“A whole practice is a whole world. It’s beautiful. And quite emotional to give time to that with other people’’
A collective experiment in holding space for horizontal artistic exchange and mutual support.
In practice(s) was a series of scores for sharing practices and approaches, visions and frustrations; a space to make and re-make relationships with other artists and with our own practices. The project was a pilot of what an artistic framework dedicated to practice sharing and collaboration for Irish-based women and non-binary multimedia artists could look like, that I researched and designed over a six month period, and facilitated for a group of eight artists over four days in Dublin in July 2022.
The development of this project was supported by Heike Langsdorf of radical house (Brussels) and Eszter Nemethi, and the sessions in Dublin were supported by Evelyn Broderick and Common Ground through Studio 468, and Kirkos Ensemble through their space Unit 44.
This project was made possible by an Agility Award from the Arts Council of Ireland. The next stage of the project is currently in development.
A lecture performance about loneliness, lying (down) and leaving space. An attempt to share everything that happened during the research that was You and Me up until that point.
Performed by me and everyone in the audience, in the herb garden of the Bijloke at the KASK masters graduation, July 2021.
Photos by Koen Bracke
Dad has discovered Marina A. He tells me a story about how she got into performance art, after a partisan friend of her father’s set a gasoline-soaked canvas on fire in front of her and told her it was a sunset. I tell him one too, about her and her partner and the Great Wall of China. He is in marley park in Dublin when I get through to him, trying to get this 10,000 steps in. The docters told him this week that Marty can’t go home anymore. That he just isn’t able to live on his own. It was a shock at first he said, but today he sounds almost upbeat. Marty won’t mind. He has been more detached recently, abstracted from himself. The concept is sad and appealing and difficult to grasp, all at the same time. We talk about the project. Send me the list of places, he says. I can go and draw them, and you write the texts. I have been working on something actually, but something else. He sends it on whatsapp. It’s a portrait of me.
You and Me is a platform for experiments in collaboration, departing from one-on-one encounters with family, friends, acquaintances and strangers.
Outputs of the platform to date include the publication You and Me, Then and There, the lecture performance You and Me, Here and Now, and the video work Qpark.
A performative space for women and non-binary people to collectively explore and express female anger through discussion, reading, forming temporary punk bands, screaming in the woods, smashing rituals, and more.
The Anger Club currently meets sporadically, email somersdj@tcd.ie for more information.
Photos by Magdalena Meißner, who co-hosted the most recent meeting in June 2022.
The Library of Things is an artistic research project about co-creating new relationships with objects and each other. The main practices of the project are collecting/gathering things for the library, creating improvised installations and interventions in public space, and designing scores with and for objects.
The research is collective, and takes place in a variety of contexts. The most recent phase, TUBES, was carried out on Fridays in the nieghbourhood of Nieuw Gent between January and March 2022, in collaboration with manoeuvre, Mariam, Mirra, Aya, Omar, Edibe, Rony, Hugo, Hakkan, Zahra, Michael, Gifty, Zehra, Chris, Katja and Eszter. One of the primary kind of objects I found for the Library in public spaces in Nieuw Gent were tubes, and so began a collaborative performative research into all the things that a tube is and can be. The project was kindly supported by demos through the Arts in Society Award. This phase was documented in a small DIY publication printed in manoeuvre’s printerette in the CultuurContainers.
An experimental group improvisation practice
If you would like to find out about future sessions, drop me a line at somersdj@tcd.ie
Are you worried about what I’m worried about?
A collaboration with Ingrid Beatriz in Dublin, Brasilia and Ghent
January 2021 - ongoing (currently on hiatus)
A branch project of You and Me, the platform for experiments in collaboration
A choir for cows.
As part of the pKp, the para institute for ART and precarity, at Kunst en Zwalm art parcour 2021, curated by croxhapox.
In collaboration with residents from Korsele.
A vocal piece for five swimmers.
Performed in the Irish sea at the Vico Baths in September 2020 in Biosphere, a festival of free, outdoor-based experimental encounters, by Kirkos Ensemble.
Performed by Hannah Miller, Robert Coleman, Tom Roseingrave, Sebastian Adams and Joan Somers Donnelly.
An interactive fantasy about the politics of housing, created in collaboration with Donncha MacCoil, Ingrid Beatriz, Síle Maguire and Stefania Pantavos. Halfway through the show the audience were invited onstage to rebuild the set. Presented as part of the Dublin Fringe Festival. Studio Two, The Lir Academy, Dublin, 2018
Photos by Ciara Coyne
A devised theatre show about proximity. Samuel Beckett Theatre, Dublin, 2013
Photos by Kasia Kaminska
A performance about fear, the ocean depths, and venturing into the unknown. In collaboration with visual artist and puppet maker Caoimhe Dunn. Dance House, Moving Bodies Festival, Dublin, 2017
A performance collective creating playful interventions in unexpected places, with unexpected people. Discotheque Collective are Venetia Bowe, Anna Clifford, Liadain Kaminska and Joan Somers Donnelly.
Your Phibsborough Your Call was a collaborative mapping action in Dublin as part of Phizzfest, and Snail Walk was a subtle walking performance performed in various locations in Dublin and Berlin, as part of the 10 Days in Dublin Festival and Space/Time Berlin respectively.
Video and photos by Liadain Kaminska
A devised show based on the 1977 play Hamletmachine by Heiner Müller. Conceived, created and co-directed with theatre maker Jenni Schnarr. Players Theatre, Trinity College, Dublin, 2012
Photos by Trinity Fringe Festival
A show about dancing, featuring audio interviews with three generations of Irish men. Smock Alley Main Stage, Scene & Heard Festival of New Work, Dublin, 2017
A video work created as part of a project with young people in Ballymun and Santry on performance and personal geographies. Funded by a mini-commision from axis Ballymun. 2016-2017
A lecture performance on authenticity. Created and performed with harpist Anne Duvieuxbourg. LIVESTOCK Performance Platform, The Complex, Dublin, 2017
Photos by LIVESTOCK
A series of dance installations in public spaces. Various locations, Berlin, 2015
Video stills by Julia Rodríguez Pérez
A audiovisual and movement work inspired by the construction of the Ardnacrusha hydroelectric power station and the project of modernity in Ireland. Created in collaboration with visual designer John Galvin, and presented in the Belltable Showcase of Ideas. The Belltable Theatre, Limerick, 2017
Video stills by Red Paw Media
