January 2011 Line Up Announced for Múscailt Arts Festival at NUI Galway

Múscailt Spring Festival is coming. From 7 to 12 February 2011, NUI Galway will host a superb line-up of opera, music, performance, sculpture and visual art with many free events to which the public are welcome. The theme this year is Exploration (in all its senses). Múscailt has invited special guest artists to create new work on campus, linking art and science. There is the Irish premiére of a new opera, a new children's show, original drama, new writing and an abundance of music. Alongside special guests, local artists, staff and students have also created work specifically for Múscailt and annual events including the musical and performances by the orchestra and choir are present as always. Continuing the success of Múscáilt, music will feature strongly in this year's programme with the Festival hosting the Irish premiére of Gatto Marte's (Cats from Mars) new Opera , Colombo Tutto Tondo, (Colombus, the world is round). In association with Music for Galway RTÉ Vanbrugh Quartet will perform two concerts celebrating Beethoven's late quartets. NUI Galway Chamber Orchestra will perform movements from Mendelssohn's Italian symphony and Weber's clarinet concerto featuring special guest Robert Solyon and GUMS -NUI Galway Musical Society will perform the rock musical, The Wedding Singer, a comic tale of a Wedding Singer whose fortunes change when he is jilted at the altar. During the festival Dermot Healy, celebrated Irish writer of poetry, novels, plays, memoir and screenplays will read from his forthcoming book, Writing in the Sky and emerging writer Rab Swannock Fulton will introduce his new sci-fi 'blog novel 'in progress, Marcus Marcus and the Hurting Heart. Ana Perez Pereda, renowned Spanish Sculptor, and Artist José María Molina will spend three weeks on campus and create hanging sculptures in a project linking Art and Science. Titled 'Jovian Sequences', the sculptures are inspired by Jove's moon's movements, showing time dancing around the orbits, drawing spiral lines, in a visual game incorporating the three dimensions of the orbits within the space, and the spiral development, which shows the fourth dimension, time. The two artists will also host interventions in Physics and Astronomy in conjunction with the Centre for Astronomy and local art colleges, GMIT, GTI and LIT. Fred Robeson, artist from Holland, will transpose 50 individual prints on to the lift shaft on the balcony of Áras na Mac Léinn, to produce a giant artwork entitled 'Nature Versus the City'. He will be working on it from mid-January and will unveil the work during the festival. The Artsoc's annual show, this year entitled Black Hole Paradise, will consist of drawings, paintings, textiles and sculpture. This year, writer/storyteller Rab Swannock Fulton and artist, Marina Wild, have joined forces to create a new show for children up to 10 years of age, Pirates, Dragons and Moon Monsters, involving performances of rhyming poems, in the surrounds of original paintings, all on the theme of exploration. The Red Apple Tree, a new dance theatre piece, will be presented by The Colours Theatre Company. A new, modern-day, drama entitled NOT FOR OSCAR by Shane Daly-Hughes will be performed by the recently formed University College Players and Dramsoc will play The Lime-Tree Bower by Conor McPherson. Commenting on this year's line up, Fionnuala Gallagher, NUI Galway Arts Officer says, "This year Múscailt celebrates 'Exploration' offering an escape into the world of fantasy, astronomy and history. We will experience Jove's moons, through sculpture; recreate Columbus' journey through song and music and watch Dermot Healy's barnacle geese 'writing in the sky'. Belts may be tightened but the creative world is very rich in 2011 and Múscailt is in full swing." All exhibitions are open throughout the week. The programme includes many more events by Comedysoc, Dramsoc, Juggling Soc, Comic Soc, Anime Manga soc, Filmsoc, individual artists and new dramatic monologues by staff and students in a SOLOS Show. A comic market-place with chill-out zones is also on offer. For full details, see website www.muscailt.ie. For a copy of the programme and more info, contact the Arts Office at 493766 or 495098 or Fionnuala Gallagher at fionnuala.gallagher@nuigalway.ie. Tickets for events will be available from the Socsbox at 091 492852 or socsbox@socs.nuigalway.ie. For more info on society events see www.socs.nuigalway.ie. Flirt FM 101.3 will provide daily updates. All ages are extended an invitation to come on campus and enjoy the events, shows and exhibitions on offer from 7 to 12 February. -Ends-