A major feature by Ciarán Walsh on local elections 2014 in Ireland is published in the Irish Independent Weekend Magazine edited by Katie Byrne. The article looks at young candidates who are competing in the elections for he first time and questions whether this is a response to widespread disenchantment with the political establishment and, whether a new generation of politically smart young people can challenge the status quo through the use of social media and other techniques. The article is based on ten interviews carried out 2 weeks prior to the election and was published the weekend before voting takes place.
Category Archives: Comment
Getting into politics: Ciarán Walsh writes feature on local elections for Irish Independent Weekend Magazine 17.05.2014
‘Is oth linn an briseadh seo.’ We regret the interruption in web-posting due to storm damage
Primarily, the period February / March has been taken up with two projects.
The first involves completing the second and final year of the Dioplóma sa Ghaeilge (Dioploma in Irish) with NUI Galway in partnership with Oidhdreacht Chorca Dhuibhne – final exams scheduled for 5 April. Dar fia!
The second involves development work on the ‘Haddon in Ireland’ project with the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge and NUI Maynooth. This includes a paper to be given at the RAI’s conference in the British Museum in May/June.
“Ciarán Walsh reports…” Feature on Cloughjordan Eco-Village, Irish Independent, 01 February 2014
<img class=" wp-image-3253 alignnone" title="Residents of Cloughjordan Eco-Village in 2014" alt="Cloughjordan Eco-Village: this photo shows a large goup of residents gathered in the village square on a bright, cold day in January2014. The photo was taken by Liam Burke Press 22 Limerick for an article Commissioned by Irish Independent Weekend Editor Katie Byrne, 'On the edge of Utopia' examines the life of Eco-Villagers in Cloughjordan in County Tipperary. Since the crash of 2007 this community has defied the odds and built the Cloughjordan Eco-Village, a template for sustainable living in rural Ireland. Ciarán Walsh is the reporter project management web app.” src=”https://www.curator.ie/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Cloughjordan-Eco-600.jpg” width=”600″ height=”525″ srcset=”https://www.curator.ie/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Cloughjordan-Eco-600.jpg 600w, https://www.curator.ie/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Cloughjordan-Eco-600-300×262.jpg 300w” sizes=”(max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px” />
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Commissioned by Irish Independent ‘Weekend’ Editor Katie Byrne, ‘On the edge of Utopia’ examines the life of Eco-Villagers in Cloughjordan in County Tipperary. Since the crash of 2007 this community has defied the odds and built the Cloughjordan Eco-Village, a template for sustainable living in rural Ireland. Ciarán Walsh examines how they are getting on.
In all good newsagents and online on Saturday 2 February 2014.
Photo by
Liam Burke, Press 22, Limerick
TV series on photography in Ireland developed by www.curator.ie & Sibéal Teo for TG4
A starving Irish family from Carraroe, County Galway during the Famine . (Source: University of Virginia)
About 10 years go I came across this photograph. The caption suggests that it was taken during the Famine of 1845-9 in Ireland. It wasn’t. True, it is very similar to the scenes recorded in cabins throughout the west of Ireland and graphic illustrations of such scenes were published in illustrated newspapers at the time. There is no record, however, of any photograph of people dying of starvation in the 1845-9 famine. Indeed a photograph like this would have been impossible in the early stages of photography – invented less than a decade before the famine. As a result he photograph has been dismissed by some people as a fake, the harsh pool of light suggesting a studio staging.
I set out to look for the original and test its authenticity. I never found it, but I found the next best thing – the original document in which the photograph was first published. The photograph is entitled ‘A Sick Family Carraroe’ and is one of 18 photographs that were published in a pamphlet entitled ‘Relief of Distress in the West and South of Ireland, 1898.’ The photographs were taken in April during an inspection of conditions in Connemara by Thomas L. Esmonde, Inspector of the Manchester Committee. He was reacting to reports of famine in Connemara, what locals call the Second Famine or Gorta Beag. He inspected a dozen houses in which he found people lying on the floor, covered with rags and old sacks and barely able to move from a combination of influenza and hunger.
The search for the photograph became the basis of an idea for a TV series on social documentary photography or, to put it another way, a social history of documentary photography in Ireland in the 19th century. I pitched the idea to a producer and a broadcaster in 2011 and funding was eventually secured from the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland in 2014 for a six part series based on my research. TG4 will begin broadcasting Trid an Lionsa or ‘Through the Lens’ tomorrow Sunday 25 October 2015.
I haven’t been involved in in the production itself, just the research into historical social documentary photography and the people who work in this area. This material has been “translated into television” by Cathal Watters (Oíche na Gaoithe Móire) and follows the TG4 controversial format of presenter driven, on-the-road info-tainment. (Lost in Translation).
I have no idea what to expect. Like a colleague I will be watching from behind the couch … hoping! It’ll be interesting to see how the balance between a social history of documentary photography and ‘factual’ entertainment works out. The reliance on off-the-cuff interviews rather than scripted narrative is a risky business in general Read Full Article. It suits some formats but I don’t know about a documentary on 19th century photography, with it’s intricate social, political and historical contexts and plots. I know some key “voices” were excluded but that is the unenviable task of a producer. Dropping a key commentator on the history of photography because, apparently, there were already enough English speakers is a bit odd though. Either way it promises be an intriguing televisual event and, at the very least, it should create an awareness of the rich resource that exists in photographic archives and collections around the country.
For more images / Comment see: Ballymaclinton, The Town that Time Forgot