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 in Monaghan. Each bursary covers the costs for a two-week period, plus the use of a studio if relevant. There are 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.
The Tyrone Guthrie Centre is a residential workplace for artists, dedicated to supporting and facilitating creativity within a welcoming and trusted environment and it is an established and central part of cultural life in Ireland being the largest residency of its type for artists in this country. The centre at Annaghmakerrig is universally well-regarded for successfully providing a creative space outside everyday life, which gives artists time and space to focus on ideas and work.
The Mayo County Council Tyrone Guthrie bursaries are advertised annually and are open to practitioners in all art forms born or domiciled within County Mayo. Applicants need to show significant achievement in their chosen field, e.g. visual artists should have had one-person shows in reputable galleries and composers or musicians should have had their work commissioned, recorded or performed or whatever might be appropriate to the particular art form. Otherwise the applicant must demonstrate a high degree of promise attested by references or other forms of support from established figures in the arts.
All submissions are assessed by an independent, expert panel who were extremely impressed with the quality and standard this year. This year’s successful applicants are theatre practitioner and artist Áine O’Hara, and visual artist Conor O’Grady.
Áine O'Hara is a native of Carrowmore - Lacken. She has a BA in Visual Art from IADT, Dun Laoghaire and an MFA in Stage Design from The Lír. Áine is a practicing designer and performance artist. Credits include: I'm Your Man by Mark Palmer, directed by Philip McMahon for Dublin Theatre Festival 2015 (Set Design ), Mimes in Time by Dreamgun Productions at Edinburgh Fringe and Dublin Fringe Festival 2016 (Set Design ) and Finem Respice by Vickey Curtis as part of Dublin Fringe Festival 2016 (Stage Manager ). Áine is also one half of the curatorial collective 4DSpace. She is currently set and costume designer for The Gaiety School of Acting's productions of Romeo and Juliet and The Merchant of Venice and will also be presenting a work in progress as part of Scene and Heard Festival at Smock Alley Theatre this February.
Mayo native Conor O’Grady is an interdisciplinary visual artist. Since 2010 his work has been shown in several group exhibitions, visual art screenings and festivals in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Europe, Australia, and his works have been published in online and printed editions of visual art and literary journals in Ireland and America. He studied Fine Art (Education ) at the National College of Art and Design and was awarded an honours degree in Fine Art at Dublin Institute of Technology in 2013. His work has been included in a number of prominent public and private exhibitions and projects. In 2016 he was awarded a solo exhibition at Custom House Gallery and Studios and the Krems artist in residence award in Austria, where he will also showcase moving image works at the Austrian Documentary Film Alliance in November 2017.
For further information contact the Arts Office, Mayo County Council. Tel 094 90 24444 exts 7558/ 7471. e-mail: [email protected]
