“The liminal space between disciplines is where THESE ROOMS sits”
Owen Boss – Feb 2016
David Bolger, Owen Boss and Louise Lowe came together almost two years prior to the world premiere of THESE ROOMS in 2016 to explore each others methodology and practices with the desire to co-create a truly interdisciplinary collaboration between their individual artforms.
Realised as a radical and important performance, THESE ROOMS cross pollinates immersive theatre, choreography, visual art, installation, movement, text and design to create a work that places audiences central to the performance experience in an immediate and authentic way.
These three artists have built highly successful careers in their chosen fields. In this project they challenge one another in order to provoke, caress and inspire responses to create a new hybrid of explosive art – an experience of total engagement. A testament to a time in Irish political history. A story never told before in a form that didn’t exist before.
David Bolger is the Artistic Director and co-founder of CoisCéim Dance Theatre. His work has been seen by millions of people worldwide and has received prestigious awards for its innovation, performance and choreography. Over the last two decades, David has directed and choreographed over 20 original productions for CoisCéim, including the acclaimed SWIMMING WITH MY MOTHER, MISSING, AGNES and most recently his first work for children and families, THE WOLF AND PETER.
His work for film includes the multi award-winning HIT AND RUN (CoisCéim/Saffron Pictures) and DEEP END DANCE (Wildfire Films). David has received numerous choreographic commissions for theatre and opera worldwide, recently co-directing MIDSUMMER with Joe Dowling for the Guthrie Theater (Minneapolis) and as Director (Movement) on the multi-award winning DRUIDSHAKESPEARE.
As Co-Artistic Director of ANU Owen’s work includes: On Corporation Street (HOME Commission, Manchester), Sunder (Dublin Theatre Festival), Pals, The Irish at Gallipoli (National Museum of Ireland), Beautiful Dreamers (Limerick City of Culture), Vardo (Dublin Theatre Festival), Angel Meadow (Home Commission, Manchester), Vardo Development (Dublin Theatre Festival), THIRTEEN (Dublin Fringe Festival), Living the Lockout, Boys of Foley Street (Dublin Theatre Festival), Laundry (Dublin Theatre Festival), World’s End Lane (Dublin Theatre Festival), Fingal Ronan (Watermill Center New York), Basin (Dublin Fringe Festival).
Owen holds a Masters of Fine Art at the National College of Art and Design, Ireland. Exhibitions include A Yellow Rose, (Free Mason’s Grand Lodge), Contemporary Art and the Moving Image, Life with Edits, (Joinery Dublin), Testimonial Live, (Project Art Centre), Testimonial, Potential of Vacancy, Projector, (Four Gallery), Camera Obscura, (Lighthouse Cinema), Punctum, (Project Art Centre), Tumbledowntown, (Hotel Ballymun).
Owen is the recipient of a number of awards from the Arts Council of Ireland.
As Artistic Director of ANU her work includes: Beautiful Dreamers (Limerick City of Culture), Vardo (DTF 2014), Angel Meadow (HOME Manchester), Thirteen (Fringe 2009), Dublin Tenement Experience; The Boys of Foley Street (DTF 2012); Laundry (DTF 2011), World’s End Lane (Dublin Theatre Festival 2011, Memory Deleted and Basin (Fringe 2009).
Other recent directing credits include work with the LIR Academy, Cork Midsummer Festival, The Performance Corporation, Fishamble, The New Play and Prime Cut Productions (where she is Associate Director). Louise is the recipient of the Captain Cathal Ryan Cultural Entrepreneurial Award and the prestigious International Artist Residency Award at the Robert Wilson Centre, New York.
Founded in 2009, we work in a studio-based context and our multi-award winning company stands at the forefront of Ireland’s daring new hybrid art. Our aesthetic represents the independent, the innovative, and the experimental and we have become successful at creating a new kind of multi-disciplinary model.
We produce work that is affordable, challenging and places the audience at the very centre of the experience—offering them the opportunity to feel that they are part of something vital and important. Over the past few years we have worked with some of the most talented artists in Ireland and created thirteen seminal productions, gallery installations and museum interpretations.
Cited in the Irish times as Ireland’s leading site-specific specialists, ANU has become renowned for exploring historical events. Placing the audience at the very centre of our practice, there has been international recognition of our thinking about performance, history and socially engaged practice. Our work delves into historical events, with both scalpel like precision and dreamlike intensity. Bringing the voices of the past to the fore, we aim to blur the lines between interactive, participative, site specific and installation art, challenging accepted conventions of theatre and visual art.
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CoisCéim Dance Theatre is one of Ireland’s leading dance companies. A client of the Arts Council of Ireland for over 20 years, the company has presented work to audiences large and small, on stage and on film throughout Ireland and overseas.
The style of performance is contemporary and vibrant, with a knowing regard for the everyday. Artistic Director, David Bolger embraces a selection of dance styles to articulate stories and emotions that are relevant to the landscapes in which we live. Lauded for his creativity and choreography on stage and on film, David is the recipient of numerous awards and is a member of Aosdana.
Credits include the highly lauded THE WOLF AND PETER, and the co-productions THESE ROOMS (Irish Times Theatre Award), INVITATION TO A JOURNEY and BODY LANGUAGE, a collaboration with RHA Gallery, Dublin. Internationally, its work has been included in many prestigious series and festivals including Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival and Peak Performances in USA, Spring Loaded (The Place) and the Brighton Festival in the UK, Ten Days on the Island, Tasmania, The Venice Biennale, and in 2017 became the first Irish contemporary dance company to perform at the iconic Sydney Opera House. CoisCéim has received many awards including two Edinburgh Fringe Firsts and an Argus Angel Award and is widely acclaimed for its “exhilarating…astounding performances” (The Guardian).
In parallel with the performance programme the company conducts an integrated, original and comprehensive artform awareness and participation initiative through CoisCéim BROADREACH. BROADREACH is founded on the principle that dance is a performing art and a participatory activity which is open to everyone. Its activities are pioneering, targeting all sections of the population in an exciting and innovative manner to create a genuine curiosity in dance. Every year, BROADREACH touches the lives of thousands of people, through classes, workshops, residencies and dance performance participation projects.
Find out more at www.coisceim.com.