Mayo County Council Arts Office was recently awarded significant funding from the Arts Council Local Partnership Scheme to mark Ireland's presidency of the Council of the EU. The project, entitled ‘I Could Read The Sky’, will see the arts office and Mayo Arts Squad work with Dead Good Guides (UK ) and local artists to develop an integrated art project, which will culminate in a public event at Ballycroy National Park on April 13 and 14. The physical landscape of Ballycroy, on the periphery of the European continent, sustains a history of human development, inhabitation, craft, trades, culture, and the arts. This project aims to unearth these threads and use that knowledge to raise consciousness around values that shape our present and future.
The project will engage local/ regional/ national artists and will also engage inclusively with local communities. Part of this process began in February with extensive site visits to the Ballycroy and to the project site at Ballycroy National Park. Planning and visioning sessions with all of the participating artists have also taken place. The next episode of the project will start later in March with the artists working in Ballycroy over a three week art-making phase. This is an open-ended, collaborative, organic approach to developing art work as an immediate response to environment. The final public event takes place over a weekend in April (Saturday 13 and 14, from 1pm to 6pm daily ) when Ballycroy will be welcoming friends and strangers alike to celebrate and engage with the work created during the project.
