Archive News
Group of artists breathe new life into Cregg Castle
Date Published: 16-Aug-2012
AGROUP of artists who have taken up residency in Corrandulla’s Cregg Castle, where they are developing an interactive work space, gallery and garden, will hold a group show in the Town Hall Theatre from August 17 to September 5.
This innovative Cregg Castle project is the work of Salthill born artist Alan Murray, who has a family link with the castle, which was built in 1648 by the Kirwan family, one of the Tribes of Galway.
Alan’s grandparents Martin and Margaret Murray bought the castle in 1972, growing vegetables in the walled garden and rearing beef cattle in the adjoining land to supply their well-known hotel in Salthill.
Later, Alan’s aunt and uncle, Ann Marie and Patrick ran a highly regarded B & B in Cregg Castle until the historic building was sold in 2005.
The new owners applied to develop the castle and its grounds into hotel and golf course, but the recession put paid to those plans and it was closed up.
When he became aware of this, Alan approached the owners with a business plan which would involve artists’ residencies, exhibitions and events to keep Cregg Castle alive.
“Because of the family connection, they realised I had a genuine interest in it,” he explains of the owners’ reaction.
As a result of a two-year agreement which he signed with them five artists moved into the building in May, following a selection process which saw Alan put a call-out in local papers and on the internet.
There are two Cork artists and one from Monaghan, as well as Alan and another Galwegian, Martina Finn from Loughrea.
“The arrangement is that we keep the castle maintained while we are here and other than that, it’s what we choose to do ourselves,” he says.
Each artist pays a nominal rent of between €100 and €120 and also does general maintenance work as part of the residency agreement. This includes working in the vegetable garden and cutting firewood to keep the castle heated in winter.
For that, they get to live in a castle, with the use of their own studio space and shared gallery space, as well as a communal kitchen and relaxation area.
The period of residency for each artist may last for the full two years or may end sooner, depending on each person’s situation.
There are another four spaces to fill in the residency project and Alan is working on that at present, so there will be a total of nine artists living in Cregg Castle when the scheme is fully up and running.
This is the first group exhibition from the five who are looking forward to a wonderful and inspiring future in their ambitious venture at Cregg Castle.
They have extended an open invite to the public to the exhibition opening at Galway’s Town Hall Theatre on Friday next, August 17 at 6pm.
Meanwhile, the castle is open to the public from Thursday to Sunday each week.
People’s living conditions less than 100 years ago were frightening. We have come a long way. We talk about water charges today, but back then the local District Councils were erecting pumps for local communities and the lovely town of Mountbellew, according to Council minutes, had open sewers,” says Galway County Council archivist Patria McWalter.
Patria believes we “need to take pride in our history, and we should take the same pride in our historical records as we do in our built heritage”. When you see the wealth of material in her care, this belief makes sense.
She is in charge of caring for the rich collection of administrative records owned by Galway County Council and says “these records are as much part of our history as the Rock of Cashel is. They document our lives and our ancestors’ lives. And nobody can plan for the future unless you learn from the past, what worked and what didn’t”.
Archivists and librarians are often unfairly regarded as being dry, academic types, but that’s certainly not true of Patria. Her enthusiasm is infectious as she turns the pages of several minute books from Galway’s Rural District Councils, all of them at least 100 years old.
Part of her role involved cataloguing all the records of the Councils – Ballinasloe, Clifden, Galway, Gort, Loughrea, Mountbellew, Portumna and Tuam. These records mostly consisted of minutes of various meetings.
When she was cataloguing them she realised their worth to local historians and researchers, so she decided to compile a guide to their content. The result is For the Record: The Archives of Galway’s Rural District Councils, which will be a valuable asset to anybody with an interest in history.
Many representatives on these Councils were local personalities and several were arrested during the political upheaval of the era, she explains.
And, ushering in a new era in history, women were allowed to sit on these Rural District Councils – at the time they were not allowed to sit on County Councils.
All of this information is included in Patria’s introductory essay to the attractively produced A4 size guide, which gives a glimpse into how these Rural Councils operated and the way political thinking changed in Ireland during a short 26-year period. In the early 1900s, these Councils supported Home Rule, but by 1920, they were calling for full independence and refusing to recognise the British administration.
“I love the tone,” says Patria of the minutes from meetings. “The language was very emotive.”
That was certainly true of the Gort Rural District Council. At a meeting in 1907, following riots in Dublin at the premiere of JM Synge’s play, The Playboy of the Western World the councillors’ response was vehement. They recorded their decision to “protest most emphatically against the libellous comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, that was belched forth during the past week in the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, under the fostering care of Lady Gregory and Mr Yeats. We congratulate the good people of Dublin in howling down the gross buffoonery and immoral suggestions that are scattered throughout this scandalous performance.
For more from the archives see this week’s Tribunes here
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
SLIGO 0-9
GALWAY 1-4
FRANK FARRAGHER IN ENNISCRONE
GALWAY’S first serious examination of the 2013 season rather disturbingly ended with a rating well below the 40% pass mark at the idyllic, if rather Siberian, seaside setting of Enniscrone on Sunday last.
The defeat cost Galway a place in the FBD League Final against Leitrim and also put a fair dent on their confidence shield for the bigger tests that lie ahead in February.
There was no fluke element in this success by an understrength Sligo side and by the time Leitrim referee, Frank Flynn, sounded the final whistle, there wasn’t a perished soul in the crowd of about 500 who could question the justice of the outcome.
It is only pre-season and last Sunday’s blast of dry polar winds did remind everyone that this is far from summer football, but make no mistake about it, the match did lay down some very worrying markers for Galway following a couple of victories over below par third level college teams.
Galway did start the game quite positively, leading by four points at the end of a first quarter when they missed as much more, but when Sligo stepped up the tempo of the game in the 10 minutes before half-time, the maroon resistance crumbled with frightening rapidity.
Some of the statistics of the match make for grim perusal. Over the course of the hour, Galway only scored two points from play and they went through a 52 minute period of the match, without raising a white flag – admittedly a late rally did bring them close to a draw but that would have been very rough justice on Sligo.
Sligo were backable at 9/4 coming into this match, the odds being stretched with the ‘missing list’ on Kevin Walsh’s team sheet – Adrian Marren, Stephen Coen, Tony Taylor, Ross Donovan, David Kelly, David Maye, Johnny Davey and Eamon O’Hara, were all marked absent for a variety of reasons.
Walsh has his Sligo side well schooled in the high intensity, close quarters type of football, and the harder Galway tried to go through the short game channels, the more the home side bottled them up.
Galway badly needed to find some variety in their attacking strategy and maybe there is a lot to be said for the traditional Meath style of giving long, quick ball to a full forward line with a big target man on the edge of the square – given Paul Conroy’s prowess close to goal last season, maybe it is time to ‘settle’ on a few basics.
Defensively, Galway were reasonably solid with Gary Sice at centre back probably their best player – he was one of the few men in maroon to deliver decent long ball deep into the attacking zone – while Finian Hanley, Conor Costello and Gary O’Donnell also kept things tight.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
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