Upcoming Public Events

Our Place Kerry Exhibition, Kerry County Museum, 20 Sept – 20 Oct 2024

Our Place is a multi-sensory installation that explores themes of happiness, human rights, and belonging. The installation features an immersive sound artwork played through 10 speakers, a vibrant neon artwork, and tactile light artworks. The exhibition features distinct sensory areas with both group and individual seating. Exhibition accessibility additionally includes Lámh sign language video, braille, audio and captioned descriptions.

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Our Place Dublin Exhibition, RHA Gallery, 6-22 Sept, 2024

Our Place is a multi-sensory installation that explores themes of happiness, human rights, and belonging. The installation features an immersive sound artwork played through 10 speakers, a vibrant neon artwork, and tactile light artworks. The exhibition features distinct sensory areas with both group and individual seating. Exhibition accessibility additionally includes Lámh sign language video, braille, audio and captioned descriptions.

Read More »
An electrifying neon sign featuring a diverse group of abstract figures, each uniquely shaped and glowing in vibrant colours. The figures, representing a diverse range of people, are set against a dark, velvety backdrop, with their light reflecting softly on the floor and curtain behind. To the right, the words 'Our Place' are illuminated in bold, neon letters. Our Place, exhibition image, credit: Daniel Obina Moses, AlanJames Burns, Sinead McCann, Orla Basquille.

Our Place Kerry Exhibition, Kerry County Museum, 20 Sept – 20 Oct 2024

Our Place is a multi-sensory installation that explores themes of happiness, human rights, and belonging. The installation features an immersive sound artwork played through 10 speakers, a vibrant neon artwork, and tactile light artworks. The exhibition features distinct sensory areas with both group and individual seating. Exhibition accessibility additionally includes Lámh sign language video, braille, audio and captioned descriptions.

DETAILS →
An electrifying neon sign featuring a diverse group of abstract figures, each uniquely shaped and glowing in vibrant colours. The figures, representing a diverse range of people, are set against a dark, velvety backdrop, with their light reflecting softly on the floor and curtain behind. To the right, the words 'Our Place' are illuminated in bold, neon letters. Our Place, exhibition image, credit: Daniel Obina Moses, AlanJames Burns, Sinead McCann, Orla Basquille.

Our Place Dublin Exhibition, RHA Gallery, 6-22 Sept, 2024

Our Place is a multi-sensory installation that explores themes of happiness, human rights, and belonging. The installation features an immersive sound artwork played through 10 speakers, a vibrant neon artwork, and tactile light artworks. The exhibition features distinct sensory areas with both group and individual seating. Exhibition accessibility additionally includes Lámh sign language video, braille, audio and captioned descriptions.

DETAILS →
Banner for the Disrupt Disability Arts Festival. The festival logo, a large ‘D’, sits on a black background. In the top right and bottom left corners, there are wavy pink lines in bright cerise. Behind them are blurred lines of the same colour giving the impression of motion.

Disrupt Disability Festival 2024

Disrupt Disability Arts Festival is a vibrant celebration of disability art, curated by and for the disability community. 

Festival launches, 7 March.

Performance Programme, 7-11 March.

Visual Arts Exhibition and Online Programme, 8 March – 20 April

DETAILS →

Featured News

Disability Arts Online Content Takeover, February 2024

The Disability Arts Online Logo. A white square on a background of black brush strokes. The words ‘Disability Arts Online’ sit at the bottom of the white square.

This month AlanJames Burns has been invited to do a Content Takeover for Disability Arts Online. The takeover will explore the intersections of disability, climate change and the arts.

The first piece of content is a very exciting one, a podcast for ‘Disability Add…’. Alan spoke with Professor Julia Watts Belser who is a professor of Jewish Studies and Disability Studies at Georgetown University and coordinator of the Disability and Climate Change Public Archive. They discuss thier experiences as creative practitioners, members of the disability community, and concerned climate activists.

The podcast will be followed by pieces for the DAO magazine and a week-long takeover of DAO’s Instagram account this February.

Business to Arts Awards: Accenture Digital Innovation in Art Bursary

Screen shot from the Business to Arts website showing the announcement of the Business to Arts Awards for 2023. The title reads ‘The winners of the 2023 Business to Arts Awards have been announced’. The background is a warm cream and under the title there is an image of a group of people in brightly coloured clothing, some are standing, others sit on flight cases and the person closest to the camera is sitting on the ground with their back against a flight case. They look like a dynamic and creative group.

