Every year Mayo County Council offers two bursary awards to artists born or living in Mayo, to enable them to spend two weeks at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre at Annaghmakerrig, County Monaghan. Each bursary covers the costs for a two-week period, plus the use of a studio if relevant. There is a variety of artist work spaces available including studios, a music room for composers and musicians, a multi-media room, and a large rehearsal and performance space. This year the successful applicants are visual artist Joanna Hopkins and poet Michelle O’Sullivan.
Joanna Hopkins holds a BA in fine art from Limerick School of Art and Design and an MA with distinction in social practice and the creative environment, also from Limerick School of Art and Design. She works predominantly in video, photography, and installation, with a focus on interactive works. She has exhibited widely across Ireland and Northern Ireland and was the 2012/2013 recipient of the first Visual Artists Ireland and Digital Art Studios Belfast Residency Award. Recent solo exhibitions include Polarise at Catalyst Arts Belfast, June 2013. Recent group exhibitions include Illusion at Science Gallery Trinity College Dublin, and the CATA Project at Eva International 2012. She has also been selected as part of Mayo Arts Office and the Linenhall Arts Centre commission FIND for 2014.
Michelle O'Sullivan is a recent winner of the Strong/Shine Award for best first collection. O'Sullivan's The Blue End of Stars was published by Gallery Press in July 2012. It was also shortlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Prize in the UK. Having grown up in Sligo and currently living in Mayo for more than a decade, the seasons and landscapes, expanses of the west of Ireland, are an integral component to this poet’s work and vision.
