dance

Moving Dublin explores the everyday world of movement in Dublin and its vast sprawling suburbs spreading out west from the coastal city. We look at how far the contemporary world of the Dublin commuter has strayed from the civic realm it constituted when Joyce wrote the Wandering Rocks chapter of Ulysses.

Moving Dublin is to be published in the form of a book and DVD in March 2009 by Gandon Editions

Moving Dublin has been commissioned by South Dublin County Council through In Context 3 and funded under the Department of Environment, Heritage and Local Government’s Per Cent for Art Scheme.

Early in 2008 we were working with dancers in Dublin’s Inner City. One rainy Saturday morning in February we brought six of them into a bleak little park behind Sean McDermott Street. The dancing drew the attention of some local people who got involved, leading to an 11-minute short film which we eventually called Not a Fish. The film sparked controversy, some people judging it objectionable, or just dreary, while others found it exhilarating and provocative. There ensued a lengthy and heated correspondence, which we published in our book Moving Dublin. The central point in such entanglements is to follow them where they want to go. It was the very last line of the correspondence which gave the film its name. Signed by our 80 year old friend and mentor Eléonore Schöffer, responding to my own contribution, in which I described feeling like a fish while I was filming the event:

... go on searching and creating, as creation is the "mirror" in which the artist can find the answer to the question: "Who am I?" Not this, not this, not this, and, of course...not a fish.

... At first he was quietly standing by a tree, watching us skillfully improvise our way round the piles of dog shite, looking pretty rough and not all that steady on his legs. Generally speaking, someone you’d probably avoid if you were on your own. But we (the participants of the ‘Body and Camera’ workshop with Denis Connolly and Anne Cleary) were connecting to each other through our first language and having a great time inbetween the rain showers. Seamus saw this and started a shy little dance next to his tree. As Denis glided by with his steadycam, I whispered to him: ‘look at yer man, he’s dancin!’ Denis swooped around to catch Seamus in his treedancingmoment and that was all the invitation he needed to join in.

Extract from a text by Cindy Cummings

With

Eileen Casey

Cindy Cummings

Natalie Grand

Emma Fitzgerald

Cindy Cummings

Fiona Delaney

Ailish Claffey

Mary Keane

Colm Keegan

Deirdre Murphy