covers for a wide range of theatre makers and music producers both locally and internationally; been named an award-winning artist by the D31 art gallery in Doncaster; and has worked with multiply charities to create artwork to help promote mental health awareness. Recently Fergus finished illustrating his first children’s book commissioned by EastSide Partnership in Belfast. Fergus’ work has also featured in theatre and performances across the country. He recently designed and animated illustrations for ‘HEAVE’ which featured in this years Dublin Fringe. He will also be taking part in this years Outburst Arts Festival as part of the ‘New Queer Works’ showcase at the Brian Friel Theatre, with his creative partner Colm McCready. You can find more of his work on Instagram; @f.e.w.k or on his website; fewk.art.

Ciarán MacArtain and Cristian Cruceru

Ciarán MacArtain
Ciarán is a poet, theatre and performance artist from Glasheen in Cork City. He is Artistic Director of Strive Theatre, creator and manager of The Crossover, a member of The Choke Collective and a board member of Obheal. He has written poetry prolifically since 2011 and has performed his work extensively both nationally and internationally. His work has been published in a variety of journals, zines and anthologies. He loves going on creative journeys with other artists to explore what unique and interesting things can be made in collaboration. His practice as a theatre maker encompasses performance, directing, producing, design, writing and facilitation. Strive Theatre have produced 7 original plays and embarked on 3 national and an international tour under his artistic direction. See www.strivetheatre.ie.He is the creator and manager of multi-disciplinary performance art project The Crossover. This project was initiated in early 2018 and brings together artists working in different disciplines to devise a 3-act piece of performance art. Each piece is built of individual sections of 5-10 minutes based on collaborations between two or more artists, which are then woven together through a series of visual and lighting cues. There have been 5 Crossover events thus far; in Dali & Gala in March 2018, Dali CORK (Nov 2018), The Kino (as part of First Fortnight 2019), at Hazelwood Stage, Electric Picnic in September 2019 and most recently, in Charles Fort in Kinsale in Sept. 2021. Ciarán has acted as director, lighting designer and collaborator for each of these events. The project produced The Crossover – Connect in 2020/21, a four part video series produced in association with Garden Collective, based on cross-cultural collaborations between Irish and Portuguese based artists, thanks to funding from Cork City Council Arts Office.

Cristian Cruceru
Cristian is an Audio/Visual artist based in Cork City. His visual background is in the Fine Arts with a recent masters in Film and Screen Media.  Contact with music came primarily through his work as lighting and visual designer, seeing him perform live visuals for many international electronic music acts including Christian Löffler and Jon Hopkins.

With the recent hiatus on live events, he has been developing his own music compositions and exploring intersections with experimental narratives and abstract visuals. Working within the field of an expanded idea of cinema, his practise is an ever developing collaboration between different media and processes.

Louise White and Michelle O’Rourke

Louise White
Louise White is a theatre and performance maker celebrating over 10 years’ progressive arts practice. She experiments with dramaturgical models to create original audience experiences that ask questions about community and the human condition. Each project is devised around a core topic and interdisciplinary collaboration is vital to her practice. She takes influence from the contemporary moment, drawing from pop culture, sociology, therapeutic exercises, classic literature and post-dramatic art. Louise has developed projects with dancers, culinary artists, composers, visual artists, opera singers, older people and children. Works of note: This is the Funeral of Your Life; 6 venue National Tour 2019 & Project Arts Centre 2017. Mother You 2015; Large scale performance for 11,000 sq ft commercial unit. Way Back Home 2013; WINNER Spirit of the Fringe. From the Heart 2010; NOMINATED Spirit of the Fringe, Best Off-Site & Best Design.

Louise is also a facilitator and educator. She trained at The Oxford School of Drama and Trinity College Dublin & she has an MA in Socially Engaged Art from NCAD. She has worked with Laois Youth Theatre, Mountrath Youth Theatre, Dublin Youth Theatre, The National Women’s Council of Ireland, The SAOL Project, The Abbeyleix Bog Project and The Lantern Centre’s International Women’s Group.

www.louisewhiteperformance.com.

Michelle O’Rourke
Michelle O’Rourke is a singer based in Dublin, Ireland. Empowered by a background in Baroque vocal music, and ever-fascinated by the role of voice in the ritual of performance, Michelle maintains a diverse portfolio of work: from contemporary classical music, to devised interdisciplinary projects, to holistic vocal coaching.

Michelle’s natural sound, unaffected expressivity, and technical ability make for an interpreter of rare dynamism. Several Irish composers have created work specially for her, including: Andrew Hamilton, Simon O’Connor, Karen Power, Judith Ring, Anna Murray, Benedict Schlepper-Connolly, and Garrett Sholdice.

Since 2016, Michelle has worked on a number of interdisciplinary projects, including work by Louise White Performance, Rob Heaslip Dance, Tonnta, theatre-makers Oonagh Murphy & Maeve Stone, and choreographer Catherine Young. In 2019, Michelle was co-curator of Listening Bodies, a durational performance event presented by Tonnta and Kirkos.

Michelle has featured on a number of critically acclaimed releases, including: Left Behind: Songs of the 1916 Widows (with Simon O’Connor, Ergodos label) and Andrew Hamilton: Music for People (with Crash Ensemble, NMC label). Michelle can be heard contributing to Inside Out, the recent release by Dutch violinist Diamanda La Berge Dramm (Genuin label).

Current and upcoming activity includes: the development of new performance collaborations, including a new duo with flautist Lina Andonovska; solo albums featuring work by Andrew Hamilton and original self-composed material; and an album featuring folk-inspired ensemble music with Ficino Ensemble.

michelleorourke.ie.