Children RISE to new creative levels

Galway’s young citizens are dancing, leaping and learning with local and international artists this month. It’s as a result of an initiative between Baboró International Arts Festival for Children and Galway 2020 European Capital of Culture.

Children aged 8-13 years are involved in two RISE projects from Baboró, which involve parkour, circus skills, performance art and sport.

For St Pat’s Lockdown Olympics, students and teachers from St Patrick’s National School in Galway City are creating and competing in a zany Olympic competition, working with James Riordan of Galway’s Brú Theatre and Australia-based performance director Darren O’Donnell of the wonderfully titled Mammalian Diving Reflex.

The two are creating a series of four whacky weekly videos, which are delivered to the students’ homes, accompanied by props, to help the children create spectacularly zany sports. Students earn points for the weirdness, creativity and ‘sportiness’ of their new sport. The project is culminating at the end of this month when the class with most points will win the St Pat’s Lockdown Olympics.

Darren O’Donnell was about to take a plane to Galway last March, when Covid-19 intervened.

“We’ve kept our nervous optimism alive for a whole year, despite being half a world apart, delivering the weirdest little labour of love that has ever existed,” he says.

“What’s been great is seeing the students of St Pat’s go wild when creating their own sports from home,” adds James. “Feathered clown score-targets, golfing chickens and clothes-peg eared players have all been competing in the Lockdown Olympics. It’s been a lot of fun to be a part of.”

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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