Co Wexford solar farm used for ‘thought provoking' project

The project began in The Douglas Hyde Gallery of Contemporary Art at Trinity College Dublin before embarking on a tour around key parts of rural Ireland, including Wexford.

The Quickening is a nationwide project and the culmination of three years of research which included sculptural plantings, workshops and performative feasts held in the City Assembly House in Dublin and the Butler Gallery in Kilkenny under the banner ‘Sustainment Experiments.’

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It runs at The Douglas Hyde until June 23 and encompasses a Walls & Halls tour of rural Ireland from April 18 to May 4. It comes to Blackbird Cultur Lab, Foulksmills, Wexford on May 4, beginning at 11 a.m., supported by Wexford Arts Centre.

After the screening, ‘Farming for Nature’ Ambassador Suzanna Crampton will respond to The Quickening in relation to regenerative farming, the importance of dung beetles and other soil creatures, and what makes a healthy soil ecology.

Presented for the first time in a major commissioned solo exhibition, The Quickening has now evolved into a must-see, must-hear multi-channel film and sound installation that explores the actions that must be taken around farming, food production and consumption in the face of present ecological and climate crises.

Blackbird Cultur-Lab is a creative cultural laboratory run by Karla Sánchez Zepeda O’Connell and Oisín O’Connell, based within a working farm that is transitioning towards regenerative agriculture practices. It aims to provide an environment for farmers, artists, academics and practitioners from various disciplines to experiment and work beyond traditional boundaries.

Both O’Connell and Sánchez have years of experience of working in the arts, education, social sciences and agriculture. They are working to transition their farm from traditional methods to regenerative agriculture.

Blackbird Cultur-Lab was also used as the location for the film and Karla Sánchez attended the Dublin feast contributing to the film libretto. The farm is a particular interest as it is a solar farm with the soil beneath the panels planted with multispecies swards, providing soil and biodiversity benefits as well as grazing for sheep.

Voices are central to creating engagement, renowned artist Deirdre O’Mahony, explained. “The starting point has been multiple conversations between farmers, scientists and politicians at organised feasts that generated open and frank conversations about food production and current challenges.

“These were transcribed for a libretto, developed with writer, Joanna Walsh, along with some of Ireland’s most exciting singers and musicians, among them Siobhán Kavanagh and Ultan O’Brien, each with a distinctive pitch, style, pace and vocabulary.”

She continued: “The sound we’ve created will communicate entangled human and non-human activities; sowing and harvesting, extreme weather and the hum of solar and wind farms, along with concerns about the reality of farming life; the volatile demands of the market, food regulation and policies.

“Within the soundscape, other voices are also being heard; breathing animals, insect and soil creatures, the assembled, complex mix of voices, accents and sounds, collective roots that unsettle ideological positions of purity and righteousness.

“The Quickening represents a polyvocal response to the most urgent questions affecting land and its inhabitants, giving voice to the invisible protagonists that shape our earth’s future and an idea of being-in-common that encompasses all earthly inhabitants.”

The Quickening will tour to six rural locations in the East and South East, among them barns, farms halls and community centres. The Walls & Halls Tour runs from April 18th to May 4th 2024 and visits Rathanna Community Hall, Carlow; Coolydoody Farm, Waterford; The Powerhouse, Callan, Kilkenny; STAC Chapel, Davis Road, Clonmel, Tipperary; Foresters Hall, Aughrim, Co. Wicklow; Blackbird Cultur-Lab, Foulksmills, Wexford.

Deirdre O’Mahony’s The Quickening was co-produced by Georgina Jackson, Éilis Lavelle and Deirdre O’Mahony. Libretto developed by Deirdre O’Mahony and Joanna Walsh with singers/performers Branwen Kavanagh, Michelle Doyle, Siobhán Kavanagh, Ultan O’ Brien and Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin. Film and photography was by Tom Flanagan and Saskia Vermeulen. Sound recordist and audio post mix was by John Brennan and the editor is Michael Higgins,