Twelve projects were announced as winners at the Business to Arts Awards 2023. The awards recognise partnerships between businesses and the arts.

AlanJames Burn is honored to be one of the winners, receiving the €10,000 Accenture Digital Innovation in Art bursary, the for their work Divergent Together. This work uses interactive brain-computer interface technologies as a creative medium to explore the intersection of climate change and neurodiversity.

RTÉ Lyric FM, Culture File: The Waking Walls

The ruin of a round stone castle sits on a tiny island on a lake, the island is just big enough for the tower. One side of the tower has crumbled away. Trees surround the island and disappear into the water, birds fly across the sky. The reflection of the tower is clearly seen in the still water, creating a mirror image. The weather is grey and foggy obscuring the boundary between the water and the sky.

AlanJames Burns talks to RTÉ’s Lyric FM Culture File about their upcoming collaborative project ‘The Waking Walls’. 

The Waking Walls is a new collaborative, theatrical artwork that reawakens and equips us with age-old methods of coping with loss. The Waking Walls is an invitation to reframe environmental grief – not as a state of disconnection and isolation, but as a unifying experience to collectively process climate disruption.

The Waking Walls has been developed by Cavan-born environmental artist AlanJames Burns in collaboration with writer Chandrika Narayanan-Mohan, NYAH (Cross Border Collective of Traditional Arts Musicians), Cavan Arts Office, Irish Hospice Foundation and Cavan Adventure Centre.

RTÉ Tús Áite: Caoineadh Aeráide/The Waking Walls

The ruin of a round stone castle town sits on a tiny island in a lake, the island is just big enough for the tower. Behind the tower the forested mainland is visible through a veil of fog. Trees surround the edge of the island and disappear into the water. The bright green grass on the island stands out in contrast to the grey of the fog and dark blue water of the lake.

Gormfhlaith Ní Shíocháin, Ní Bheoláin talks to RTÉ’s Tús Áite about ‘The Waking Walls’. 

Caoineadh don ghéarchéim aeráide agus an scrios éiceolaíochta atá i cur i láthair amharclannaíochta a dhéanfar ag Caisleán suite ar oileán bídeach i loch i gCo. an Chabháin ag an deireadh seachtaine. Bhí Gormfhlaith Ní Shíocháin, Ní Bheoláin atá bainteach leis an saothar seo ar an gclár chun tuilleadh a insint dúinn faoi.

The Waking Walls is a new collaborative, theatrical artwork that reawakens and equips us with age-old methods of coping with loss. The Waking Walls is an invitation to reframe environmental grief – not as a state of disconnection and isolation, but as a unifying experience to collectively process climate disruption.

The Waking Walls has been developed by Cavan-born environmental artist AlanJames Burns in collaboration with writer Chandrika Narayanan-Mohan, NYAH (Cross Border Collective of Traditional Arts Musicians), Cavan Arts Office, Irish Hospice Foundation and Cavan Adventure Centre.

Clore Fellows 2023/24 Announced

A grid of faces of the Clore Fellows for 2023/24. 23 individuals of varying gender, ethnicity and age are represented in professional headshots. The Clore Leadership logo is in bright pink at the bottom right corner of the image.

AlanJames Burns is delighted to have been selected as one of the 2023/24 Clore Fellows.

The highly valued Clore Fellowships are awarded to dynamic change-makers from across the arts and culture sector who demonstrate vision, strategy and an appetite or collaboration in leading the arts, culture and creativity for a positive impact on society.

This nineteenth cohort of Clore Fellows (#Clore19) includes 23 leaders from the breadth of the arts and cultural sector, covering at least ten cultural disciplines, and include independent practitioners, those working in small and medium scale arts venues, as well as representatives from our largest cultural institutions.    

Collectively, they reflect the vibrant and diverse nature of the arts and cultural sector, coming from eight regions across the UK, from Falmouth to the Isle of Mull, as well as Ireland, Brazil and Hong Kong.

iCRAG AiR, Summer 2023

Three masculine appearing figures in white hard hats, large yellow safety jackets with life jackets and waterproof boots, stand on the deck of a ship. A feminine figure in overalls and a red jumper is crouched beside a tube that is suspended by chains from a crane. They are examining this tube intently.

