Misneach (Courage): A monumental celebration of youth
John Byrne is currently in the process of creating a spectacular large bronze equestrian sculpture for Ballymun. This new work will reference traditional classical equestrian sculpture yet Byrne will subvert this tradition by placing the figure of a teenage girl from Ballymun as the rider on the horse. This is a major new work, which will be one of the most significant new bronze works to be sited in Ireland in recent years.
The sculpture will be unveiled September 2010.
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Mick O’Kelly
Urban Space and Models of Sustainability
Mick O’Kelly has developed a proposal to build scaled architectural models of the old Ballymun tower blocks that will be fully functioning Beehives. The project seeks to explore the interplay of positions and relationships of parallel models of societal structures. There is an obvious parallel between the Imperial Empire and the hierarchical social structure of the Bee Colony. The status of the Queen as head supported by the workers, guards and drones resembles that of the Monarchy. There are also parallels to systems of Capitalism where the production of honey becomes the capital of the hive and the beekeepers draw of the honey as surplus capital for profit. Questions of value, labour and capitalism are inherently at play. Equally models of a spatial organisation utopian urbanism are present.
This project offers an interesting and engaging arena for research across diverse borders and disciplines to examine and question sustainable models of societal structures and new forms of urban imagination. The anticipated working structure for this project emphasises collaborative and participatory forms of practice.
Living in urban spaces is complex and demands a matrix of spatial organization in which to build a sustainable future. This includes urban planning, healthcare, education, transport infrastructure, clean water, sanitation, housing and energy. We have moved beyond sustainable thinking as an alternative lifestyle to positions of necessity to avoid apocalyptic disaster.
Mick O’Kelly is interested in developing strategies for sustainability that provide flexibility, adaptability to building new urban imaginings for how we produce the social spaces we inhabit. This can be envisaged as sustainable approaches to art, architecture, special organization or how we use the land for agriculture or energy. From an art perspective this approach can be visualized through a docking-on-to, plugging-into existent urban structures offering indeterminate and as yet unimagined outcomes. Sustainability can be temporal in thinking and practice, small in scale but with global implications. Building relationships between art and other urban practices can lead to innovation and new ways of producing and inhabiting urban spaces.
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Jochen Gerz: amaptocare
Jochen Gerz's 'amaptocare' project has been slowly evolving across Ballymun since 2002. One of the largest and most significant public art commissions in Ireland, 'amaptocare' seeks to inverse the routine of social housing and institutional urbanism by asking the residents to make a public donation. Gerz has invited Ballymun residents, as well as people from other areas, to donate a tree of their choice and to have it planted at a site of their own choosing. Each tree donor then meets with the artist and is asked the question “If this tree could speak, what should it say for you?” The donor’s response is printed on a lectern planted at the foot of each tree.
The names of all donors are to be engraved on the granite pavement of the new Civic Plaza, at the centre of which a glass map of the new Ballymun will be installed. The map will be illuminated by a series of bright lights, each marking the site of a donated tree.
Planting trees and plaques in Ballymun
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To contact Breaking Ground by email:
paul.mcaree@axis-ballymun.ie
