Bittersweet at Galway Arts Centre

Bittersweet is a collaborative installation by Red Bird Youth Collective and artists from the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services Day Hospital at Merlin Park Hospital. On display in Galway Arts Centre until 27 September 2017, the work has been facilitated by artist Louise Manifold.

Participants worked with Louise Manifold to devise and create an experimental film that utilises performance and movement to create meaning. The starting point is the story of James Connolly handing his son a .22 gun & asking him to fight for his country, something Red Bird members learned about in school during the 1916 commemorations.

This inheritance of politics and ideologies was the basis for exploration, starting a discussion on legacy in relation to current politics. Members also explored the massive popularity of dystopian young adult fiction. Many of the new novels are set in a post-apocalyptic future, in which young people must clean up the mess their elders have made – not to mention struggle to live up to a new, sometimes unmeetable set of standards.

Funded by the National Youth Council of Ireland.

www.galwayartscentre.ie