In summer 2023 (July/August) AlanJames Burns headed not for sun and sand, but did hit the high seas. As the 2023 iCRAG artist in residence on the RV Celtic Explorer, Alan was able to experience a marine expedition first hand. 

Over a month on board the research vessel, they learned about everything from climate proxies and identifying foram species, to ice dynamics, carbon fluxes, arctic amplification, ocean acidification and much, much more.

Alan expressed, “What struck me during the cruise was the acknowledgement that nothing exists in a bubble, everything is connected; we are connected to all organisms large and small, to all corners of the planet, to our past and future.”

An arctic seascape with a cloudy grey sky. A small piece of sea ice sits in a rough, deep blue black sea. Where the ice is submerged the aqua blue colour of the water reflects off the ice surface, creating the illusion that the ice underwater is blue.
The crew of the Celtic Explorer with artist AlanJames Burns, taken on the deck of the vessel. There is a mixture of smiling men and women wearing outdoor clothes of various colours. Alan wears a bright yellow jacket and pink shorts.
A group of four researchers sit around a table, they are each looking into a microscope. Around them are bottles and glass laboratory containers. Windows behind them look out onto the deck of a ship.

Festival Makers Conference 2023, 11th May 2023

Festival Makers Festival poster. A light pink background with bright pink abstract triangle shapes. The words 'The Changing Landscape of Festival' are across the poster in black. The dates of the festival are 11 & 12 May 2023, in Galway City

AlanJames Burns will present on ‘Festival Making as a creative act’ as part of the Arts Council of Ireland Festival Makers Conference, 11 & 12 May 2023, Galway.

A group discussion with delegates exploring the curatorial practice in festivals, the role of the citizen artist and the practice of festival making. Following the 2020 Change Makers festival conference, the Arts Council revised its Festival Policy to recognise “the complex and special nature of ‘festival-making’ as a creative act and its curatorial role in the development of artistic programming”.

RHA / IPUT Wilton Park Studios

Artist AlanJames Burns sits cross legged on a purple yoga mat. Their arms are out strengthened and they are smiling warmly. They are sitting in a circle of people who are laughing and smiling. The room is bright and the combination of people’s clothes and purple mat make the image very colourful.

AlanJames Burns is one of the recipients of the RHA / IPUT Wilton Park Studios 2023.

The RHA and IPUT Real Estate Artist in Residence Programme at Wilton Park Studios in Dublin 2 is a direct response to the ever-increasing studio crisis in Dublin. IPUT Real Estate, Ireland’s leading property company, continues to fully support a facility with three studios, in collaboration with the RHA.

Our Place recieves Creative Ireland Bursary Award 2023 from Kildare County Council

A neon sign with the words ‘Our Place’ in block capitals. The sign is glowing a warm purple pink colour.

AlanJames Burns’ collaborative socially engaged project Our Place with Sinead McCann and collaborating artists from Saint John of God Liffey Services: Aíne Walsh, David Carter, Keith Whelan, Laura Hickey, Aidan Winters, Conor Begley, David Carter, David Deane, Frances Quinn, Jonathan Smith, Niamh Fortune and Sean Winder, has graciously received the Creative Ireland Bursary Award 2023 from Kildare County Council.

“Two new Insight Artists-in-Residence announced: AlanJames Burns and Erin Redmond” (Insight Centre)

Artist AlanJames Burns, an individual with masculine features wears a deep blue denim shirt and is smiling directly towards the viewer. Their features are in a pleased and content expression, with the corners of the mouth turned up and the front teeth exposed.

AlanJames Burns grateful recipient of Artist-In-Residence position at Insight Centre Dublin City University a Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Data Analytics.

The Insight SFI Research Centre for Data Analytics artist-in-residence programme awards artists in the community who wish to engage in scientific research to further their own practice, fostering links between the arts and science communities to promote interdisciplinary research.

The purpose of the residencies is to support artists, curators or producers to develop and research new, ambitious work intended for public presentation. The residencies will allow the artists impactful access to current research at Insight SFI Research Centre for Data Analytics at Dublin City University. The research collaborations will focus on the development of a particular project.

It is hoped that the residencies will inspire the creation of work that is ambitious and far-reaching: works that propose new forms of medium and new ways of theorising complex scientific ideas.

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