Good Times, Badhands, and the Lay of the Land

Cavan Arts Festival returns this summer with a programme that’s equal parts joy evoking and thought provoking. Amongst the eye and ear catching highlights are an exhibition by Turner Prize winners and the world première of a new immersive sound and visual installation at a secret subterranean location!

Now entering its sixth year, including two Covid editions that somehow still managed to promote creativity throughout the county, an even bigger than before Cavan Arts Festival (CAF) takes place from Thursday to Sunday, May 18-21.

Pulsating outwards from its “heartbeat” at Con Smith Park, co-organiser Kim McCafferty was positively brimming with excitement as members of Array, including Killeshandra’s Laura O’Connor, helped launch the brochure of events at Cavan Townhall last Thursday evening.

The Townhall itself will play an important part in CAF’s expanded footprint. Kim remembers back to when she was 12 years old taking part in a youth theatre there. She says the vast majority of those attending the Friday evening improv sessions all now work in the arts.

“That’s phenomenal when you think about it! It was still this place where you paid your rates and had council meetings taking place, but once a week it became this incredible space.”

She says it remains an “incredible space”, and even more so since it was regenerated as a hub for arts, describing what has happened since as a “rewilding”.

“It’s changing lives. Any day at the Townhall there’s a dozen artists making work, writing scripts, doing films, developing festivals. It really is a case of make it and they will come.”

Cabaret

Aside from housing the Array Collective’s ‘The Lay of the Land’ exhibit (free), the Townhall play host to a cabaret featuring dance artist Jessie Keenan and her new work in progress ‘The Picture Palace’, in collaboration with multilingual multi-instrumentalist Rita Perry and hip hop producer Odhran O’Brien, aka Odd Numbers (Thursday, 7pm, €5).

The building will also facilitate Tape That by Belfast’s Hands Down Circus (Thurs/Fri, two shows daily); and the screening of Meddler Mulligan, the sequel to the famous ‘Mulligan’s Millions’, remastered by Padraig Conaty (Friday, 7pm, €5).

The Imperial’s Metric Bar will meanwhile welcome Paintclub with artist Lorraine O’Neill (Thursday, 8.30pm, €35), while Urney Church of Ireland will contain a not-to-be-missed intimate concert by traditional maestro and outside-the-box-master, West Kerry’s Cormac Begley (Friday, 8.30pm, €15).

Whatever about overground entertainment, on Saturday, two shows (6 & 8pm, €15) will whisk audiences off to a secret subterranean location for Chambergrist, with members of the globally recognised Crash Ensemble in collaboration with artist Elaine Harrington.

Kim though assures that the focus of CAF will stay within its ancestral home at Con Smith Park (Sat & Sun, 12-5pm). “We always wanted [the festival] to be of the town, and be part of the town. Different people will go to different spaces. But the heartbeat is there.”

Centred around the iconic Big Top, Síolta Circus will perform their dystopian, yet uplifting show ‘On Tish’, with Hands Down also appearing.

Audiences can meanwhile get up close and personal in the world’s smallest venue, Horsebox Theatre, dance the afternoon away at the legendary Baby Rave, converse within An Gaeltacht Beag, or experience any number of other exhibitions and performances by artists, including a garage rock double-header from Badhands and Cavan’s Eddie Cruiser and the Savage Hearts.

Energies

The launch at Cavan’s Townhall was attended by Cathaoirleach John Paul Feeley, who recently facilitated Kim in addressing himself and fellow councillors on the importance of supporting the arts.

He encouraged people to promote the festival and share its contents with others, “whether through social media, word of mouth, or other means”.

Kim herself is quick to pay tribute to the time and energies of so many involved in the organising CAF, many of whom juggle the role with a full time jobs, family life, studies, and other commitments - from Paula McQuillan, Joe Keenan, Conor Harrington, Chloe Maguire, and Michael O’Brien.

She thanked also Catriona O’Reilly, Arts Officer, Padraic McIntyre, Townhall, and county librarian and Creative Ireland facilitator, Emma Clancy.

Exhilarating

Kim tells the Celt that the committee behind CAF were “thrilled” to present such a bold and visionary programme for 2023.

“Cavan is absolutely heaving with creativity and artistic talent,” she says. “Through presenting such a diverse and exciting programme we hope we will provide not just an exhilarating four day festival, but inspiration to a new generation of artists to go and make their mark on the world.”

Cavan Arts Festival runs for four days, May 18-21, in Cavan Town.